It's curious how easy it is to tell a piece of paper what you don't dare say to someone's face.

Normal people bring children into the world; we novelists bring books. We are condemned to put our whole lives into them, even though they hardly ever thank us for it. We are condemned to die in their pages and sometimes even to let our books be the ones who, in the end, will take our lives.

Time goes faster the more hollow it is. Lives with no meaning go straight past you, like trains that don’t stop at your station.

My childhood was surrounded by books and writing. From a very early age I was fascinated by storytelling, by the printed word, by language, by ideas. So I would seek them out.

Do you know the best thing about broken hearts? They can only really break once the rest is just scratches.

Who are the lunatics? The ones who see horror in the heart of their fellow humans and search for peace at any price? Or the ones who pretend they don't see what's going on around them? The world belongs either to lunatics or hypocrites. There are no other races on this earth. You must choose which one to belong to.

That's what happens when people reach old age; nobody remembers they've been bastards too.