'Perfect' is about a set-up that looks perfect from the outside - beautiful country house, beautiful wife and mother, everything where it should be - and the deep fissures that, in fact, lie beneath that. 'Perfect' was partly a response to the shock of my first book, 'The Unlikely Pilgrimage Of Harold Fry,' being a success.

Actors go inside the heads of other people and are not afraid of the complicated places you can find yourself.

I'm drawn to people who find themselves on the outside of things. I'm moved by that in real life.

My dad was always busy. You would pop round for a cup of tea, and within minutes you would see him walking past with a step-ladder. He was always fixing things.

I went to see Dad in hospital after he had gone through one particularly grueling operation. I walked into the room where he was recovering, and he was sitting up in a chair, wearing his shirt and tie. That was after eight hours of surgery. I found that so moving.

I went through a stage of writing my cramped hand in tiny books. My two sisters and I did have our Bronte period. My mum is from Yorkshire, and we would go up to the Moors. It tapped into our romantic visions of ourselves.