Quote

I think the best fiction is a form of psychological suspense, even though I don't really write in that idiom.

There's always a bit of fiction in everything that I write.

I think fiction lends itself to messiness rather than the ideal, and plays well with the ironies surrounding what happens versus what should happen.

I like to play unpredictable characters, and I like to be unpredictable in what movie I'll do.

All my fiction starts from a feeling of unique perception, the pressure of a secret, a story that needs to be told.

I love the secrecy of writing fiction. When I write a novel, I don't tell anybody what I'm doing. I'm living in my private world. And it's a great sensation.

I think part of what I like about being a fiction writer is that I can inhabit something that's beyond the limits of my own personality.

I generally find fiction without some move to the weird, less imaginative, dull, prosaic. Not all of it, of course, but a lot of it. I suppose it's just a question of taste.

Fiction is about telling a good story, first and foremost. But of course, everything I'm interested in or angry about leaks into my writing, from art to violence against women.

Also, most people read fiction as an escape - and I wonder whether my books aren't a bit too grounded in reality to reach the widest possible audience.