“I don't know if that's a year's bad luck, or if that's how it works. But stealing a Christmas tree - that can't be a good thing, karma-wise.”

“A locked-room problem lies at the heart of my new novel, 'In The Morning I'll Be Gone,' in which an RUC detective has to find out whether a publican's daughter who fell off a table in a bar that wa...”

“I think the poetry that came out of Belfast, and especially the Queen's University set, in the 1970s and '80s - you know, Paul Muldoon and Seamus Heaney, Derek Mahon and Ciaran Carson - that was pr...”

“Failed relationships can be described as so much wasted make-up.”

“Sex without love is a meaningless experience, but as far as meaningless experiences go its pretty damn good.”

“Aside from the obvious, Francesca, what do you want in return for supplying information? Bones asked, getting back to the subject. You to take me, she replied at once. Not gonna happen! I spat, squ...”

“Oh, she said. Yes. She was warm with the wine, with the shape of the plan shed begun to form, and could not keep the merriment from her voice, the joy of reaching out into the world and altering it...”

“For every purpose there is a plan”

“Success is when everything that goes wrong, fits in your plan.”

“The thin line between life and death is still under construction.”

“Any fool can write a book and most of them are doing it but it takes brains to build a house. ”

“The palace started as a single vaulted room and grew in proportion to my despair. It began as an exercise to keep my mind from its melancholy, then it became a dream and a necessity. . . . I built ...”