Life has a funny way of becoming ordinary as soon as it can.

I was first in Sydney in 1993, and have been a few times since then. For someone who didn't know Australia, it came as a shock how intelligent, interesting and funny the people were. If I lived there I might see it differently, but as a visitor it was a lot of fun.

I never listen to music when I am writing. It would be impossible. I listen to Bach in the mornings, mostly choral music; also some Handel, mostly songs and arias; I like Schubert's and Beethoven's chamber music and Sibelius' symphonies; for opera, I listen to Mozart and in recent years Wagner.

I wrote every day between the ages of 12 and 20 when I stopped because I went to Barcelona, where life was too exciting to write.

If you have to read to cheer yourself up, read biographies of writers who went insane.

I have to write a first draft with a fountain pen before I type it up as a second.

Three of my novels and a good number of my short stories are told from the point of view of men. I was brought up in a house of women.