“It pretty much defeats the purpose of bedtime reading if you fall asle...” — Mal Peet Quote

“It pretty much defeats the purpose of bedtime reading if you fall asleep before the kids do. And you tend to wake up with a matchbox stuck on the end of your nose and/or a potty on your head.”

“A sentence that clots in your mouth is unlikely to flow in your mind.”

“It was weird - writing is a stupid thing to do. I come up here in the morning to a pleasant room in the roof of my house and imagine I'm a black South American football superstar; then I have to imagine I'm a female pop celebrity who's pregnant. It's a completely mad way to spend your time.”

“I was asleep at the wheel before cancer shook me awake.”

“Certainly, last year we did an episode about the census and sampling versus a direct statistic. You just said the word 'census,' and people fall asleep.”

“Everything you do in a patient's room, after he is 'put up' for the night, increases tenfold the risk of his having a bad night. But, if you rouse him up after he has fallen asleep, you do not risk - you secure him a bad night.”