But heroes, at times, had to be fools.

When I wrote 'The Alexandria Link,' I discovered that we are only aware of about 10 percent of the knowledge of the ancient world. In the ancient world, most of the knowledge was destroyed. Every emperor of China who came in wiped out everything that came before them, to the point that the country completely forgot its past.

A concerted effort to preserve our heritage is a vital link to our cultural, educational, aesthetic, inspirational and economic legacies - all of the things that quite literally make us who we are.

But heroes, at times, had to be fools.

Ninety-five percent of all writers who write do not get published, but 100 percent of all writers write because they have a voice in their head. The vast majority of writers simply write because they have to.

I don't think my mum ever understood my love of Doctor Who. Surely her strongest memory would have been me, standing at the top of the stairs, crying about how the "jelly men" were going to get me? Sorry, Mum, for those sleepless nights, but it was with good reason they called it Terror of the Zygons.

Follow your heart. It rarely leads you astray. It's thinking that gets us into trouble.