I was first set alight by Conrad, Mailer, Hemingway and F Scott Fitzgerald - with a little help from Mickey Spillane. I thought Greene and Maugham were awe inspiring. Lisa Alther’s Kin-Flicks and Jack Kerouac’s Desolation Angels showed me there were alternative ways to write. As a young man I imagined myself in a flat overlooking the sea, writing my novels (perhaps fighting bulls in between). I was a romantic.
Later I envied Carl Hiaasen and John Irving’s light touch and wanted to emulate it. Now on a long flight I’ll re-read Herodotus or The Iliad because they turn me on. But I know I’m a tabloid, fast read populist writer. I have no pretentions to being otherwise.