Malorie Blackman

And what was fascinating to me was...

It's like everyone knew what was going to be in the book and I hadn't written a word.

And so I thought, oh, well, how can I do this to play with people's assumptions about what the book is going to be about?

And the thing about in Noughts and Crosses, I only mention colour once.

There are always Noughts and Crosses or the derogatory names for them are Blankers and Daggers.

And so I only mentioned Callum once throughout the whole book.

And I remember when I sent my mum a proof and she said she was reading it because I wanted to play with people's preconceptions about who Callum and Sefi were as people.

And I remember I sent my mum a proof and she phoned me up and she was irate.

And she said, Callum's a nought, right?

I said, that's right.

She said, is he white or black?

I said, he's white, mum.

So she said, so Sophie's black.

The rich girl's black.

I said, yes, that's right, mum.

She said, now I'm going to have to start the whole book again.

And she was so vexed.

And then it was, I thought, yeah, that's working.

That's exactly what I wanted.

Exactly.