Because the start of this novel is set back in 1981 I thought that including music from the eighties would be a good way to imprint the time in people’s minds (and memories). The eighties was my clubbing era too, so a lot of the songs had particular memories for me. In fact all through the novel, as the time progresses, I enjoyed listening to old favourites of the eighties and nineties as I worked

What I did was to give each chapter a heading of a song from that year and one which I hoped reflected a little bit of the spirit of the chapter too.

The opening chapter is headed ‘Woman’ which is the John Lennon song and was at No 7 in US charts back in April 1981. I’m a big fan of John Lennon and this is actually one of my favourite of his songs. John composed it for Yoko Ono but said it was for all women. So I thought it was a great omen for my first book!

1986 is a tough year for Jane and her relationship with her husband Rory and it’s encapsulated in the Chapter 11 song title ‘How Will I Know?’ by Whitney Houston which was at number 11 in the UK charts in March that year. (Co-incidentally that also became the title of a later novel.) At this point in the book Jane is beginning to wonder about the path her life is taking her.

Ireland went World Cup crazy in June 1990 and so Chapter 22’s keynote song is Luciano Pavarotti’s Nessun Dorma. I don’t always think football when I hear it but sometimes it’s hard not to remember.

The final chapter in the novel is ‘Always’ which was a UK No 2 hit for Jon Bon Jovi in September 1994. That was when I finished the novel too. I can’t believe it’s so long ago now because when I look back at it and glance through the chapters I remember sitting at my desk writing them.

I’m very fond of Jane because she was my very first heroine and because she was the character that moved me from being (as I say in the acknowledgements) an amateur to a professional author. And it was because I wanted to write Jane’s story that I didn’t quit.