But you can try to read books at the wrong time or for the wrong reasons.

But we are entitled to look for continuity in politics.

But at the same time, I have trouble keeping things out of books, which is why I don't write short stories because they turn into novels.

As the books grew bigger and more ambitious, the situations in question sometimes became political ones, and so it became necessary to start painting in the social background on a scale which eventually became panoramic.

As soon as you start writing about how human beings interact with each other socially, you're into politics, aren't you?

As I said, I had no publisher for What a Carve Up! while I was writing it, so all we had to live off was my wife's money and little bits I was picking up for journalism.

Also I had financial worries because it took four years to write and we were living off my wife's income all that time, which wasn't very great.

Ah, well, I have no talent for nonfiction, that's my problem.

But I have always - ever since The Accidental Woman - written novels about individuals attempting to make choices in the context of situations over which they have no control.