Sadia Ahmed asked Jonathan Stroud:

Hi Mr Stroud, I'm a huge fan. One thing I love about your books is the subtle humor. This might be a question you get asked often but is it difficult to write a humorous character? And how do you keep Bartimaeus in character when he switches to serious mode?

Jonathan Stroud Hi Sadia - that's a good question. Um, I don't know... I think the humour has to be (to some extent) your own humour: in other words, you're writing things that you find funny. If you stick to that, then I don't think it's difficult, though you have to be careful to flesh out the character with other, more serious, concerns. Some days I don't feel funny at all, and then I tend to write serious bits. On other days the jokes are closer to the surface and (with Bartimaeus) lots of juicy footnotes come pouring out.

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