I think there's a danger of becoming too familiar with things, isn't there? That you kind of, when you're used to seeing the same things every day, you see those things come what may, and you don't see maybe the interesting things just slightly out of view behind them.
— Steven Hall
I'm such a magpie. I'll get halfway through one thing and pick up something else. I always have 5 or 6 books open and spine-up by my bed: it's like a row of tents. I don't finish nearly as many books as I should.
I'm a bit suspicious of people who are narrow in their musical tastes.
Are Simon & Garfunkel cool, or are they just really uncool? I can't decide.
I'm excited about how books work in a digital age. When you read a book, unlike a film, you are decoding symbols in order to 'see' the story, so it is collaborative in a way that a film can never be.
Longhand isn't well suited to my way of writing. I tend to end up with dozens of pages of crossings-out and margin scribbles just to find one good paragraph, and it's easy to lose your train of thought, working like that.
He was a great man, my granddad, a very calm, logical and methodical guy. I suppose I'm trying to be more like him as I get older.
I love books that give you space to climb inside there. And you have to run to keep up in places, and you have to fill in a lot of blanks yourself. So it almost becomes your story.
I'd love a signed first edition of 'City of Glass' by Paul Auster. My favourite book of all time.
Sometimes, I seem to be only able to actually move and get going with things on the razor edge of possibly still managing whatever it is I'm supposed to do. I think, secretly, I might even get a buzz out of it. Maybe I crave the adrenalin like some sort of crazy gambler high on risking everything on the turn of a card.
One of the coolest things about touring around, actually, is getting to meet people, and getting to pick up on things that other people like. So many times, people come up to me after a reading and say, 'You must have read this,' or 'You must have seen this,' or 'Do you listen to this?' Usually I haven't.
There are a few 'Raw Shark Texts' tattoos floating around the Internet now, so I'm gathering them up to post on my forum. It's a strange thought, knowing that readers are tattooing themselves with something I've created, but it feels wonderful to have added something that people care about to the world.
The calmer and more well-ordered my desktop is, the more I can convince myself I'm on top of things.
When I'm out and about, I'll text or email myself from my phone. A smart phone is a great tool for a writer.
Beer. It always seems like such a good idea at the time, doesn't it? What's worse is beer seems like an even better idea after you've had some beer.
When I was a kid, I wanted to be a palaeontologist. I wanted to dig up dinosaurs.
'Homeward Bound.' I find myself listening to that tune a lot when I'm traveling. Sitting in a railway station, wanting to go home, carrying all your stuff with you.
I don't listen to Nirvana plugged anymore. I think there's a whole group of people who have semi-forgotten that Nirvana used electric guitars because of the 'Unplugged' album. It's so great.
I have notebooks and sketchbooks for ideas. I also have drawers full of envelopes covered in quick outlines, scenes or scraps of dialogue that I don't want to forget. I tend to grab whatever's to hand and just get the thing down before it's lost. It's not what you would call a streamlined system.
Twitter is incredibly useful. It's a great example of how the Internet is changing the way we engage with information and text. Above all else, this change in the nature of engagement is fascinating for me as a writer.
