Children simply don't make the distinction; a book is either good or bad. And some of the books they think are good are very, very bad indeed.

You could ask for hugs if you were feeling sad or you'd hurt yourself, but when it happened spontaneously it made you feel warm inside.

A lot of roles for people with disabilities are quite patronising. It's a real pity when they are just used to give dull PC kudos to a drama, or when they're wheeled on in a tokenistic way without any real involvement in the plot.

Find the extraordinary inside the ordinary.

I think most writers feel like they're on the outside looking in much of the time... All of us feel, to a certain extent, alienated from the stuff going on around us.

Well, we're meant to be writing stories today.

The secret of contentment lay in ignoring many things completely.