Right From The Very Beginning,

My First Novel Was Turned Down By Half A Dozen Publishers. And Even After Having Published Five Or Six Books, I Wasn't Making Enough Money To Live On, And Was Beginning To Think I'd Have To Give Up The Dream Of Being A Full-time Writer.

A Lot Of Writers, Especially Crime Writers, Have An Image That We Think We're Trying To Keep Up With. You've Got To Be Seen As Dark And Slightly Dangerous. But I'm Not Like That And I've Realised That I Don't Need To Put That On. People Will Buy The Books Whether They See A Photo Of You Dressed In Black Or Not.

I Don't Have Many Friends. It's Not Because I'm A Misanthrope. It's Because I'm Reserved. I'm Self-contained. I Get All My Adventures In My Head When I'm Writing My Books.

I've Always Written. At The Age Of Six Or Seven, I Would Get Sheets Of A4 Paper And Fold Them In Half, Cut The Edges To Make A Little Eight-page Booklet, Break It Up Into Squares And Put In Little Stick Men With Little Speech Bubbles, And I'd Have A Spy Story, A Space Story And A Football Story.

Was It All Inevitable, John?" Reeve Was Pushing His Fingers Across The Floor Of The Cell, Seated On His Haunches. I Was Lying On The Mattress. Yes," I Said. "i Think It Was. Certainly, It's Written That Way. The End Of The Book Is There Before The Beginning's Hardly Started.