Morning all! Today I have the pleasure of welcoming Rosie Millard 🙂 You may remember I featured Rosie’s most recent book, The Brazilian, a little while back (The Brazilian by Rosie Millard @Rosiemillard @Legend_Press #Extract & #Giveaway).

Rosie has very kindly agreed to answer my questions…..

For those who don’t know already, could you tell us about yourself and your book(s) please?

I am a journalist and writer and The Brazilian is my second novel and sequel to The Square, a comic romp set in North London. The Brazilian is another comic romp but set in Ibiza largely amid the terrain of a crazy TV reality show.

Where did/do you get your ideas from?

I get an overall idea of what I want to discuss – here, the craziness of celebrity, the way the British middle classes take holidays and the nature of parenting. The plot came from several of my own experiences woven together, especially being on a Channel 5 daytime reality show which was very fertile ground!

Are any of your characters based (however loosely) on anyone you know?

No they are all invented.

How do you pick your characters names?

I pick them with relation to the age of the character, hence my lead female character is called Jane which is never given to a young girl these days but which was very popular when I was growing up. Other than that I look for comic effect. One of my favourite characters is called Gilda, another Jasper. They reveal a bit of a theatrical nature in these people.

Can you share your writing process with us, in a nutshell?

I start early in the morning, edit what I wrote yesterday and stay at my computer until I have written 1000 fresh words. I do this every day until I reach about 80,000 words. Then I write The End.

Who are your top 5 favourite authors?

George Eliot, Tolstoy, George Saunders, Hanya Yanaghihara, Laura Ingalls Wilder

If you could meet any author, who would it be and what would you ask them?

I would ask Martin Amis if he was satisfied.

Were you a big reader as a child?

Yes. Four books from the library every week for years.

When did you start to write?

I started writing features for newspapers when I was about 23.

If you could re-write the ending to any book what would it be and what would you change?

I would get Sydney Carton off the scaffold in Paris in the last page of Tale of Two Cities and I would marry him off to Lucy.

Is there a book you wish you had written?

The Diary of Bridget Jones

If you wrote an autobiography, what would your title be?

Get Out of Your Comfort Zone

If you could invite any fictional character for coffee who would it be and where would you take them?

I would invite David Copperfield to my children’s secondary school so he could see that education had improved since he was under Mr Creakle’s cruel management of children.

What are you working on right now?

I am writing a 3000 word piece on the Royal Navy for the Sunday Times Magazine

Do you have a new release due?

Mercifully, no! Writing fiction is very very hard – in my experience!

What do you generally do to celebrate on publication day?

I drink champagne and laugh a lot.

How can readers keep in touch with you?

Twitter @rosiemillard

Is there anything else you would like us to know?

I love to make people laugh and think that life generally turns out OK. That’s the message of my books, if there is one.

Thank you for taking the time to answer my questions, Rosie 🙂 

My pleasure. Thanks for such interesting questions.

Rosie Millard’s Amazon Author Page

Enjoy!