Second, there are so many magical places in books that you can't go to, like Hogwarts and Middle Earth, so I wanted to set a story in a place where children can actually go.

I just did a picture book called The Wildest Brother on Earth, and you will find both of my children in there.

I don't like to eat the same dish every day, so I read very different things.

There are not so many mythical creatures from Inkheart.

If I was a book, I would like to be a library book, so I would be taken home by all different sorts of kids.

I always thought it hadn't influenced me very much, but I heard from many people from England that many motives from German fairytales are to be found in my books.

Every German child learns to speak English in school.

And I always read the English translation and always have conversations with my translator, for example about the names. I always have to approve it.

I love to read aloud.

Every reader knows about the feeling that characters in books seem more real than real people.

I like a composer called Henry Purcell, and I love to listen to Neil Young.

My daughter, Anna, is almost 15, and my son, Ben, is almost 10.

Oh, I think every author is inspired by all of the books that she reads.

And I plan to write a sequel to Dragon Rider.

I like to visit my horse, have a walk with my dog.

I always wanted to ride a dragon myself, so I decided to do this for a year in my imagination.

They are shooting The Thief Lord in Venice at the moment.

Everything gets to me. I'm very sentimental.

And my father always took me to the library. We were both book addicts.

I live in Hamburg; that's in the north. And I live on the outskirts of town. It looks like countryside.

My grandmother told stories; she was very good at that.

I love to read, I love to watch movies, and I love to be with my children.

My son always says I like very weird music.

I wish I had more time to visit schools.

I will try to write books until I drop dead.

Yes, I always imagined living in other places.

I have two Iceland horses, a very hairy dog called Looney, and a guinea pig.

Second, there are so many magical places in books that you can't go to, like Hogwarts and Middle Earth, so I wanted to set a story in a place where children can actually go.

A library book, I imagine, is a happy book.

Children theyre the same everywhere. Greedy little creatures but the best listeners in the world any world. The very best of all.

Nothing is more frightening than a fear you cannot name.

Reality is a fragile thing.

There were a lot of adventure books for boys, historical novels by Kenneth Roberts, and whatever mystery novels the alarmed librarian imagined might not corrupt an eager but innocent youth.

It is chiefly through books that we enjoy intercourse with superior minds. In the best books, great men talk to us, give us their most precious thoughts, and pour their souls into ours.

It is the interest one takes in books that makes a library. And if a library have interest it is; if not, it isn't.

I enjoy about 1 out of 100 movies, it's about the same proportion to books published that I care to read.

I was drawn to boxing because I got beat up as a kid. I was the kid with the piano books in a New York neighbourhood.

It's clear to me that there is no good reason for many philosophy books to sound as complicated as they do.

The proper study of mankind is books.

I have written about 10 books, all just practical encouragement for moms.

Whites were the winners, blacks were the losers, we wrote the history books, and they didn't feature.

Good books, like good friends, are few and chosen; the more select, the more enjoyable.

You could say, in a vulgar Freudian way, that I am the unhappy child who escapes into books. Even as a child, I was most happy being alone. This has not changed.

Jewish villages were built in the place of Arab villages. You do not even know the names of these Arab villages, and I do not blame you because geography books no longer exist.

As I have studied the Bible and the Book of Mormon, I have come to know through the power of the Spirit of God, that these books contain the fullness of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

There are some friends you don't meet for twenty years and when you meet them again it's as if no twenty years has happened - you're lucky when that happens. I feel the same about books.

Then I found books that were written much later, as late as 15 years ago. It was very superficial material, but enough to tell me that the genesis of this story was worth exploring.

To buy books would be a good thing if we also could buy the time to read them.

Well, it was actually - I brought the idea of doing a documentary to HBO back in 2000, when there were some press reports sort of were bandied about that there were going to TV movies based on some of the books that were out.