I've got a strangely retentive memory
My memory insists on retaining facts and dates, even unnecessary dates like an acquaintance's birthday or a colleague's wedding anniversay. Maybe that's why history has always seemed accessible to me. A good memory comes in handy when there's a lot of plot to keep track of and you need to remind yourself of a perfect little detail that you wrote in a notebook months earlier - which is now urgently needed to put some zing into the end of a chapter.
Debra Daley
I have a weakness for clothes. And perfume.
If I could, I would write at my desk in a gorgeous robe à la Polonaise and a feathered hat. Instead I gave a love of fashion to my latest heroine, Carey Ravine, and her flash husband. Dressing 18th century characters is always a lot of fun. My favourite perfume is Portrait of a Lady by Frederic Malle. It's all spice notes and roses and costs a bomb. I treated myself to a bottle when I got my publishing deal and have eked it out over two books.
Good evening. How goes it, sirrah?
I once worked as a conversation hostess in Japan. It was all very proper, nothing sexual, but mad all the same. It was mostly businessmen out to impress their clients. My specialty was literature. I had to casually strike up a little light conversation about Shakespeare or Dickens. As in so many other situations in life, I found that the easiest way to carry this off was to be sincere.
Hot stuff coming through!
I am a City & Guilds qualified chef. I still have good knife skills. If you ever need a novelist to fix breakfast for fifty in a hurry, I'm your woman.
May everybody be happy. May everything move in the right direction
I have practised Zen meditation for almost twenty years. All you have to do is sit and look at a blank wall while observing the rise and fall of your breath. So simple to say; so hard to do. Thoughts always want to run away with you. But this practice of focusing on the here and now has helped me to calm down.
I couldn't live without …
Music. I started out writing pop music reviews for Melody Maker back in the day. I often play music to evoke a certain mood when I write. In my new novel there is a vein of menace that runs beneath the surface glamour of the high life in Georgian London. I played a lot of American avant-garde composer Harold Budd while I was writing this book. I was especially drawn to the chilly beauty of his album, The White Arcades.
The wilderness instinct
For the first time I have the space - a third of an acre - to create a big garden. I am planting a food forest so that my partner and I (who is also a novelist) can be as self-sufficient as possible. We have dug in about 50 trees so far and already harvest a huge variety of fruit and vegetables. The creation of a novel and a garden are both rich, mutable, abundant enterprises that are deeply fulfilling.
I'm always thinking about you
In my mind I've got a contract with readers that says I'm not allowed to shortchange them. If I set up something in the narrative, I have to pay it off. If I write a scene that wasn't my best, I have to bin it and write a better one. I always feel conscious that someone reading a book I have written is expending time that belongs to them. It's my job to make it worth their while.
Clap along if you feel like happiness is the truth
My goal in life is to do my best to be optimistic. Like most people, I've had soul-crushing rejections and days of total overwhelm, but in my life, as well as in my writing, I am always trying to turn dark feelings towards the light.
Most accurate description of my personality
A friend once told me I was "shy but steely'. It's pretty true.
