My memories of them had rubbed thin with overuse, worn to frail color transparencies flickering on the walls of my mind...

Ireland is such a young society. The British were the ruling class up until they left about a hundred years ago, and we've been trying to work out what our class hierarchy is ever since.

I had always felt that I was an observer, never a participant; that I was watching from behind a thick glass wall as people went about the business of living--and did it with such ease, with a skill that they took for granted and that I had never known.

I don't do that kind of negativity. If you put your energy into thinking about how much the fall would hurt, you're already halfway down.

The thing about being a mystery writer, what marks a mystery writer out from a chick lit author or historical fiction writer, is that you always find a mystery in every situation.

One of my da's tragedies was always the fact that he was bright enough to understand just how comprehensively he had shat all over his life.

Sarte was right, Hell is other people