I need time to develop the idea into a plot before I talk about it.

When I was hired by the University of Washington extension school to teach the one-year fiction writing course - 96 classroom hours - I quickly determined that I knew only about an hour's worth off the top of my head.

I researched fiction writing for months before I taught my first class, much of it looking for strong techniques from bestselling authors.

On opening sentences: "If in the first chapter a hurricane is going to blow down an oak tree which falls through the kitchen roof, there's no need to first describe the kitchen."

I've never discovered the idea for my next novel while I was still working on the current novel. Other writers don't suffer this.

I need time to develop the idea into a plot before I talk about it.

My experience is that an original and compelling idea for a novel is a rare thing.