My book has a very simple surface, but there are layers of irony and paradox all the way through it.

I better make the plot good. I wanted to make it grip people on the first page and have a big turning point in the middle, as there is, and construct the whole thing like a bit of a roller coaster ride...

Jane Austen was writing about boring people with desperately limited lives. We forget this because we've seen too many of her books on screen.

Fiction that responds to recent world events is a hostage to fortune because all momentous events look very different a year, two years, three years later.

I find people confusing.

Most murders are committed by someone who is known to the victim. In fact, you are most likely to be murdered by a member of your own family on Christmas day.

I like dogs. You always know what a dog is thinking. It has four moods. Happy, sad, cross and concentrating. Also, dogs are faithful and they do not tell lies because they cannot talk.