“I often went for a walk straight after my writing and editing time, to blow cobwebs away and to reconnect to the here and now, to smell roses and rosemary and lilac and jasmine in the beautiful gardens of East Orange.”

‘Reading Janet Frame is to enter a world of animated detail. No person, place or thing is ordinary; all is worked into a web of significance. This way of imagining the world can be equally revelatory and dangerous.’