A Sense Of Wrongness, Of

My Parents Were Hippies, And The Story Is That They Went Through A Dictionary Looking For A Beautiful Word To Name Me. They Nearly Called Me Banyan, But Flipped A Few Pages On And Reached "china," Thankfully. The Other Reason They Liked It Is That "china" Is Cockney Rhyming Slang For "mate." People Say "my Old China," Meaning "my Old Mate," Because "china Plate" Rhymes With "mate.

There Are Only So Many Ways To Experience Pain. There Are An Almost Limitless Number Of Ways To Inflict It, But The Pain Itself, Initially Vividly Distinct In All Its Specifications, Becomes, Inevitably, Just Pain.

There's Plenty Of Stuff That I Don't Feel Dissident About: I Really Like Tea, I Don't Have Any Problem With That. I Like Lots Of Paintings.

Ever Since I Was Two, I've Loved Octopuses, Monsters, Abandoned Buildings.

In The Field Of Fantastic Fiction, The Question Of World-building Is Not Uncontroversial. But I Grew Up With 'dungeons And Dragons,' So That Whole World-building Thing Is Very Close To My Heart.