The great liberty of the fictional writer is to let the imagination out of the traces and see it gallop off over the horizon.

Without a shadow of doubt, Trafalgar Square has to be one of the most crap urban public spaces in the world.

I'm English enough to feel something of a gut-reaction to modernism, to continental philosophising and anything that smacks of a refusal to pay attention to the forensics: the empirical facts on the ground.

You know that sickening feeling of inadequacy and over-exposure you feel when you look upon your own empurpled prose? Relax into the awareness that this ghastly sensation will never, ever leave you, no matter how successful and publicly lauded you become. It is intrinsic to the real business of writing and should be cherished.

Vaughn's vision is older, wiser and harder than Ritchie's.

Live life and write about life. Of the making of many books there is indeed no end, but there are more than enough books about books.

What more chilling indictment of the modern world is there than this: that the condition of the smartphone user is that of a dumb animal. Moooo!