If I were prime minister for a day (which is looking like an increasingly realistic prospect for all of us), one of my first acts would be to ban events being held on Monday nights. The first day of the week is always a jarring change of pace from the lazy joys of the weekend. I prefer my Monday evening to be a restful transition point into the rest of the week, like gradually dunking a Digestive into a mug of tea in order to get the right ratio of crunch to sogginess. You don’t want to hurl the whole biscuit in there at once.

Alas, the British Book Awards held its ceremony on a Monday and, for the first time ever, decided to nominate me for a prize. My latest novel, One Of Us, was up for audiobook of the year, which is akin to giving a marrow grower a participation certificate at the village fête. The prize was really for my excellent narrators rather than for me, but they are all glamorous actors and none of them was available. So off I schlepped to the carpeted glories of the Grosvenor House Hotel to eat what might have been a sweet potato smeared with hummus.

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