I wasn't that into crime novels at all, but a friend introduced me to the work of Jim Thompson - I loved all his books.

Just imagine walking away from something you've started. Something you really believed would be good. I don't think I could ever do that.

I have problems with a religion which says that faith in itself is enough for a ticket to heaven. In other words, that the ideal is your ability to manipulate your own common sense to accept something your intellect rejects. It's the same model of intellectual submission that dictatorships have used throughout time, the concept of a higher reasoning without any obligation to discharge the burden of proof.

The nature of Scandinavians is that they don't talk so much, there will be these dark secrets, and most things are under-communicated.

For many years, it seemed as if nothing changed in Norway. You could leave the country for three months, travel the world, through coups d'etat, assassinations, famines, massacres and tsunamis, and come home to find that the only new thing in the newspapers was the crossword puzzle.

I have questioned myself about the brutality in the last few novels. Actually in The Leopard, in hindsight, I feel I went a little bit too far with screaming blood. There are a couple of scenes that I regret and wish I had the chance to rewrite. Phantom has less blood.

...he went into the sitting room, put on a Duke Ellington record he had bought after seeing Gene Hackman sitting on the overnight bus in The Conversation to the sound of some fragile piano notes that were the loneliest Harry had ever heard.