Lisa Jewell

“I must always, always have a box of Extra chewing gum in my bag because I have developed a terrible cheek-chewing compulsion. It's not only uncomfortable, but I look really weird when I'm doing it, and chewing gum is the only way I can stop myself.”

“I don't really get into a writing routine until March or April, when I'll write a few hundred words a day, often in a cafe in the morning after the school run.”

“People say 'chick lit,' and what they mean is 'crap.' And so even though you might sell 100,000 copies of a book, you're never going to win a prize. These are books that people don't just read, they devour them - they stay up into the early hours because they want to devour them.”

“Getting married young was the worst experience of my life. It was horrible - really horrible.”

“My publishers find me really challenging, as a lot of the time, I don't even know what I'm going to be writing about until I sit down to do it.”

“Don't do a hard sell or try to tell the agent that you're going to be a bestseller or the next John Grisham. This goes down very badly. If your work is good, then they are skilled enough to know this within a few pages.”

“Every time I've written a book, I'm like, 'Oh, it's so different from the last one. Are they going to like it?'”

“My father was a self-employed textile agent, and the shop below his office was an art gallery.”

“She remembered the intensity of her desire to undress him, to be naked with him, the way she felt like she could say whatever she wanted and be fully understood and do whatever she wanted and be totally accepted. She remembered how easy it had all been, how open and bright, like being in a whitewashed room with all the windows wide open.”

“For a very long time, I thought everyone I met through the process of getting an agent and a publishing deal had made a mistake. When they agreed to pay me for the book, I thought they would ask me for the money back.”

“'Ralph's Party' was supposed to be a psychological thriller, but I fell in love with all my characters and wanted only the best for them.”

“Whenever I watch any kind of competition, my immediate reaction when they call out the name of the winner is to look at the loser.”