Gold (49 page)

You say in your Author’s Note that
Gold
went through six drafts. What was the first draft of the novel like? What did you learn from the process of rewriting and revising?

The first draft was unremittingly bleak. It wasn’t obvious to me how to write about sick children in a way that had some hope and some humor in it. It took me a while to find my way, and I was conscious of the fact that many of the people who helped me research the book as parents of sick children would be reading it. I also knew that a great many people I would never meet would be reading the book, and that many of them would have sick relatives or children.

Therefore, I wanted to strike the right balance between acknowledging the seriousness of the situation and outlining the very real grounds for hope and high spirits. It took me a few tries to get the tone of the book right, and then a few tries more to make the novel read smoothly while getting its manipulation of time to work in concert with the psychological dynamics of the developing characters. If that all sounds a bit technical, it was. I think what I learned was that you can’t ever do too much work on a novel. There is always an extra mile you can go, and I am very fortunate to have publishers who respect my readers enough to allow me to do that work. I don’t think my next novel will take anything like as long as three years to write, but I have no regrets that
Gold
did.

Like Jack and Kate, you juggle family and career. How do you negotiate the demands of writing and parenting at the same time?

Actually I have no complaints and I find it possible to give my full attention to both projects. I think I have it easier than most in that respect because I get to choose the hours I keep, so I’m lucky enough to spend time with my kids when they’re awake and do my writing while they’re asleep or at school. I think I juggle it the same as anyone in their thirties: sleep less, live more.

After the success of
Little Bee
and
Incendiary
, did you feel pressure to write another political novel? Do you think you will go back to that realm any time soon?

Well, I don’t think of
Little Bee
and
Incendiary
as political novels. Really they’re novels inspired by anger. I like most of the people I meet—I think ninety percent of humans are basically good—and therefore like any sane person I get furious to the point of weeping about politicians and money men and thugs and mercenaries and the whole apparatus of mean-spirited fools that makes life hell for so many people. It just happens to be my job to write about those things in a way that hopefully generates more light than heat. I’m defusing the bomb of my anger in my novels. I’m using tools like humor and pathos and story and character to disassemble that rage into its constituent parts and then build those components back into something less ugly and more useful. That’s what a true novel is: a sword turned into a ploughshare. Anything less is just a rant: a blast pattern made by shrapnel.

In evolving through those first two novels to
Gold
, I haven’t changed what I do as a writer at all. It’s just that I’m directing my anger at some harder and (to me) more frightening targets. I’m over being angry at policy and polity—it’s the novelistic equivalent of shooting trout in a barrel. I always need a bigger enemy and so this time around I’m raising my game, with whatever success the reader will judge. I’m angry at death itself, in this novel. I’m interested to see whether as a writer I can apply my same trusted tools—humor and pathos and story and character—to disassemble that anger I feel against our own inevitable dissolution, and to build it back up into something beautiful.

I made a promise when I started out as a writer that I would never repeat myself and that I would try harder and harder every time to express something I’m still certain is true: that people are good, and that life can be beautiful. In my attempts to show this, I think my characters will be up against a stronger adversary with each novel.

I was having this conversation with a friend who asked me whether there was anywhere left to go, once you’ve made death itself the villain of a piece. My answer is that there is a lot I still want to write, because there are things I fear more than death. I haven’t written a novel about insanity yet, for example. I haven’t written a novel about evil.

What do you most want to be known for, as a writer?

Someone who asks respectfully for the reader’s time and never wastes it.

What do you hope readers will take away from
Gold
?

I hope they will be happy. I hope it’s a happy story.

What can your fans look forward to next? What projects are you working on now?

Right now I’m ensorcelled by a new novel, which is going very well. It’s about war. I’m about halfway through the first draft. I’ve joined a very old library in London where I have a little desk to work at, right at the top of the building in the dusty stacks. It’s a place of intense concentration, and I hope I’m using it to write the most emotionally engaged and psychologically nuanced novel I’ve attempted to date.

I’d like to thank my readers for their faith in my work. Your kindness and support mean everything to me, and when I get messages on my website saying that you have enjoyed one of my books, I am always very moved. Thank you. I am determined to always work harder to produce books that mean something to you.

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