Scotland consistently produces world-class writers.

It is through our extended family that we first learn to compromise and come to an understanding that even if we don't always agree about things we can still love and look out for each other.

I always thought that bagels and lox was my soul food, but it turns out it's sushi.

Something I notice speaking to writers from south of Hadrians Wall is that the culture is different. At base, I think Scotland values its creative industries differently from England.

I jealously guard my research time and I love fully immersing myself in those dusty old books and papers. It's one of the most enjoyable parts of my job.

The sky was a sparkling succession of black diamonds on black velvet made crystal clear by the blackout.

I believe the era of the militant lady is back.

Without archives many stories of real people would be lost, and along with those stories, vital clues that allow us to reflect and interpret our lives today.

Research material can turn up anywhere - in a dusty old letter in an archive, a journal or some old photographs you find in a charity shop.

Writers of novels live in a strange world where what's made up is as important as what's real.

Books have a vital place in our culture. They are the source of ideas, of stories that engage and stretch the imagination and most importantly, inspire.

Marry the person who makes you feel like you can face life together. Because that's what it's about. It's about facing life together.

The king was pregnant.

Our state of mind, our state of being, and our outlook on life is contagious.

Medicine is the study of disease and what causes man to die. Chiropractic is the study of health and what causes man to live.

We are so very rich if we know just a few people in a way in which we know no others.

In the Book of Poetry there are three hundred poems, but the meaning of all of them may be put in a single sentence: Have no debasing thoughts.

What you eat is everything. What you eat is what you are.

He can who thinks he can.

I have never done jewelry before so, of course, I had an idea in mind, but I needed it to be feasible and I don't really know about the materials, like what's possible, what's not possible.

The inclination to digress is human. But the dramatist must avoid it even more strenuously than the saint must avoid sin, for while sin may be venial, digression is mortal.