Interview by Connie Perryman

Recognised as one of the most influential novelists of this generation, Ainsdale-born David Mitchell has produced a number of extraordinary novels such as Number9Dream, Cloud Atlas and his most recent offering, the bone clocks. His work has been nominated for prestigious awards, and has even been adapted for the big screen, but the author remains humble about his astounding success. We spoke to David about memories of Merseyside, his own inspirations for writing and exciting plans for future novels.

What was the inspiration for your most recent novel The Bone Clocks?

There isn’t really one easy answer but if there has to be it’s probably the fact that I was growing older. I wanted to run a thought experiment along the lines of if you didn’t have to age, if you could stay young and healthy and have as much time as you wanted for the rest of your life, what would you be prepared to pay? It’s not so much an inspiration, it’s that question and from that came a book where this deal is on the table, you can sign on that dotted line if you want, but of course there is a price.

You’re originally from Southport; do you still have links to the area?

I was born in Ainsdale in a little house down Waterfoot Avenue; I haven’t been back for many years though. My earliest memories are a footbridge going over the railway tracks to Southport and walking down to the beach. I’ve been to Liverpool a few times; I’ve supported Liverpool all my life. Liverpool, Southport, Ainsdale, they’re the beginning of my life and a lot has happened since we moved down to Worcestershire when I was about six, but you can’t reboot earliest memories.

You’ve lived in Italy and Japan. Have your own experiences of travelling influenced the different countries featured in your work?

More than influenced, they gave me the material for them; I couldn’t have written the books I have done had I not lived in the countries I’ve lived in. I like to think I would still have been a writer but I would have written about different countries and maybe in some ways the books will have been different.

You’re coming to Liverpool in August, how does it feel coming back to Merseyside as a best-selling author?

Liverpool is always just a little bit special however I come back, it’s not that I’m pleased with myself, it’s not that I’m one of the Beatles coming back to Liverpool. You do your best in the line of work that you are engaged in and move through your life doing the best you can. I’d almost leave the author bit out of it, it’s nice to reconnect with a part of the world that you once lived in and to see what’s changed. I like the company of northerners; you are a more direct, more honest, more open audience I feel. Northerners never fake anything which is what I like about being in the North. This isn’t just true of Liverpool, but the fact that I do have this historical connection with Liverpool, Southport and the area does make it a bit special.

The film adaptation of ‘Cloud Atlas’ was a huge success, how do you feel about your work being adapted into a film? Is it visually what you expected when you were writing the novel?

You don’t write a novel expecting it to be a film, you can do but if you do it’s not going to be a very good novel. If you mean does the film correspond with how I was imagining it when I
was writing the scene, the weird answer is I can no longer remember because it has been replaced by the film. When I was writing a section about a publisher called Tim Cavendish who is played by Jim Broadbent in the film, I must have had an idea in my head about what Tim Cavendish looked like, but I can’t remember it because it’s been replaced by Jim Broadbent. I don’t have a problem with that because he is a great actor.

Are there any plans to adapt ‘The Bone Clocks’ into a film?

Yeah there are, I need to be circumspect about the details but it’s going to be a TV series so long form, small screen, probably six or seven episodes of an hour each. That’s the idea anyway, whether it comes to fruition or not you never know in the film world.

The Bone Clocks has been nominated for numerous awards and was long listed for the Man Booker Prize in 2014; did you ever think that you would reach such success?

I suppose I used to daydream about it, but I didn’t know anything about it until I got more disciplined about writing. I was just working on the books. I think that’s the deal, you work on the books and neglect other areas of your life, including if necessary your family and your loved ones which you have to make up for later. You’ve got to pour your mind, your soul, your attention, your time above all into your books to make them work. You’ve just got to make them good and then hopefully good things will happen. If you spend time thinking what level of success am I going to achieve with this I think it undercuts the work.

Do any of your novels or characters stand out as your favourite?

My next book has got to be the best one. If I feel that the book I’m working on isn’t as good as the one before, that means I haven’t got the book right yet, so I’ve got to start again or work out what’s wrong with it or put it away for a week and not think about it, then come back with fresh eyes.

You’ve become a critically acclaimed author; do you have any literary influences for your own work?

Pretty much anything I’ve ever read is an influence. If it’s brilliant then I want to work out why it’s brilliant, and how I can emulate that. Books that urged me to become a writer, which
lit a fever in me to do to other people what books have done to me, would be books I read as a kid, things like Watership Down or Ursula Le Guin’s fantasy novels.

Do you have any plans or ideas for your
next novel?

Always, not just the next one but the one after that. It’s a question of marshalling them all and departmentalising them all so that they don’t all crowd at me like a bar of angry drinkers one minute before closing time. I’ve got a new book coming out in October called Slade House; I’m just putting a few finishing touches to that at the moment. That’s what I’m working on now but after that I’ve got about four or five different ideas for books, I’m not sure which one I’ll go with yet.

 Waterstones will be hosting an evening With David Mitchell on Thursday 13 August at Oh Me Oh My, Water street.
For more information visit www.waterstones.com/events.

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