If you go into a bar or restaurant with a cop, the first thing he does is he'll stand in the entrance, and he'll look at every single face in that room because he doesn't want to spend an hour having a drink or lunch and didn't spot some villain they've been looking for, for two years.

Peter James

Categorized in : Years Two Lunch

...I don't have concrete plans for the future. I just think of success and keep a successful attitude. Success is 99 percent preparation. If you set yourself up for winning, rarely will you fail.

Peter James

success attitude thinking

There are people who can achieve huge success in life, while adding a bit of fun and a splash of colour to this increasingly grey world.

Peter James

fun people world

I think the police are a major part of the glue that holds civilised life together. They're not highly paid.

Peter James

police together thinking

If you talk to any cop, however hardened, and say, "Has anything that's ever bothered you", they'll tell you about the death of a child that they had to deal with.

Peter James

cop deals children

Death is just nature's way of making room for the less experienced.

Peter James

way rooms

I travel abroad constantly on book promotion and research, and the Internet is invaluable to me for accessing U.K. news in places such as America, which most of the time hasn't heard of England.

Peter James

news book america

Life's not some slot machine in an arcade with a sign that flashes up saying 'I'm sorry, you have been killed. Would you like another go?' But we might get put through the same test each time, get faced with the same situations until we've learned how to cope.

Peter James

machines sorry might

A news junkie, I read, daily, the 'Times/Sunday Times,' the 'Guardian/Observer,' 'Mail,' and the 'Argus' - both to keep up with crime in Brighton, where I set my novels, and because I think it is vital to support local papers - they provide a unique accountability for councils, emergency services and so much else, and are dangerously undervalued.

Peter James

sunday unique thinking

I like dogs. Dogs don't judge people.

Peter James

judging dog people

Music is an important part of my writing process.

Peter James

important process writing

The crime genre's always been regarded very well by the literary end of the book world, whereas horror, although it had that spell in the late eighties, by and large, it's sort of ghetto-ized, and considered to be exploited literature.

Peter James

ghetto literature book

The world is changing and people don't like change.

Peter James

people world

Most of us have one big idea at some point in our lives. That Eureka! moment. It comes to us all in different ways, often by chance of serendipity.

Peter James

serendipity different ideas

Drafting is like painting the Golden Gate Bridge.The closer you get to the end, the more you start to worry about the beginning.

Peter James

golden bridges worry

What Brighton's got is a major sea port on either side, good for importing drugs, great for exporting cash, stolen cars, stolen antiques. It's got the largest number of antique shops in the UK, so it's a great place to fence stolen goods. It's got tremendous communication: you've got the sea ports, you've got the channel tunnel, you've got Gatwick Airport 25 minutes away, and London's 50 minutes away by train. So all these escape routes... Which is what villains like.

Peter James

airports communication sea

Sometimes the body gets out of bed an hour before the brain.

Peter James

bed body brain

Almost every officer is going to put their life on the line at some point in their career.

Peter James

officers lines careers

To read is human, to review is divine.

Peter James

reviews humans divine

There's a difference between what I call a dumb ghost and a smart ghost. The smart ghost is Hamlet's father - you know, he says, "Get revenge, my son!" That's incredibly rare. It's much more the grey lady in the same place everyday, moving across the floor.

Peter James

smart revenge father

There's a really classic cliche every time you switch the TV on - you see cops arguing. I have spent a day a week for many years in the presence of police and I have never seen them argue. It's a military hierarchy. They do what they're told. There's no bickering.

Peter James

police military years