If you have a craftsman's command of the language and basic writing techniques you'll be able to write - as long as you know what you want to say

You think publishing is tough but the music world is ten times tougher.

I spend eight months outlining and researching the novel before I begin to write a single word of the prose.

Generally my typical books have lots of twists and turns a big surprise ending and then usually another surprise at the end and ideally, as in Garden of Beasts, we get to the very end and we find at the last few pages that there's yet another surprise.

It's becoming apparent that I like bad boys. That's one of my problems. They've all been bad boys. You're one too. You're a bad boy. But, I think you're a good bad boy.

Robert Rotenberg does for Toronto what Ian Rankin does for Edinburgh.

I also try very hard to create characters - both heroes and villains - with psychological depth.