We shouldn't be saying 'Save the planet'; we should be saying: 'Save viable conditions in which people can live.' That's what we're dealing with here.

The threat to the planet is us. It's actually not a threat to the planet - it's a threat to us.

Should is a futile word. It's about what didn't happen. It belongs in a parallel universe. It belongs in another dimension of space.

All fiction is about people, unless it's about rabbits pretending to be people. It's all essentially characters in action, which means characters moving through time and changes taking place, and that's what we call 'the plot'.

I got into trouble a while ago for saying that I thought the internet led to increased literacy - people scolded me about the shocking grammar to be found online - but I was talking about fundamentals: quite simply, you can't use the net unless you can read.

Speculative fiction encompasses that which we could actually do. Sci-fi is that which we're probably not going to see.