Matt Cooper

Yeah, but it is the whole point.

And you develop in the book as well, there's a lot of discussion between Artie and his son about free will.

As to whether you can actually dictate your own life and your own circumstances or whether things happen to you and then how you actually deal with the things that happen to you.

You haven't come to a conclusion on that?

Because it's the unexpected.

How many people have lives that they have mapped out for themselves?

The other thing that really comes across of the many themes in the book as well is that how well do we really know the people that we think we know?

Precisely.

So why did you develop that theme?

And there are some fairly big twists and I don't want to give spoilers away.

But they're all entirely believable and understandable.

These are the type of things that actually happen in people's day-to-day lives.

And yet, the things we never say, the things that are kept secret.

Is keeping things secret at times a better way to deal with it?

Because there's been sort of a trend in recent decades that you should...

And when it comes to who they are, what's also very interesting is how he really can't escape his upbringing.

and his childhood.

I wonder how much that is a case for so many people that when you're formed in your childhood, that that just doesn't leave your character.

So what has stuck with you that's still very much as you age?

What are the things from your childhood in particular which still very much form you and are you?