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 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

Don't write about what you know - write about what you're interested in. Don't write about yourself - you aren't as interesting as you think.

You're so calm and quiet, you never say. But there are things inside you. I see them sometimes, hiding in your eyes.

It's a rare book that wins the battle against drooping eyelids.

The sign of a masterpiece: A painting when there's a lack of resolution.