I could have written a misery memoir and instead I tried to make it funny. I never complained.

A library in the middle of a community is a cross between an emergency exit, a life raft and a festival. They are cathedrals of the mind; hospitals of the soul; theme parks of the imagination. On a cold, rainy island, they are the only sheltered public spaces where you are not a consumer, but a citizen, instead.

I just want Tina Fey to be my best friend. And Lena Dunham. And Oprah, too.

All the things that are taboo are the things that are not normal, and all the things that are not normal are the things that are exclusively about physically being a woman.

I am in love, and he's the one. Obviously I thought the one before him was the one and the one before that was the one, too. Frankly, I'm so much into the idea of being in love that anyone out of about 3 million could be the one. But no, this one now is definitely the one, the very one.

In the end I want to spend my 60s writing bonkbusters like Jilly Cooper.

Benedict Cumberbatch is very beautiful.