I was born and bred in Birkenhead
Despite forever having my head buried in a novel, the dream of authorship never entered my mind growing up. And why would it have done? My favourite writers did not much resemble me: Jane Austen was not expected to work outside the home; Virginia Woolf's annual allowance funded her room of one's own. I have still to discover a fellow novelist born and bred in Birkenhead.
Emma Claire Sweeney by Rosalind Hobley
One of my sisters has disabilities
Lou's cerebral palsy was detected in 1983, and a name put to her autism far later. The doctor who diagnosed her told our parents to focus their love on their other two daughters, Sarah and me. He said to put Lou in an institution, forget there'd ever been three. Sarah and I are profoundly grateful that our parents ignored the doctor, daring instead to share their love and attention between all three of their girls.
My sisters are twins
Since Sarah is Lou's twin, people assume that I must be the third wheel. Because of Lou's disabilities, she and Sarah were never in the same class at school or part of the same clubs. Perhaps this is why we've always felt like a trio.
I tried to relocate my novel to Birkenhead, but my characters insisted on staying in Morecambe
The twin sisters in Owl Song at Dawn - one fêted as the cleverest girl in town; the other diagnosed as 'severely subnormal' - speak in Lancashire dialects that refused to morph into Scouse. My sister lived in Lancaster for a while, and her college took trips to the seaside. Subconsciously, I must associate Morecambe with my sister: a place that welcomed her.
My grandma, although she's been dead for years, still holds sway over my imagination.
She lived off the state pension but wore fur coats and paid weekly visits to the hairdresser; treated us to milk loaf and strawberry splits. But her life was irrevocably damaged by events in her past. And so in my novel I created an elderly woman, both proud and brave, and offered her one last chance.
I get ideas from trashy TV
The Strangest Hotel in Britain - a show about people with learning disabilities, who work at Foxes Hotel - gave me the idea for the guesthouse in my novel, Sea View Lodge.
I write best in bursts
Vast swathes of Owl Song at Dawn were written in Circle of Missé in the Loire Valley, an enchanting writing retreat where I hibernate from life's distractions and temptations.
If in doubt, run
When I hit a problem with my writing, I make myself take a run. By the time I return, sweaty and exhausted, I always have a solution. I just wish I enjoyed running!
The writers I return to time and again
Jane Austen, Jill Dawson, Edward Hogan, Kazuo Ishiguro, Maggie O'Farrell, Elizabeth Strout, Virginia Woolf.
When I met my co-writer, both of us were writing in secret
My next book is non-fiction about the friendships of Jane Austen, Charlotte Brontë, George Eliot and Virginia Woolf. I'm co-writing it with my own friend, Emily Midorikawa. We met fifteen years ago in rural Japan, working as English teachers by day and secretly scribbling stories by night.
