I liked the waythat you used a novel to explore the work of a biography writer. What inspired you to do that?

Biographers have always been detectives who use their forensic skills to dissect and analyse the lives of their subjects. But these days, biographers have assumed formidable powers. The public expects revelations, a life between and under the covers, with no holds barred, and a subject with secrets is vulnerable as never before. I am interested in the potential power wielded by an unscrupulous biographer – and, in this book, in the character and motives of the biographer himself.

You seem to have been writing your whole life in many different mediums. What is your favorite type of writing?

Novels and film scripts, because you can explore character and plots in greater detail than anywhere else, and because your imagination is the only limiting factor. If I had to choose one it would be novels – a film script is a collaborative process, and I have come to love the solitary nature of novel-writing.

Misha is described with a great creative spirit. I do not want to ask about similarities in your life; however, I assumed that you must have contact with painters and hold a love of modern art to be able to describe Misha and his work. Is this so?

Since studying art history at school I have been interested in art and artists. My brother-in-law is an artist, and I have other artist friends. If I were not a writer I would love to have been a painter.

The setting of the novel is beautiful. I particularly loved the pool area and the kitchens. I think anyone who reads this book will want to go there. Have you been there?

Yes. The location is based closely on a hilltop hamlet in Italy near Montalcino. It is owned and was restored by an Anglo-Italian family, and is exceptionally special. But apart from the physical similarities, the use of the buildings and the book’s characters are imagined and reinvented.

I was intrigued with your main character Greer Gordon. At times she seemed so calculated, yet vulnerable. She gave up so much. Do you think women do make that kind of sacrifice for love?

Oh yes, and not only women. I am interested in the explosive nature of passion, how it can be almost terrifying in its elemental power to direct the course of a person’s life.

Do you know anyone like Greer?

I know many people who have some of Greer’s qualities.

Without giving the plot away, I pondered why Misha and Greer seemed so separate on their past choices that affected them both so much. Do you think that Misha used Tony, the young biography writer to confront Greer?

It’s hard to answer this without giving away a key element of the story, but confront is the wrong word.

I really enjoyed reading this novel. Did you enjoy writing it?

Writing a novel is a difficult, extraordinary, unpredictable and exhilarating activity. This one became absorbing and all-consuming, until for the last two years I wanted to do nothing else.