You went straight from writing your PhD thesis to writing a novel. What does the writing process mean to you? Do you have a routine?Yes, I have a very regular routine, and that discipline is definitely something I acquired when I was writing my thesis. For me, being a novelist is the greatest occupation in the world, but it is still, at heart, a job, and I treat it like one: I work Monday to Friday, 9-5, and when I am in the first phase of writing a novel I aim to write a basic minimum of 1,000 words a day. They will not always be good words, but they will be a starting-point, and by keeping to my routine I will gradually build up the first draft of a novel; the bulk of the writing, then, is actually re-writing. Without this daily discipline, I would be lost. If I sat around waiting for inspiration to strike, it would never happen. You have to allow it to happen, I find, by doing lots of spade-work first.All your novels hark back to a bygone era. What do you find so compelling about the past?I love the difference of the past, its unfamiliarity. I don't think that human beings have changed much, in essence, for a very long time, but culture evolves quickly, social mores and priorities shift, and you don't have to go very far back in time for really basic issues like how we feel about our bodies, or the way we live in families and houses, to look very different indeed. I like trying to capture the subtleties of that different landscape, and to bring them to life for a reader.Is it likely then that you won't write a novel in a contemporary setting?I really don't know (and I like not knowing). I feel very engaged with the contemporary world in all sorts of ways, but as an author I do enjoy the intellectual challenge of writing historical fiction; I imagine that I will always feel that basic excitement about the past. But if a story came to me that would clearly work best in a modern setting, then I would pursue it. It would be a sort of adventure. But the moment would have to be right.How and where do you find the characters for your books?Well, I always begin my novels with a phase of pure research: I want to get to know the period that I'm aiming to write about, and I want to settle on a story that will somehow represent that period and allow me to explore its salient issues. The characters begin to form for me in that phase. For example, with The Paying Guests, I could see that the early 1920s in the UK was a time of post-war sadness, but also a period of energetic changes - changes in relations between men and women, and between the classes. So I began to imagine a suburban house, containing an awkward mix of people: a bereaved middle-class mother and her unhappy spinster daughter, and a young married couple a few rungs below them on the social scale. I thought about what might have brought them together - and what sort of tensions and desires might arise between them. In trying out scenes and bits of dialogue, they slowly came to life for me.Your books contain a variety of themes from wild romp and betrayal to spirituality and love. What ground have you not covered that you would like to explore next?I love the energy of a strong narrative, and there are definitely some narrative scenarios that I would love to explore: blackmail, mistaken identity, people fleeing for their lives... Basically, if Hitchcock did it, I'd like to have a go at it too. I wrote a haunted house novel in The Little Stranger, and that was very satisfying, so I'd also like to write another ghost story at some point.Homosexuality is a lot more open in society now, even if it is still forbidden in many places. What role do you think literature plays in bringing hitherto taboo subjects in the realm of the mainstream?I think it plays a huge role. Certainly, as a young lesbian, coming out in the '80s and '90s, gay books were crucial to me: they gave me celebratory representations of gay love at a time when society at large was not at all sympathetic to homosexuality; they let me know that other gay people were around - that I could be part of a community that was proud, defiant and joyous. For the mainstream, too, gay literature is important. Novels encourage empathy; they allow us to put ourselves in the shoes of characters who are not at all like us, and find the points of contact between us. Most of my novels have a lesbian element, but they are also (I hope) just great stories - stories about love, passion, loss and moral dilemma. I don't write with an overt 'message' about sexuality; I just treat my lesbian characters with dignity, honesty and care, and hope that that's how my readers receive them.How do you measure success?When a complete stranger comes up to me on the street or on a train and says, 'I love your books!' - that's amazing. That's success, for me - the success of having brought a story to life, from nothing, and passed it on to readers.What do awards mean to you?Well, everyone likes to win a prize, and it is lovely to feel that your hard work has been appreciated. But I have also done enough prize judging myself to know that the judging process is a very subjective and sometimes almost haphazard one. So I think prizes are to be enjoyed, but not taken too seriously.Three of your books have been shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize in the past. Were you ever overwhelmed by anticipation?No, because I never expected to win.Do you secretly wish that your latest book, The Paying Guests, is selected for the Man Booker, and wins?I think I have done really well with my three previous nominations. If you had told me, twenty years ago, when I first started writing, that I would one day be in a position where people would ask me, 'Were you disappointed not to make it on to the Man Booker shortlist this time?' I would have fallen over with amazement and delight. My career has been an incredibly lucky one, and I never forget that.marisha.karwa@dnaindia.net; @MarishaThakur

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