I'm not trying to uncover the facts of my life but to discover the dramatic truth of the situations I was in.

Surely: the adverb of a man without an argument.

The thing about the 'Melrose' novels is that I have to feel they're impossible when I set out.

I think that some laughter comes from escaped horror, doesn't it?

Detachment is what interests me, seeing how people couldn't have been any other way, how they were the product of forces that they had no control over.

Well, the attractive thing about the subject of happiness is that it is notoriously difficult to write.

The Booker 2011 is of no more interest to me than the world heavyweight championship, which I'm not going to win either. It's irrelevant.