Ian Watson

My wife will automatically quote and compare the price of diesel at every petrol station we drive by, like she's got oil-based Tourette's.

I'm working class. Not because my family have always been skint or because I'm from the grim north, but because I am from a class of people who believe in work. In paying their way.

I think we are living in paradise with regards to the ways we can amuse ourselves, communicate. We have such a richness of possibilities.

People say, 'Where do you live?' and I say that theoretically, I live in London, but basically that's just where I go to change my suitcase. Otherwise, I'm always flying somewhere.

I don't really have any interest in doing Donald Blake stories. Maybe it's just I don't know what to do with that sort of alter ego.

Another thing that freaks me out is time. Time is like a book. You have a beginning, a middle and an end. It's just a cycle.