It's one thing to say, 'I don't like what you said to me and I find it rude and offensive,' but the moment you threaten violence in return, you've taken it to another level, where you lose whatever credibility you had.

What I've always tried to find in my books are points at which the private lives of the characters, and also my own, intersect with the public life of the culture.

Vertigo is the conflict between the fear of falling and the desire to fall.

Something was badly amiss with the spiritual life of the planet...Too many demons inside people claiming to believe in God.

We who have grown up on a diet of honour and shame can still grasp what must seem unthinkable to people living in the aftermath of the death of God and of tragedy: that men will sacrifice their dearest love on the implacable altars of their pride.

Sometimes writing a novel is not unlike having a baby. You'd have to ask a female novelist to compare the pain.

The way you write a screenplay is that you close your eyes and run the movie in your head and then you write it down.