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TELL US ABOUT YOUR BACKGROUND?
I was born in the Netherlands and studied Philosophy, Politics & Economics and Finance & Financial Law. I have worked as a fund manager and business school lecturer and served as a British Army officer. I also used to box. Having spent the early part of my career in London and Mumbai, I now live with my family in North Wales. My first book, Salt, Sweat, Tears was shortlisted for best new writer at the Cross British Sports Book Awards.
WHY DID YOU WRITE 'WHITE COLLAR'?
How we spend our days shapes the people we become. I've seen how the City's culture and value system can change a person over time. I wanted to use satire to make light of this, and also to give the reader a first person experience of stepping onto a trading floor or into a boxing ring, or a fund managers' office in Mayfair.
HOW MUCH OF 'WHITE COLLAR' IS TRUE?
I'll speak to my lawyer and get back to you.
DO YOU PREFER WRITING FICTION OR NON-FICTION?
I find fiction much harder to write because you have the freedom to take the story anywhere. Although that freedom can be paralysing, it comes with the thrill of creating a world and letting other people in.
WHY DID YOU WRITE 'SALT, SWEAT, TEARS'?
Writing is therapy. After having a significant life experience it’s natural to want to make sense of it; to fit it into the narrative of your life; to believe that it was all for a reason. People do this in different ways. Peter Bird, who you’ll read about in chapter seven, did it by returning to the ocean again and again, until finally it killed him. I did it by writing a book.
WHICH ASPECT OF YOUR ATLANTIC ROW DID YOU FIND HARDEST TO WRITE ABOUT?
One thing I learnt while writing this book is that in history there is no such thing as truth. That doesn’t just apply to events of sixty or a hundred years ago, but also to the experiences that Jimmy and I shared on the ocean. There are two sides to every story, and putting those moments when we disagreed down on paper was difficult, because of course there were some things that Jimmy remembered very differently.
WHICH OF THE ROWS THAT YOU RESEARCHED FOR 'SALT, SWEAT, TEARS' INTERESTED YOU MOST?
I think that the best character is John Fairfax, the shark hunter, who appears in chapter five. The best story on and off the water is the race between the jounalists and the paratroopers in 1966, in chapter three. I was most moved by the life of Peter Bird, who appears in chapter seven. To write about Peter I interviewed many of his family and friends, including his mother Joan, who is in her eighties, and his son Louis, who was just three years old when his father was lost at sea. Salt, Sweat, Tears helped Louis to learn more about his father and that pushed me over that line of being just an observer. The thing that Louis wanted more than anything was to see his father’s boat restored. After reading the book, a boat yard owner contacted me offering to do just that. It was a wonderful postscript to Peter’s chapter.
WHAT HAVE YOU DISCOVERED RECENTLY?
My wife surprised me recently with a trip to the Ratnam Pen Works in Rajahmundry, India. Mr Ratnam made India’s first fountain pen in 1931 and today his son continues to hand-craft fountain pens in exactly the same fashion. On the wall of the workshop is a letter dated July 16, 1935, thanking Mr Ratnam for the gift of a pen. The letter is from Mahatma Gandhi.
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