Family life was wonderful. The streets were bleak. The playgrounds were bleak. But home was always warm. My mother and father had a great relationship. I always felt 'safe' there.

You seldom get a censorship attempt from a 14-year-old boy. It's the adults who get upset.

As much as there is joy in writing, there's always the little bit of terror to keep you on edge, on your toes. It is a strange way to occupy yourself - to enjoy your life on a daily basis. There is no guarantee that something great is going to come next.

I'm weary of the battle. But a tired fighter can still be a fighter.

That's what Archie did - built a house nobody could anticipate a need for, except himself, a house that was invisible to everyone else.

It came to me that hell would not be fire and smoke after all but arctic, everything white and frigid. Hell would be not anger but indifference.

When people say they write for themselves, that's probably what they do. I will admit that I don't write for myself; I write to be read. I've got the reader in my mind all the time.