What is your idea of perfect happiness?
Fly fishing.
What is your greatest fear?
Boredom.
Which living person do you most admire?
Francis Crick.
What objects do you always carry with you?
A compass for use on emerging from a tube station.
What single thing would improve the quality of your life?
A private IT department.
What is the most important lesson life has taught you?
That time is limited, so one must do the things that matter and not the things that don’t.
Which writer has had the greatest influence on your work?
Richard Dawkins.
Do you have a favourite book?
No. My answer to ‘what is my favourite book’ would be different every few years and each time I would have to think about it.
Where do you go for inspiration?
The internet, these days.
Which book do you wish you had written?
Arcadia by Tom Stoppard.
What do you think of literary prizes?
That they go to other people!