I don't separate my books into historical novels and the rest. To me, they're all made-up worlds, and both kinds are borne out of curiosity, some investigation into the past.

I have written a memoir here and there, and that takes its own form of selfishness and courage. However, generally speaking, I have no interest in writing about my own life or intruding in the privacy of those around me.

I have never begun a novel which wasn't going to stretch me further than I had ever stretched before.

I don't think you have the right to shout about other people's private life.

I never base characters on real people. There are people who do that but I really don't know how to do it.

My greatest pleasure is to invent. My continual mad ambition is to make something true and beautiful that never existed in the world before.

At the very end of a book I can manage to work for longer stretches, but mostly, making stuff up for three hours, that's enough. I can't do any more. At the end of the day I might tinker with my morning's work and maybe write some again. But I think three hours is fine.