Goodreads asked Albert J. Clack:

How do you get inspired to write?

Albert J. Clack So far the inspirations for the basic ideas have come from a mixture of my own experiences (eg being a touring actor in a stage play), people I've met during my life (eg a retired Fleet Street printer who supported the miners in their 1984 strike), and events in the news (eg the growth of small neo-fascist parties in recent years). Once I have the germ of an idea, I go through a period lasting several weeks of letting it churn it around in my mind until it starts assuming a viable structure. Then I write lots of brief notes on small index cards - just a few words on each - to indicate possible scenes, spread them out on my big dining-room table, move them around, and gradually add to them. This is also the phase when I find people with expert knowledge of the subjects I'm going to be covering, and record interviews with them to give my story a credible grounding in reality. Then it's just a case of getting up in the morning, telling myself, "Do your job," and sitting down to write the flesh on to the bones.

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