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I think that women definitely have a special bond as friends that is hard to describe to men, and we don't often see that portrayed narratively.

I do make some conscious efforts to write female friendships, intergenerational female friendships. I make a conscious effort to include things that I see as important real parts of my life that are not reflected as much as I think they should be in popular culture. We very seldom have the opportunity to see women compete and remain friends.

If one could be friendly with women, what a pleasure - the relationship so secret and private compared with relations with men. Why not write about it truthfully?

A lot of ink is given over to mythologizing female friendships as curious, fragile relationships that are always intensely fraught. Stop reading writing that encourages this mythology.

I like to write about women, not so much about the way they relate to men, but about the way they relate to each other. And I don't think anyone's really doing it.

As I grow older, I think friendship between women is a thing to cherish.

Believe it or not, friendships are difficult to write in fiction. They can easily come across as forced, particularly if they involve too much explication and too many overt gestures of affection.

Friendship can only exist between persons with similar interests and points of view. Man and woman by the conventions of society are born with different interests and different points of view.

Between men and women there is no friendship possible. There is passion, enmity, worship, love, but no friendship.

Common perceptions of female friendships are morning coffees discussing children, bags, periods and agreeing about the misdemeanours of men... mild, soft, nurturing relationships.