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'What I'm after is a gripping read, with stuff going on behind it.'

16 December 2013

'I treat it like a job. I like a nice long day. I can't work in bits and pieces, and I prefer not to work at evenings and weekends... The thing about writing a novel that's so funny is that there are perhaps just two or three moments of three minutes - those moments when you have the key ideas - and that's the whole book. Everything else is just filling the gaps. Of course there are moments of fun, but there's a lot that's just work, sometimes hard, sometimes dull...

I have a quite clear sense of what I want from a book. I have a vision of the impact I want to make, and I suppose the writing process is about trying to achieve that. What I'm after is a gripping read, with stuff going on behind it. That's about as articulate as I get about my method.'

Sarah Waters, author of The Little Stranger in the Observer