I think part of it is that both Boyfriend Material and Husband Material are told from Luc’s POV, so his friends are necessarily going to be more central. I do wish there’d been a bit more space for Oliver’s friends in this book (Jennifer and Peter both get a cameo, and I think Brian gets a mention) but given the focus of the book is on weddings and most of Oliver’s friends are quite pointedly already married there wasn’t a natural place for them.

Husband Material followed an interesting structure. Did you have that in mind before you began, or did that develop as the story progressed?

Nope. I decided going in I was going to blatantly and shamelessly rip off Four Weddings and a Funeral. Which is what I’m assuming ‘interesting structure’ is a polite euphemism for.

Your novels often veer from hilarity to pointed social commentary (a great example is Ana with one N). Do you have those issues in mind when you start writing, or do they just sort of pop up?

This makes it sound like I don’t know what I’m doing, but they do just sort of pop up. I mean, I think what Luc and Oliver have going on in terms of their various issues and their relationships to the intersecting branches of their identities is sort of baked into the characters and therefore baked into the premise. But a lot of the rest of the time it’s sort of almost circumstantial.

Ana With One N is a good example of this. Like, in a sense, she came about because part of Rhys’s deal is that he tends to serial date and so he always brings a different woman to every CRAPP-related event. And, obviously, I didn’t want these people to be faceless ciphers, so I needed to get Rhys’s date a fairly clear personality, backstory, and worldview.

That’s kind of what happened with Tyler as well: I wanted Luc to look at art during his own gender non-specific bird party and to have a healthy, flirty encounter with a guy (to offset all the unhealthy encounters he’s had previously). And that just took me down the “what kind of person would know Priya” rabbit hole, which would be someone cool, interesting, arty, and a bit angry. And from there you get Tyler.

What’s one thing that both Oliver and Luc might have in the refrigerator at their flats? (Does such an item even exist?)

Margarine. It’s a weird crossover point between “random crap that even people who never cook have to put on bread” and “stuff that’s actually quite useful and vegan.”

Do your fans create some of the best fan art in the world? The correct answer is YES. What are your thoughts on people creating art or stories from your own work?