Thank you to all those of you who have supported my fundraising for Greenhouse. I've just been able to send them £349. I shall keep wearing the T-shirt to continue raising awareness of their excellent work.

If people say they’re not sure about reading my new table-tennis themed novel doubles because they don’t like sport, I insist it’s actually about people, relationships and family secrets. Lots of unsporty people have enjoyed it, honest! Which is true, but the table-tennis is important too, because it’s a metaphor for the spins and deceptions going on beneath the surface. And also, I’d love to introduce more people to the game. I mean, what’s not to love about a sport which is simple to...

Traffic Tom Vanderbilt Allen Lane 2008

We all know that statistically speaking we’re far more likely to be killed driving to the airport than going down with the plane, but many of us still feel far more nervous as the aircraft takes off than we ever do on the road. The difference is that the driver feels in control, and since most drivers believe they’re above average, they don’t need to worry. (Their passengers may feel differently, but that would have to be their nerves, how could...

Traffic Tom Vanderbilt Allen Lane 2008

[i]‘The road, more than simply a system of regulations and designs, is a place where many millions of us, with only loose parameters for how to behave, are thrown together daily in a kind of massive petri dish in which all kinds of uncharted, little-understood dynamics are at work. There is no other place where so many people from different walks of life – different ages, races, classes, religions, genders, political preferences, lifestyle...