Usually when I'm trying to establish character, I try and find out where they live.

I always wanted to work at Take A Break magazine, you know, just to inject a little bit of politics into their stories. I applied for a job there after I'd done my law degree and didn't even get an interview. I only wrote Garnethill because I didn't get that job!

I think graphic novels are closer to prose than film, which is a really different form.

In the 'Garnethill' trilogy, people always forget that Maureen O'Donnell's dad was a journalist and she did art history at uni and her brother did law, but no-one ever thinks they're middle-class - they're just working class because they speak with accents.

People are interested in crime fiction when they're quite distanced from crime. People in Darfur are not reading murder mysteries.

My upbringing was middle-class but my parents' families were both working-class so I had this odd combination of working-class background but in a privileged position.

There's a real emphasis on being witty in Scotland, even in crime novels.