I don t over-write. I remembering reading Thomas De Quincey s Confessions of an English Opium Eater aloud to a girlfriend. That was when I realised that good English was clear. That s my style and always has been. Clear story-telling with substance and body is about as much as you can aspire to.
Some authors say that writing is a job.
I have said that right from the first novel. But writing is my reason for being alive. There s nothing else to do. Arthur Seaton as a pensioner is a disillusioned Labour voter with nothing good to say about Tony Blair s Government. I don t know.