"Death's a capricious thing, innit?" "Yes. Yes, she is."

As we age, we become our parents; live long enough and we see faces repeat in time.

I'm not blessed, or merciful. I'm just me. I've got a job to do, and I do it. Listen: even as we're talking, I'm there for old and young, innocent and guilty, those who die together and those who die alone. I'm in cars and boats and planes; in hospitals and forests and abbatoirs. For some folks death is a release, and for others death is an abomination, a terrible thing. But in the end, I'm there for all of them.

In many ways, it was much, much harder to get the first book contract. The hardest thing probably overall has been learning not to trust people, publicists and so forth, implicitly.

London grew into something huge and contradictory. It was a good place, and a fine city, but there is a price to be paid for all good places, and a price that all good places have to pay.

I guess it's just another one of life's little mysteries." "I'm tired of mysteries." "Yeah? I think they add a kind of zest to the world. Like salt in a stew.

Words can wound, and wounds can heal.