Scotland is a picturesque country where the people are friendly yet completely incomprehensible. Also, the national delicacy is a sheep's stomach filled with its liver, lungs, and heart.
I come more to Scotland than I ever used to, so I feel more connected to it, more part of the zeitgeist. You know when you realize you have a choice and I'm choosing my homeland. It's funny: when you get older these things creep up to you.
My mother's background was Scottish. She came from an old family, some of whom lived in upper New York State and some of whom had come over from Scotland.
I hate it when people romanticize Scotland.
My father is from Newark in Nottinghamshire and my mother is from the very north of Ireland. They've ended up in Scotland, where my father - well, both of them - will always be seen as having come from somewhere else.
I try not to think about writers who came before me when I'm writing myself. If I did, given the abundance of literary talent Scotland - and Edinburgh in particular - has bestowed upon the world, I wouldn't be able to get as much as a sentence written.
If I'm out shopping, in Topshop or wherever, I'm never spotted. In fact, I'm usually asked if I have a student card. No-one seems to notice me, they're oblivious to who I am even in Scotland, and I'm very happy to be able to blend in with the crowd.
Hearing the statistic that one in four children in Scotland suffer from poverty just made me think that if there is even a tiny thing I could do that would help then it was totally worthwhile.
Northern Ireland, England, Scotland - when we play each other, you don't want to lose to a neighbouring country.
Scotland is a great country. It's integral to the U.K.
