If you write satire, the guilty pleasure these days is that there's just so much material about. On the other hand, if you have a family it can be depressing.

My escape is to just get in a boat and disappear on the water.

I got overwhelmed by the magnitude of the celebrity culture in America. My background is as a news journalist, and newsrooms in the US are shrinking - investigation teams are being terminated or shrunk on newspapers all around the country. The one aspect that's expanded is coverage of celebrity culture.

Obviously you have to make a profit to put out a newspaper. I'm not an idiot. But when the margins are in excess of 25 per cent you're talking about greed.

Bangkok 8 is one of the most startling and provocative mysteries that I've read in years. The characters are marvelously unique, the setting is intoxicating and the plot unwinds in dark illusory strands, reminiscent of Gorky Park. Once I started, I didn't want to put it down.

Humor can be an incredible, lacerating and effective weapon.

I've never before had the same main character appear in consecutive novels, but I liked Yancy and his attitude, and I was curious to see what would happen to him after Bad Monkey. And I liked the idea of him still trying to get his detective job back while he's stuck on roach patrol.