Dr Johnson, it’s said, was once come upon unexpectedly by the mistress of the house while kissing the maidservant.


...I wrote about my next novel, The First of July, here and a little about a research trip to the Somme (where the book is set) here. ... Obviously I’ve been thinking, in that loose free-floating way you do at the beginning of a project, for much longer. ... astonished? . . . to find that the opening scene, with two brand-new (to me) characters, came almost fully-formed into my mind a couple of days ago.


...They came fully-formed onto the page: an odd experience but one which most writers are familiar, although it usually doesn’t happen until further into a story.


...So much so that I’ve not only put up a paragraph about the odd ways beginnings get begun here, but the whole sequence here.