At All Times, Think Like A Writer,

I've Always Written. At The Age Of Six Or Seven, I Would Get Sheets Of A4 Paper And Fold Them In Half, Cut The Edges To Make A Little Eight-page Booklet, Break It Up Into Squares And Put In Little Stick Men With Little Speech Bubbles, And I'd Have A Spy Story, A Space Story And A Football Story.

I'm Interested In Scotland Now And Then, How It's Changed. I Want To Get The Reader To Think About That By Thinking About Something From The Past. How Has Society Changed, How Has Policing Changed, Have We Changed Philosophically, Psychologically, Culturally, Spiritually?

You Wouldn't Think You Could Kill An Ocean, Would You? But We'll Do It One Day. That's How Negligent We Are.

No Matter How Many Awards You've Won Or How Many Sales You've Got, Come The Next Book It's Still A Blank Sheet Of Paper And You're Still Panicking Like Hell That You've Got Nothing New To Say.

From This Height The Sleeping City Seems Like A Child's Construction, A Model Which Has Refused To Be Constrained By Imagination. The Volcanic Plug Might Be Black Plasticine, The Castle Balanced Solidly Atop It A Skewed Rendition Of Crenellated Building Bricks. The Orange Street Lamps Are Crumpled Toffee-wrappers Glued To Lollipop Sticks.