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I have been fiercely private, in part because I could never understand how a journalist could be otherwise. I was also the mother of small children, and security concerns were paramount.

I have no business being a journalist. I'm the least, I'm the least - I'm the most trusting, I absolutely make a habit of believing anything that anybody tells me about themselves. I've never had any reason in the world to think that anyone has wanted to harm me, or lie to me. I believe whatever is being sold, most of the time.

I think the key to being a journalist is getting your subject to feel comfortable enough to talk about stuff they want to talk about and the stuff they like and don't like, and still feel comfortable about it.

Journalists write because they have nothing to say, and have something to say because they write.

It's an odd experience reading interviews with yourself. Interesting, though. Of course, you know that the journalist will have edited, rephrased or even rewritten what you actually said, but you can't help feeling that there's a special kind of truth in the way someone else paints you, however subjective they might be.

I was never a good journalist, because I would make things up. A lot of people frowned on that, which is why I ended up in fiction.

I think it's like everything else; one shouldn't dig too deeply. It's silly to say that with a journalist, but sometimes there is not a truth to be found.

I always felt journalists had a very clear idea of what they wanted to write about me before the interview began.

I became a journalist partly so that I wouldn't ever have to rely on the press for my information.