It's basically a home-rule issue. I think the governing authority that appoints people as assessors certainly has reasons for doing it. ... And it certainly ought to be the board of assessors' right to say who is best qualified to serve as an appraiser.

People of this teenager's age are on the brink of adulthood and have to be allowed a greater degree of responsibility. A consequence of this is a decrease in parental responsibility. Therefore to have criminal responsibility for what you don't know about seems rather extreme.

I have a backlog of novels which I would love to be working on and would be working on if I were not obliged to hold down a full time job.

You look out on the driving range and it looks like snow, but it isn't, it's covered in golf balls.

I got to see first hand what he has done to make this a reality. That has been real rewarding to watch him achieve his dream.

It seems we are capable of immense love and loyalty, and as capable of deceit and atrocity. It's probably this shocking ambivalence that makes us unique.

If I had the luxury of working as a full time writer, I think you would see novels appearing on a much more regular, and frequent, basis.

Until you see the cross as that which is done _by_ you, you will never appreciate that it is done _for_ you.

These days - with the decline of the traditional churches - I'm concerned about where we obtain some form of moral direction.

I don't see myself as experimenting in any conscious way, it's perhaps that certain books require different densities of language.

My work is known by too few people for me to be remembered as a writer - that is, beyond those dedicated souls (bless them) who have followed the oeuvre through its various stages. To be realistic, when they and the last of my friends have died, I doubt I shall be remembered at all.

The Architect is just one of a series of works which examine the confrontation of innocence and experience, illustrating the complex ethics of power that exist between reader and writer, critic and artist, the human and the divine.

When you commit a serious doping offence you are not eligible for lottery funding.