When I first decided I was going to have a go at writing a book - and really, it was a mid-life crisis - I was 39. I was in business with my husband; we had a very busy lifestyle and quite a hectic schedule running this flourishing business in travel, and I found myself waking up and realising that I didn't want to do this anymore.

What I find is that it's the middle-aged authors who have lived a life who have the most important, interesting voices. They just need someone to give them the key to unlock the door.

Fantasy was something I'd read as a child. And, in fact, my teachers despaired a little bit because I refused to give up Enid Blyton. Then I walked through the wardrobe with C. S. Lewis, and I don't think I actually have returned fully from the wardrobe. So, fantasy was something that was in my life from quite young.

Readers want to have the confidence that you understand the era in which the book is set, so for 'The Perfumer's Secret,' I needed to know everything about the First World War from a French perspective. I had to understand those people and that town in 1914.

A girl child who is even a little bit educated is more conscious of family planning, health care and, in turn, her children's own education.

I think that for me, it's God, family and Yahoo - in that order.

I was going to make movies. I was the one in the family who was always rolling the video camera, making movies of my brothers around town, and then screening them for my parents. I still would love to make movies someday... that's something that really means a lot to me, and I know I'll have the chance to do it one day.

If you have a smothering parent, the effect it can apparently have on a child is to give them, in equal doses, a sense of too much self-esteem, because they are mummy's little princess or prince, and low self-esteem. It affects future relationships.