As you grow older, life seems funnier.

Occasionally, I have written about stories related to crime, but I have never attempted a traditional detective story. So I want to write a true detective story.

When I ventured into writing at the age of 17, I wanted to be a good and successful writer. I just wanted to write good stuff - poems, prose, stories, essays, everything.

I like talking to visitors, especially children.

I write mostly for pleasure, and the reading should ideally be for pleasure, too.

I think every writer wants future generations to read what he has written.

I wouldn't want a film to be made on my life, because I suppose I would only want them to show all the good things about me and hide the awful things, and that wouldn't be a very honest biopic, no?

When I was younger, I took life much more seriously.

I find it very lucky to be an Indian and living in India.

I wanted to be a tap dancer when I was very young.

I did all kind of jobs to sustain myself. I worked at a grocery store, in the public health department, and what was then Thomas Cook and Sons. The last job was particularly interesting, but I got fired from it.

I am hopeless with machinery. I could never learn to drive a car except into a wall.

Writing for children may have kept me young at heart.

A lot of school-going children are familiar with my writing. I am basically very much a children books author.

I'm not very good at writing fantasy or even reading it.

From the age of 17 through my 20s, I was living on my own, so sometimes I wouldn't even tell anybody it was my birthday. It was not a big thing for me.

My desk is right next to my bed. So I sit on my bed. I write in a big notebook which is on the desk. And if I feel drowsy, I just have to slide into bed.

I don't overwork - a couple of hours a day is fine for me.

I fortunately have a good memor, and that helps a lot in the way I write.

Books of exploration have always fascinated me, like somebody going up the Amazon for the first time.

All my works over the years have been autobiographical in the sense they reflect some part of my life, although I have fictionalised them to an extent.

I have always discouraged young writers from self-publishing, by which I mean going to a vanity publisher and spending your hard earned savings - say, some two-three lakhs - and getting your book printed. It's not published; it's printed!

One has to be ambitious to start writing.

Small places intrigue me. Whenever I tried moving to a larger city, I ran back to the hills.