You are the bestselling novelist of this decade. Did you ever think that you would be in this place?
No. I thought when I was writing the first one that you just finish the novel because I’ve always been a writer. I’ve done sitcoms, TV and journalism. I did it without telling anyone. I had no expectations because you can’t when you are writing a novel. Even before the first one came out, Steven Spielberg bought the rights to it. That gave me some hope.
Did it help to already have a high profile as a TV presenter?
In the UK, definitely. I thought if I gave them the final draft, I could look them in the whites of the eyes. We sold the rights in Germany before the UK. Obviously, there and in the US and China, they don’t know me. I get to see what the books do on their own merits in other territories. So, I can compare and contrast.
This is your second We Solve Murders book. Was a series always the plan?
Yes, although if the first one had gone badly then I’d be telling you that it was supposed to be a one-off. I always think if I read a book, I want to read those same characters again. I had that with the Thursday Murder Club. It hit so big and I had an immediate follow-up because I wanted to talk about the same characters again. That comes from TV. If you have a good idea in television, you don’t just want it to be one season. I love how Agatha Christie had Marple and Poirot. People love characters.
What audiences really want is two books a year, which is impossible. I do a book a year because if you have an audience and a loyalty, that’s a two-way street. It’s the least I can do.
In the book you describe Rosa D’Antonio as the “bestselling novelist in the world other than Lee Child”. Is there part of your own lifestyle that informed that character?
The fun thing about Rosie is she’s much more like Jackie Collins. She’s got 1970s, 1980s money which is helicopter money, private jet money. She comes from a very different place to me, but there is stuff in We Chase Shadows, about some of the things she’s expected to do and some of the interviews she’s expected to do that comes from real life. I know the publicity hoops she’s having to jump through.
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You have lots of exotic locations: Tuscany, Palm Springs, Malaga. Is that with an eye to it being a TV series or movie where, like the Bond franchise, it skips from one glamorous place to another?
We are developing it for Netflix as a series. It doesn’t matter where you set it. It will be in the back lot of Pinewood before you know it.
You’re also a TV presenter and host The Rest is Entertainment with Marina Hyde. How do you juggle all these things?
The podcast is three hours a week. I can do it off the top of my head. I’m not working nine to five. I’m not working the late shift at the A&E. Doing the book is a different part of the brain.
Which projects are you working on?
I’ve just started the next Thursday Murder Club book, which is a nice place to be psychologically. That will be out next September.
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Have you made a literary pilgrimage?
If I read a book with a sense of place, I always just immediately want to go there. I just finished reading an amazing book called No Name (1862) by Wilkie Collins set in 19th-century London and loads of it is set around Vauxhall Walk. So I thought I’d have a little wander down there and when I got down there it was full of serviced offices and Tesco garages.
What’s the best writing advice?
Get it done. Stop going back, changing every sentence. Go back to the beginning because then you know what your story is. Get it done and get it good, but get to the end.
Who do you admire most?
People who use their strengths to protect people rather than exploit people. My grandfather is who I always think about when I think about masculinity. He was a police officer in the 50s and 60s in Brighton and was very tough but he would look after you if you were in any sort of trouble. That’s what real masculinity really looks like.
You are supreme ruler for a day. Which law do you pass or abolish?
I think that we would solve almost all problems in the world if everybody was allowed just five opinions a year on social media or anywhere else. If you use them up on January 1st, we don’t need to hear from you for the rest of the year. If you can find me somebody who has more than five useful opinions a year, I’d be very surprised.
Which current book film and podcast would you recommend?
Book: When the Cranes Fly South by Lisa Ridzén, which my mum recommended to me. It’s beautiful, heartbreaking but life-affirming. Film: The Ballad of Wallis Island starring Tim Key and Tom Basden. Who wouldn’t love that film? It’s so charming and funny. Podcast: I really love What Did You Do Yesterday with David O’Doherty and Max Rushden.
Which public event affected you most?
I’m 55 and I was 10 or 11 when the SAS stormed the Iranian embassy in London and they had a breaking news thing which came on when the world snooker final was on. The first bit of breaking news I ever remember in life.
The most remarkable place you have visited?
A couple of years ago, I went to Palm Springs for the first time in America. It became this big Hollywood place when Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin and Bob Hope all moved out there, And they signed a contract with the studios. In the 30s, with the Hollywood studios, you had to have a home base that was within two hours of the studios.
It looks like a 50s theme park with this incredible architecture of motels and diners and the neon. And yet in the middle of the desert you’re surrounded by mountains. This was the America of my imagination in the 1970s.
What is your most treasured possession?
I guess my cats, Lottie and Liesel, but do you ever really own cats? They are the first thing I would save if my house was in danger. Apart from my wife of course.
The most beautiful book that you own?
When Thursday Murder Club really took off, and we sold our first million copies, I bought John le Carré’s Call of the Dead. On the first page he tells you about Smiley. It’s a perfect introduction. It’s a first edition and very precious to me.
Which writers living or dead would you invite to your dream dinner party?
I would love Patricia Highsmith even though anything I read about her tells you that she hated absolutely everyone, but that might be fun. Definitely, John le Carré, I would have George Eliot and then maybe Larry McMurty, who wrote Lonesome Dove, and then maybe Douglas Adams for levity
Your favourite quotation?
It’s one from my grandfather. “If you’re ever in a pub make sure you’re second through the door.”
Your favourite fictional character?
Tom Ripley is awful, but you still want to root for him and you really love him. How has Patricia Highsmith pulled that off?
A book to make you laugh?
Jonny Sweet’s The Kellerby Code. It’s a bit like Saltburn, but very funny. Towards the End of the Morning by Michael Frayn is one of my favourite books of all time and that’s set in Fleet Street in the 1950s.
A book to move you to tears?
When the Cranes Fly South by Lisa Ridzén. You are crying in such a way that you are saying, “Oh, my God life is so awful and yet it is wonderful.”
We Chase Shadows is published by Viking