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" I must always, always have a box of Extra chewing gum in my bag because I have developed a terrible cheek-chewing compulsion. It's not only uncomfortable, but I look really weird when I'm doing it, and chewing gum is the only way I can stop myself. "

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" There's something uniquely unsettling about the unhinged woman on a single-minded mission. Especially when she's the last person you ever imagined to harbour a dark and seething soul. "

Lisa Jewell

Soul

Mission

Dark

" For me, the optimum circumstances for writing a book are those of stultifying routine. "

Lisa Jewell

Writing

Book

" Agents and publishers are always looking for something 'different,' a fresh viewpoint and a new voice, not just re-hashed versions of stuff that's gone before. "

" I take the six weeks of the school summer holidays off because I'm pretty sure I'm not going to look back on my life one day and say, 'Damn, I wish I hadn't spent so much time with my children.' "

" If you can start and finish a book, then you're already a million miles ahead of all those people who talk about wanting to write a book. "

" I changed my mind about being a famous pop star when I realised that it meant I'd never be able to get on the Tube again. "

" When we were kids, we couldn't wait to have our own rooms, not to have to share anymore. And that is what I love about having my own bedroom. It is mine. My sleep is mine. Both pillows are mine. If I wake up, it is me who has woken me up... It makes me feel like a grown-up. I love it. "

" I write in cafes, never at home. I cannot focus at home, am forever getting off my chair to do other things. In a cafe, I have to sit still, or I'll look a bit unhinged. "

" People say 'chick lit,' and what they mean is 'crap.' And so even though you might sell 100,000 copies of a book, you're never going to win a prize. These are books that people don't just read, they devour them - they stay up into the early hours because they want to devour them. "

" Every time I've written a book, I'm like, 'Oh, it's so different from the last one. Are they going to like it?' "

Lisa Jewell

Different

Last

" I think that not being proactive is a good thing. I like life to unfold on its own. "

" When I travel, I can leave everything at home apart from books. I curate my holiday reading rigorously and would be devastated if I found I'd left one at home. "

" I don't think my first book was chick lit. "

" It wasn't until I was 23 and got married to a guy who was really bookish that I got completely hooked on reading and writing again. He had so many paperbacks, I didn't have to buy a book for four and a half years. "

" My parents' marriage was, on an aesthetic level, very pleasing to behold. "

" Getting married young was the worst experience of my life. It was horrible - really horrible. "

" 'Ralph's Party' was supposed to be a psychological thriller, but I fell in love with all my characters and wanted only the best for them. "

" My husband loves having his own room. "

" No man ever fell in love with me for the way I fill out a Lycra dress. "

Lisa Jewell

Out

Love

" Publishers have published women's fiction into a corner, and now we are all trying to punch our way out of it. We just have to write the best books we possibly can and hope that, once the pink covers and Bridget Jones have faded from memory, we might finally be allowed just to be called writers. "

" If one of my romantic-comedy colleagues had written and directed 'Love Actually,' they would have been torn limb from limb. I thought it was awful, contrived, dreadful. I could see every twist and turn. I thought it was despicable. It was the writing that got me. "

" Flowers would be wasted on me. I don't like valentines. I don't need gifts. I'm a pragmatic romantic. "

Lisa Jewell

Gifts

" My mother was born on February 8, 1944, in Lucknow, India. Her father, Albert, was half-Indian and half-Portuguese. "

" I was made redundant from a job as a PA in a shirt-making company in 1996. I was devastated. I had been there for three years, and it was a job I really liked. "

" I am the oldest of three girls and the only one not named after one of my father's ex-girlfriends. "

Lisa Jewell

Oldest

Three

" I knew I wasn't the sort of person who could do a full-time job and write in the evening and at weekends. "

" All my main characters have got bits of me, bits of my family, bits of my friends. "

Lisa Jewell

Got

Characters

" Sometimes you need to be shaken out of a situation. "

" I am a terrible, terrible typist. I could not have been a writer in the age of typewriters. "

Lisa Jewell

Been

Age

" Ever since 'Single White Female,' the 1990 novel which was turned into a supremely scary film, the idea of a seemingly normal woman who will stop at nothing to get what she wants has become an abiding literary trope. "