I might be able to find out what happened 6,000 years ago but I will never know what happens 6,000 years in the future! And that is not fair, blast it.

I'm very close to my parents. I admire them and respect them enormously. But my childhood unfortunately coincided with the end of their marriage. They are two people who should never, ever have got married.

I think I have probably adjusted the way I see the world, I interpret the world and I communicate the world into book format simply because of this familiarity. Possibly in another society and another context I might have been a storyteller or who knows what.

For me books have always been an incredibly solid part of my life, both as escapism and simply as resource.

I've always found the world is the most extraordinarily fascinating place and the more data you get, the more you can actually put pieces into this jigsaw.

I do read very, very quickly. I do process data very quickly. And so I write very quickly. And it is embarrassing because there is a conception that the things that you do quickly are not done well. I think that's probably one of the reasons I don't like the idea of prolific.

I don't finish a lot of the books I read. I get enormous pleasure from reading half f them, two-thirds of them, even incredibly good books. But I don't feel it's my duty to finish them. I read the last few pages and find out what happens at the end.