Open your mind to new experiences, particularly to the study of other ­people. Nothing that happens to a writer – however happy, however tragic – is ever wasted.

It was one of those perfect English autumnal days which occur more frequently in memory than in life.

It shows considerable wisdom to know what you want in life and then to direct all your energies towards getting it.

Suicide is the most private and mysterious of acts, inexplicable because the chief actor is never there to explain it.

Publishers don't nurse you; they buy and sell you.

In 1930s mysteries, all sorts of motives were credible which aren't credible today, especially motives of preventing guilty sexual secrets from coming out. Nowadays, people sell their guilty sexual secrets.

A regime which combines perpetual surveillance with total indulgence is hardly conducive to healthy development.