A tattoo doesn't make you look like an individual.

I don't think much of anything I wrote before the age of 30.

And so we stayed out in the garden of the old house until we couldn't kick a ball, laughing in the gathering twilight, making the most of the good weather and all the days that were left, our little game watched only by next door's cat, and every star in the heavens.

The thing I care about is my weight - I'm as fanatical about it as a member of Girls Aloud. I weigh myself every morning. I know exactly what I want to be - 82kg - and I try to stick to it.

Largely this is a class thing - writers tend to be cosseted little middle-class kiddies who think that the world owes them a royalty cheque. But just doing it - being in your room for years on end, locked in your head, alone with invented ghosts - it weakens and softens the body. And I know I can't just live in my head.

The thing to remember about Phuket is it's very beach-oriented and relaxed. The trendiest beach is Koh Sirey, which is full of groovy places to have a cocktail and watch the sun go down.

My parents gave up a lot to bring me up in the little house on the prairie, and I wasn't prepared to make those sacrifices, nor was the generation before me and the generation after.