One of the great pluses of being an immigrant is you get to start again in terms of your identity. You get to shed the narratives which cling to you.

Novel-writing is a bit like deception. You lie as little as you possibly can. That's the way I do it, anyway.

It won't be long before we'll be deafened by the screeches of whistles being blown by whistle-blowers blowing the whistle on themselves.

If what you want to do is write, then it's madness not to do it.

I certainly want to continue to write in a way that's intimate. I love books where you feel you're having a romance with the writer.

I'm completely cricketed out. If I never have to write another word about cricket again, I'll be a happy man.

I have been to Turkey almost every summer holiday of my life and pretty much only on summer holidays, which makes me a very shallow Turk indeed.