You're writing a book. Tell us about it — is it fiction/non-fiction? How do you find the writing process? Do you need to be in ‘the mood’ to write?

"It's fiction in theory, if such a thing exists. Although I have a tendency to feel that talking about things is a sufficient replacement for doing them, so I don't want to go into it too much. Starting to write is agony, because in any situation it will bring things up for you, and especially if you're dealing with subjects relating to your own past; but once you've passed the pain barrier it's the most wonderful relief I can imagine. I would say that I do need to be in the mood, although really that's laziness and abdication of responsibility. Because if you're not in the mood, you should force yourself to get there, or you can find that the highly ambitious date you set yourself to have written and published your first great Proustian narrative passed three years ago and you're still on the first chapter of a mediocre novella about an ex-boyfriend (for example!). I found it easiest to write the first time I spent a few months in Paris, because it was time out of life. But I'm trying at home now, and I'm better at all things late at night."