My Characters They are a special part of me, I suppose. There were countless times when I have wanted to write especially for each of them. But there's only so much about my characters that I can tell. They sort of spilled from me, one after the other, or sometimes in pairs or groups, like I was building an Ark. They just happen. Or maybe it was something subconscious. My inside fears and dreams that were suddenly built into people; characterisations of hopes and fears. But the weird thing was that I felt that I didn't own them. They had their rights and their freedom and their stories. They weren't dependant on me for building their lives. They built them on their own. If anything, I turned to them for inspiration. It was like any child's dream to have the works of fiction to be real. I personally believe that we are never too old to dream or fantasise. There is one thing that no one can do, and that is to stop someone thinking. But there was something that I understood when I was writing: these characters were not real. It was like a law: one that bound me do tightly and tried to stop me believing in the impossible. But I broke my own law. I was afraid that such a belief would ruin my reputation and everyone's expectations of me. But that was my choice. It was my choice to tell you that there is still that part of me - that one special part - that believes that my characters are truly and unmistakably real.