Please enlighten me if this is commonplace but it seems a lot of people I know or have known in the past are convinced they can recognise themselves in my books.

Now, like every writer, I tend to take a snippet of conversation, an overheard remark or an interesting personal foible and weave them in to the novels but none of my characters are based on real people – except for one who is fairly recognisable and she is quite happy about it.

There are echoes of real events too, but honestly, nothing like the events in “Death of the Elver Man” or “The Drowners” really happened and certainly not on the beautiful and peaceful Somerset Levels.

You see, it’s a story – I made it up.

Believe me when I say you are not seeing a reflection of yourself. Honest.