Music is essential to my writing process, sending me to another world, away from this one, and casting me into the moment with the characters. If I listen to, for example, ‘The Great White Open’ by Christian Löffler and Federico Albanese, or Dirty Three’s ‘Sue’s Last Ride’, I can start the process, like swimming towards the bottom of a pool and reaching a different place.

Writing a crime novel is always great fun but creating a funny crime novel is a real challenge. Killing is the easy part, making a reader laugh about it is much harder.

Hector Harrow is an almost-retired hotel concierge from Yorkshire who likes to drink tea and do newspaper puzzles in his cosy cottage. For me, he was the perfect protagonist for my murder mystery.

I never meant to be a teacher. I, in fact, categorically 100% in no absolute way wanted to teach. My complete prejudice was the result of an adult ...