Adrian McKinty

I met my wife in Oxford, fell in love with her, and followed her to New York. I was an illegal there for the first few years, until we got married, so I ended up doing lots of interesting jobs, some for a few days, some for a few months. ”

In the crime fiction section, you may just find a novel that talks about the place where you're from and speaks to you about your life - or the life yours could have become if a little misfortune had come your way. ”

I had gone to New York with no plan at all. I did a lot of jobs - barman, teacher, security guard, postman and construction worker - and I was meeting many eccentric characters, and they were saying funny things, which I always wrote down. ”

I had a few stories and longer pieces published, but my first proper novel came in 2003, called 'Dead I Well May Be.' ”

I don't know if that's a year's bad luck, or if that's how it works. But stealing a Christmas tree - that can't be a good thing, karma-wise. ”

I speak with a Northern Irish accent with a tinge of New York. My wife has a bit of a Boston accent; my oldest daughter talks with a Denver accent, and my youngest has a true blue Aussie accent. It's complicated. ”

Because of England's lack of social mobility, unless they make truly heroic efforts, writers who are privately educated and then go on to Oxbridge or an institution like the BBC will generally embarrass themselves when they attempt to have a go at working- or lower middle-class characters. ”

We were living in Denver, Colorado, and I was teaching high school. I asked the kids to write a short story, so I thought I should write some myself. ”

I was born the year the Troubles began, in 1968. That world of violence was all I knew - people murdered, maimed, kneecapped, bombed. I don't remember a time without a major atrocity of some kind every week. ”

Irish fathers still have certain responsibilities, and by the time my two daughters turned seven, they could swim, ride a bike, sing at least one part of a Woody Guthrie song, and recite all of W. B. Yeats's 'The Song of Wandering Aengus.' ”