The CIA's research program is described in a book called "The Search for the Manchurian Candidate."

I use a professional researcher in New York who does all the legwork, all that stuff which would take me days and weeks of calling, waiting for people to call back.

I don't think there's any great mystery to writing female characters, so long as you talk to them. If you lived in a monastery and never met any women, maybe it would be difficult.

We’re all good when it suits us, he used to say: that doesn’t count. It’s when you want so badly to do something wrong—when you’re about to make a fortune from a dishonest deal, or kiss the lovely lips of your neighbor’s wife, or tell a lie to get yourself out of terrible trouble—that’s when you need the rules. Your integrity is like a sword, he would say: you shouldn’t wave it until you’re about to put it to the test.

Thrillers have been traditionally very masculine books; the women characters often rather decorative.

World War II is the greatest drama in human history, the biggest war ever and a true battle of good and evil. I imagine writers will continue to get stories from it, and readers will continue to love them, for many more years.

The CIA's research program is described in a book called "The Search for the Manchurian Candidate."