Most every book I bring into the world is like birthing a baby; it's a lot of effort!

The first sentence of a book is a promise.

You always need that spark of imagination. Sometimes I'm midway through a book before it happens. However, I don't wait for the muse to descend, I sit down every day and I work when I'm not delivering lambs on the farm.

We're animals. We're born like every other mammal and we live our whole lives around disguised animal thoughts.

I don't bring expectations to any of my books. I don't tell people what to do. I want to invite them in.

Every time I write a new novel about something sombre and sobering and terrible I think, 'oh Lord, they're not going to want to go here'. But they do. Readers of fiction read, I think, for a deeper embrace of the world, of reality. And that's brave.