It was like there was some parallel universe we all vanished off to where we had all this sex.

Don’t you wonder sometimes, what might have happened if you tried?

What interests me is the surprising enormous extent to which most people accept the fate that's been given to them, and find some dignity.

There's still a part of me that thinks I have to write a really good novel. I'm not trying to say I'm not happy with the novels I've written in the past. But it always feels to me like there's another one that I have to write that will really say what I want to say, and really paint this world that I can see hazily in my head.

It was like being given a maths problem when your brain's exhausted, and you know there's some far-off solution, but you can't work up the energy even to give it a go. Something in me just gave up.

As with a wound on one's own body, it is possible to develop an intimacy with the most disturbing of things

I've always had a great fondness for English detective fiction such as Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers.