I have danced with the spider. I have cut a caper with the dancing mad god.

Fantastic fiction covers fantasy, horror and science fiction - and it doesn't get the attention it deserves from the literati.

I think the role of science fiction is not at all to prophesy. I think it is to tell interesting, vivid, strange stories that at their best are dreamlike intense versions and visions of today.

Socialism and SF are the two most fundamental influences in my life.

I remember vividly what it's like to read as a 10-year-old - that passionate inhabiting of a book.

I love it when people want to interpret my books.

When I'm writing a book, generally I start with the mood and setting, along with a couple of specific images—things that have come into my head, totally abstracted from any narrative, that I've fixated on. After that, I construct a world, or an area, into which that general setting, that atmosphere, and the specific images I've focused on can fit.