When I write, I do not begin with sentences. I begin with the person. I see them before they speak. The way they hold their shoulders. The tilt of a chin when they are weighing a decision. A smirk that almost appears. Eyes that laugh, or do not. I imagine the clothes on them, the looseness of an open collar, the confidence of a leather jacket, the way their hair falls or refuses to, and perhaps the perfume that wafts through the night air, or the napkin that dances from the table into the night.

I place them in the room before I write a single line. I picture the air, the light, the temperature of the moment. I let them move, react and breathe until the scene reveals itself. That is where the behaviour, the small sensory cues, and the emotional beats come from. I simply watch in my mind, then write at fever pitch until the chapter unfolds.

In case you're wondering, my novel took me eighteen months to write, including a four-month pause after my mum passed on New Year's Day 2025. Finishing it before her first anniversary became a promise I held close. The editing that followed took fourteen intense weeks and five full sweeps, covering grammar, consistency, structure and character continuity. Every part of the story came from me.