I am, incidentally, the only writer to have received the Somerset Maugham award twice - the first time for my first novel, the second time for my second first novel.

You never can tell, though, with suicide notes, can you? In the planetary aggregate of all life, there are many more suicide notes than there are suicides. They're like poems in that respect, suicide notes: nearly everyone tries their hand at them some time, with or without the talent. We all write them in our heads. Usually the note is the thing. You complete it, and then resume your time travel. It is the note and not the life that is cancelled out. Or the other way round. Or death. You never can tell, though, can you, with suicide notes.

You can't sort of write the novel as if you're taking dictation from heaven.

The universe is a million billion light-years wide, and every inch of it would kill you if you went there. This is the position of the universe with regards to human life.

My life looked good on paper - where, in fact, almost all of it was being lived.

Style isn't something added on; it's intrinsic to the perceptions and the way you see life.

Egotism exists everywhere, but it has a different flavor in England, where the tabloid culture goes much deeper. It's just the indulgence of vulgarity, the wallowing in vulgarity. As with everything English, there's a sort of irony to it. They write a great deal about these trivial people who have a certain eminence, always with a bit of, "Isn't it ridiculous that we are writing about this person?"