We're full of electricity, and the walls and floor of a building contain carbon - the same makeup as a video tape - and I think we give off a huge amount of energy. Some people are able to see that and pick that up. I think almost every person I've met in my life has had some sort of experience that they can't explain, and those fascinate me.

I guess a lot of police keep their sanity by developing black humour.

...I don't have concrete plans for the future. I just think of success and keep a successful attitude. Success is 99 percent preparation. If you set yourself up for winning, rarely will you fail.

I never actually wanted to write horror, oddly enough. It was a kind of misnomer, because I didn't ever actually write horror in the sense of the genre known for it. It was more a type of pigeon-holing in bookshops.

A news junkie, I read, daily, the 'Times/Sunday Times,' the 'Guardian/Observer,' 'Mail,' and the 'Argus' - both to keep up with crime in Brighton, where I set my novels, and because I think it is vital to support local papers - they provide a unique accountability for councils, emergency services and so much else, and are dangerously undervalued.

I think the police are a major part of the glue that holds civilised life together. They're not highly paid.

Most good police officers are very open-minded. The bad ones are the ones who are close-minded.