I like the rain before it falls. of course there is no such thing, she said. That's why it's my favorite. Something can still make you happy, can't it, even if it isn't real.

It seems to me that you would have to write a novel on a very small, intimate scale for it not to become political.

We say, 'Shall we meet for a drink?', as though drinking were the main end of the appointment, and the matter of company only incidental, we are so shy about admitting our need for one another.[...]We say, 'Would you like to come for some coffee?', as though it were less frightening to acknowledge that we are heavily dependent on mildly stimulating drinks, than to acknowledge that we are at all dependent on the companionship of other people.

As soon as you start writing about how human beings interact with each other socially, you're into politics, aren't you?

I had no sense of any reputation that What a Carve Up! might acquire - at the time I didnt even have a publisher, so my main worry was whether it was even going to see the light of day or not.

But at the same time, I have trouble keeping things out of books, which is why I don't write short stories because they turn into novels.

But I have always - ever since The Accidental Woman - written novels about individuals attempting to make choices in the context of situations over which they have no control.