The kind of response I hope for when I write my novels for children: to give them a chance to recognize something of their own feelings -- about themselves, their parents, their friends -- and their own situation as a kind of subject race, always at the mercy of the adults who mostly run their lives for them.

Adults get more confused by social worker jargon. Unlike children, they are also less likely to see two sides of an argument, and they no longer think they can make the world a better place. That can make them rather boring, I suppose.

All writers are liars. They twist events to suit themselves. They make use of their own tragedies to make a better story... They are terrible people.

If you are going to make companies, corporations, actually responsible for the safety of other people's lives, then if they fail in their duty, the only thing to prevent them failing in their duty is the fear that they would be put behind bars.

Margaret Thatcher was in my year, and our first-year college photograph shows us standing side by side in the back row. We were both grammar school girls on state scholarships.

I've never found it made the slightest difference being a woman - though there is a sort of feeling that as you get older you're not so interesting.

I grew up on a suburban street with lace curtains and dull neighbours, so I made up stories to tell my friend, in which they became serial killers and burglars. She told her mother, who then told mine.