"The new industries are brainy industries and so-called knowledge workers tend to like to be near other people who are the same. Think of the City of Hollywood. People cluster. This means you have winning regions, such as London and Cambridge, and losing regions. The people who want to be top lawyers in Sunderland are hoovered up by London."

"Men don't know much about women. We do know when they're happy. We know when they're crying, and we know when they're pissed off. We just don't know in what order these are gonna come at us."

"In principle, there are only three main components of spending that much matter to monetary policy: consumer spending, business investment and exports and trade."

"We Brits print banknotes out in Debden in Essex, and have contracted it out to the private sector. Here in the U.S. it is a government operation right in the heart of Washington next door to the Holocaust Museum."

"A bad book is the worse that it cannot repent. It has not been the devil's policy to keep the masses of mankind in ignorance; but finding that they will read, he is doing all in his power to poison their books."

"It's a luxury to be able to tell a long form story. I love novels, and I love to have a long relationship with characters."

"As a writer, my main objective is to tell the story urgently - as if whispering it into one ear - and to know the characters intimately."

"After I read all the medical journals and watched all the documentaries, I still didn't understand the physical sensation of ticking and where it comes from and what it feels like."