Our interview subject this week was Mel Menzies.  Here are some more wise words from her...

Do you have a favourite writing quote?

Two:  I write when I feel like it, and I make sure I feel like it at 9 o’clock every morning which I think was George Bernard Shaw.  And: Writing is 1% inspiration, and 99% perspiration which is a misquote of Thomas Edison’s, Genius is 1% . . .

What advice would you give to aspiring writers?

A parody of Churchill's words: We shall go on to the end, we shall fight discouragement, disillusion and dismay; we shall fight on the edits and revision, the keyboards and manuscripts; we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength; we shall defend our writing, whatever the cost may be; we shall fight on the publishers’ doorsteps; we shall fight on the agents’ landing grounds; we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender; we shall never, ever give in.

On taking on challenges...

I nearly turned down a commission from Hodder & Stoughton because I thought I would find it too painful.  It was the true story of a haemophiliac who, through contaminated Factor 8, contracted HIV then died of AIDS.  My publishers twisted my arm, sent me the diaries and a ticket to Geneva, and the book I wrote became a Sunday Times No. 4 Bestseller.  I wouldn’t like to claim that it was because of my writing skills; it simply hit the bookshops at the right time when the topic was a political maelstrom.