That's how fossil hunting is: It takes over, like a hunger, and nothing else matters but what you find. And even when you find it, you still start looking again the next minute, because there might be something even better waiting.

I find that when I come out of the library I'm in what I call the library bliss of being totally taken away from the distractions of life.

Over his shoulder I saw a star fall. It was me.

I read a lot of fantasy. I adored 'Anne of Green Gables'. But my favourite books as a child were probably Laura Ingalls Wilder's 'Little House' series, about a pioneer family in the mid-19th-century American west. I often thought of them as I was writing 'The Last Runaway'.

I had walked along that street all my life, but had never been so aware that my back was to my home

I try to write 1,000 words a day - about three pages. When I reach 1,000 words I feel good. Less than that: a failure. More than that: tired.

I didn't move. I've learned from years of experience that dogs and falcons and ladies come back to you if you stay where you are.