Novelists may be able to seek advice from readers and editors, but in the end, it is up to them to get the book right.

I have prided myself with striving for objectivity, something many literary-minded critics dismiss as impossible. But in Washington, reporters are practically the only people who actually spend time talking to Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals, and I find the longer I report in Washington, the mushier and less conclusive my own views are. I like it that way.

I hope I will get to novelize my present circumstances at some point. I have some great stories to tell.

It is simply much easier to infuse life, feeling, and higher truth into a novel than a non-fiction work, to find the license to write truth without being wedded to fact.

For all the worship that Ronald Reagan elicits in conservative circles in the United States, I would venture that Thatcher did far more to reshape British society than Reagan did here.

Liberals in the US don't have great passions about Margaret Thatcher. Conservatives do. For all the worship that Ronald Reagan elicits in conservative circles in the US, I would venture that Thatcher did far more to reshape British society than Reagan did here. When I moved to Britain, the utilities were state-run. By the time I left, most of that was privatized. Thatcher had broken the miners' union, all but crushed the Labour Party, cut back the welfare state, even flirted with a poll tax. In the circles I ran in, Reagan was mocked as a childish dolt. Thatcher was despised.

Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction, but usually fiction is just better.