I am not a fan of the cupcake image. This idea that you can distract a girl with something frivolous like a cake or shoes or handbags, and she won't be a threat to men.

I've experienced huge kindness here, a great welcome and some very generous reviews without the snide social edge I often suffer from at home. I'm not patronized here either, which I much appreciate!

You can change yourself and you can change the situation but you absolutely cannot change other people. Only they can do that.

I am often criticised for being rather accessible.

Oddly my name has been no professional help at all! It seems to have made no difference. I admire him hugely, both for his benevolence and his enormous psychological perception.

My view of an excellent novel was probably set in the golden age of fiction in the 19th century: narrative, character and voice are of equal importance.

I'm no lyrical stylist, you wouldn't pick me for a perfect sentence, and I certainly wouldn't describe my novels as intellectual.