I invented the historical spy novel.

I invented the historical spy novel.

Wherever God has planted you, you must know how to flower - translated from a French saying

And, with much of Europe occupied by Nazi Germany, and Mussolini's armies in Albania, on the Greek frontier, one wasn't sure what came next. So, don't trust the telephone. Or the newspapers. Or the radio. Or tomorrow.

One is what one has the nerve to pretend to be.

Whether you like it or not, Paris is the beating heart of Western civilisation. It's where it all began and ended.

It takes me three months of research and nine months of work to produce a book. When I start writing, I do two pages a day; if I'm gonna do 320, that's 160 days.