I always take an Alastair Sawday guide. I stayed in three or four places in India that they had recommended, and every one of them was wonderful.

As a young actor, I played a lot of 'exotic' parts and was stuck with the tag 'sultry.' I had to refuse such parts if I were ever to play anything else. It did the trick, but my agent feared it made me harder to cast.

I'm an actress, not a celebrity.

I have a cottage near Aldeburgh, and from there it's a sturdy two-mile walk across farmland to an empty beach, where I collect hag stones and run around with the dog. I'm a keen walker, and I love Suffolk's big skies.

A novel should be an experience and convey an emotional truth rather than arguments.

There is no royal road to a successful life, as there is no royal road to learning. It has got to be hard knocks, morning, noon, and night, and fixity of purpose.

Often what happens with the writing is that you know where you want to start and you know where you want to end, but the journey is never quite what you predict because the characters take on a life on their own.

I ran into Neal Patrick Harris recently. We were in something called The Purple People Eater. He was maybe 10, but he still remembered it as the worst experience of his life!