believably on the page. That’s what a novelist is: I’m not a creating god, I’m reality’s jailor. Your descriptions of London during the blitz are incredibly vivid. What kind of research did you conduct to get those scenes right? I did something louche and unfashionable: I talked with older people. I belong to the last generation of writers who can listen to elders who lived through WWII, either on the home front or as prisoners or combatants. I felt that it was important to listen to them while they were still with us to tell the tale. Everything else, I could—and did—research in libraries and
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