5. How do you manage to get inside the heads of your characters in order to portray them truthfully?

Once I have the plot and the title, then I must have the actors playing their parts. I wait for them to come to me, to show themselves and tell me about their lives. It might sound weird, but that’s how I work. It’s like meeting new friends. You don’t know everything about them immediately, but as they talk, you can discover who they are, where they come from, their social background, their aspirations, their failures, etc. As an author I become this person, with their viewpoint, their likes and dislikes and the reactions they will have to any given situation. An author must evolve into these characters to make them fully rounded, and it doesn’t matter what gender they are – people are very similar underneath the skin.

6. Do you base your characters on real people? And if not, where does the inspiration come from?

I don’t actually base my characters on anyone, but there are certainly shades of people I’ve known and loved or disliked intensely. People like to think I’ve based a character on them, but that isn’t so – and yet I might have picked up a habit of theirs, or the way they say things, which leads them to think that it is them.

7. What’s the most extreme thing you’ve ever done to research your book?

I flew a Spitfire. It was a simulator, unfortunately, but it certainly gave me the feeling of flying – and I got a certificate to prove it!

8. What aspect of writing do you enjoy most?

I love doing most of it. Working out a story, plotting it, finding my characters and taking them through the trials and tribulations of the book to a satisfying end. I enjoy the research too, for I’ve learned a huge amount about World War II, and I’m constantly surprised by what I uncover. The writing is harder and it seems to get harder the more I do it. Probably because I’m aware of the pitfalls, and because, at times, it feels as if I’m trying to knit fog – but once I have written THE END, the joy is in the editing. With the story complete, it’s great to go through it again and turf out all the things that shouldn’t be there, and to make it as good and as polished as possible.

9. What’s the best thing about being an author?

Not having to get dressed in the morning to go to work or to go outside when the weather is foul or to battle with commuter traffic.

10. What advice would you give aspiring writers?