Sophie Hannah

“I never write about CIA conspiracies or the FBI or mafia or anything like that because I just don't understand that world. But I think I do understand individual human harmfulness.”

“If you only have one world, one life, then however brilliant it is most of the time, you have nowhere to run when you need to escape from it for a while.”

“Just because someone has stylistic limitations doesn't necessarily make them a worse writer.”

“Cambridge is heaven, I am convinced it is the nicest place in the world to live. As you walk round, most people look incredibly bright, as if they are probably off to win a Nobel prize.”

“I always notice the dysfunctional dynamic of human relationships because most places where you encounter it, people are trying to pretend it isn't happening.”

“Crime fiction is a way of satisfying that nosy need to know.”

“A lot of women feel like they should be enjoying motherhood, they should be fulfilled and shouldn't be thinking, 'I wish I didn't have to do this.'”

“For me, a big part of writing psychological thrillers is choosing crimes committed for motives which would only apply to a particular person in a particular situation; a unique, one-off motive that is born out of someone's particular range of psychological afflictions.”

“Poirot is a classic character from fiction, not a MacBook Air; he would not benefit from updates.”

“What surprised me most while writing 'The Monogram Murders' was that everything I needed seemed to arrive in my head exactly when I needed it.”

“I was working as a secretary in Manchester and thought I would always do that. Then I got this letter offering me a two-year fellowship where I could write; they would pay me a salary and give me a flat to live in. It was heaven.”

“Everything is personal - the poems and the crime novels. I have never been involved in any murders, but there are strong autobiographical elements in each.”

“I thought to myself, 'No matter what happens from now on, even if my heart ends up in pieces, this makes it all worth it, this moment.”

“The brilliant thing about swimming is that, while you're doing it, there's nothing else you could be getting on with, like the ironing or sorting out the children. My mind goes into free-float mode; some of the best ideas for plots come into my head while I'm ploughing up and down the pool.”

“I am a fellow commoner at Lucy Cavendish College. My husband used to be a lecturer at Leeds University, and we lived in Yorkshire for 11 years. When he gave up his job, we realised we could live wherever we liked.”

“No one has been buried at Mill Road Cemetery in Cambridge, England, for many years, and so the place has a shady, overgrown magic about it.”

“Are men like babies? Is trying to distract them a better tactic than asking them to behave reasonably?”

“Reading is the only area of my life in which I prefer to be non-autonomous.”

“I know a lot of crime writers feel very underrated, like they're not taken seriously, and they want to be just thought of as writers rather than ghettoised as crime writers, but I love being thought of firmly as a crime writer.”

“Agatha Christie never wrote books that just started with a dead body, and a 'Let's find out who the murderer is', which is kind of mysterious but not that mysterious. She always started with, 'How can this thing be happening; isn't it strange?'”