Let us begin this letter, this prelude to an encounter, formally, as a declaration, in the old-fashioned way: I love you. You do not know me (although you have seen me, smiled at me). I know you (although not so well as I would like. I want to be there when your eyes flutter open in the morning, and you see me, and you smile. Surely this would be paradise enough?). So I do declare myself to you now, with pen set to paper. I declare it again: I love you.

He left the drapes open, watched the lights of the cars and of the fast food joints through the window glass, comforted to know there was another world out there, one he could walk to anytime he wanted.

People can get involved in wonderfully creative ways that have nothing to do with you, but spark off things you begin with.

When I was a kid and a young man I read everything. When I was about 23, I was incredibly lucky in that I wound up with several book review columns, which meant that I had to read huge amounts of stuff that was outside my experience and outside my comfort zone. I think every young writer should be forced to read the kind of stuff they would not normally read for pleasure.

I had to persuade a dog to swallow a pill. I twittered for advice and I got suggestion after suggestion. Most of them didn't work. 'Put the pill in the sausage.' No - that doesn't work. 'Cheese.' No. Then someone said: 'You wrap it in butter and it will slide down.' I tried it and it worked! And I'd learnt how to give a pill to a dog through the magic of Twitter.

He told me not to seek revenge, but to seek the Buddha,' said the fox spirit, sadly. 'Wise counsel,' said the fox of dreams. 'Vegeance can be a road that has no ending. You would be wise to avoid it. And...?' 'I shall seek the Buddha,' said the fox, with a toss of her head. 'But first I shall seek revenge.

I went away in my head, into a book. That was where I went whenever real life was too hard or too inflexible.