“In the end, I think that I will like that we were sitting on the bed, talking & wondering where the time had gone.”

“I was at a party in 1989 and Ian McEwan, Martin Amis and Salman Rushdie were sitting on a sofa wondering where the next generation of great British writers would come from. As we talked, it became clear they had never read a word by me.”

“I don’t know if it was just me making things up in my head but after the fear in their eyes had gone what replaced it was like a sad kind of wondering. A wondering of where the old me was hiding. A wondering about where the old me had gone to. It was like I had suddenly been taken over by someone else and they could see the old me had fallen away for good.”

“I couldn't trust you with it. To do something with it. I don't want anybody talking about me. To say where I was or what I said when I was there. I mean, you could talk about me maybe. But nobody could say that it was me. I could be anybody. I think in times like these the less said the better. If something had happened and we were survivors and we met on the road then we'd have something to talk about. But we're not. So we don't.”

“No. You’ve talked about it. I just had to sit and listen. The only person I can talk to is Ilven. We grew up together, shared the same flight space. And now, if my brother is to be believed, she’s gone.”

“I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.”