I’m currently enduring the unnerving experience of re-reading one of my own books. Not because I’m short of stuff to read. There’s a pile the size of the Matterhorn beside my bed and as fast as I finish one book I seem to buy two more. No, I’m re-reading The Dress Circle for the rather exciting reason that I’ve been asked to adapt it for the stage. A very small stage.

We are not talking Broadway or the Dublin Abbey. We’re talking about a tiny West London venue next year, but listen up. The theatre is booked. The director is on board. In a business notorious for pie crust promises this is real progress. Which is why I’m getting on with writing the script. And that brings me back to my original point. I wrote The Dress Circle fifteen years ago. It’s not a bad book. I’m still quite fond of its characters and there are a couple of lines in it that still strike me as funny. But on the whole it makes me squirm. I can only plead that it was written in haste and edited too leniently.

Put it another way, I hope I’m a better writer now. I think I am.