I went deerstalking once, in Scotland, for research. It was misery, creeping along on my belly for the sake of shooting a beast that I didn’t want to shoot. It was freezing and the water went right through my cashmere socks. Perhaps I should only write stories about middle-aged men in libraries.
For Edge of Eternity, I took a bus trip, which is unusual for me, as my normal mode of travel is a Rolls-Royce. I flew to Washington first-class, then got on a Greyhound bus for three days, finishing up in Birmingham, Alabama, where the worst atrocities of the civil-rights era took place. It was intense because the American South has a peaceful look, with whitewashed churches and pristine office buildings, yet only 50 years ago people were beaten and lynched.
You can keep the mountains and the scenery. I like cities — and architecture that tells me something of a place’s history I like Caribbean weather. We have a beach house in Antigua, on a private island called Jumby Bay. There are no cars, so it has a Toytown feel, with everybody riding round in funny little carts. I swim for exercise and we have a little boat, which my kids occasionally sail around the island. But sitting in the shade and reading is my relaxation. I try to read books that are nothing to do with what I’m writing, but I soon get itchy.
I went to Cuba to see the long promenade in Havana, where people stroll, flirt and show off in the evenings, and I visited run-down ports where the Russians landed their missiles during the Cuban missile crisis. Because the Americans have made life difficult, they’re stuck in 1959, so you can be chauffeured around in a 1950s Cadillac, though I confess I was driven in a 2013 Mercedes-Benz.
Going 200 miles into agricultural Cuba, I didn’t want a breakdown. Crumbling buildings from the Spanish-colonial era have an air of faded grandeur. We went to a restaurant in what had been a palace, with grand marble staircases, but off the broad corridors there were families sitting on sofas, watching telly.
Advertisement
I like eating in Spain. Meals are long, and I love the way you have an hour or two of wine and snacks — ham, garlic bread, inky Rioja — before you sit down. In Vitoria-Gasteiz, they were restoring the cathedral, and I helped with their fundraising. Bless their hearts, they put up a statue of me. So I’ve had some terrific meals there, late into the night.
I’m not a fan of natural beauty. I like cities, with churches and concert halls. You can keep the mountains and the scenery. Our favourite place for a getaway is Paris. Notre Dame is sensational, and there’s always something intriguing going on in the art world. If a restaurant has clean tablecloths, you can be pretty sure you will eat well and inexpensively. I love Charvet, a shirt shop on Place Vendôme, where they have all the bales of cotton material, which you can unfold for the shirt you fancy.
I’m interested in what the architecture of a town tells me about its history. One of the most spectacular places I’ve been is Chartres Cathedral. I look at the high ceilings and huge arches and think about what drove the masons to build something so beautiful. The interesting thing about cathedrals is that parts that are never seen by the human eye are just as beautifully carved, such as the roof of Milan’s Duomo. The idea was that God would see it.
Advertisement
Ken Follett, 65, has sold about 130m books worldwide. His novels include Fall of Giants and The Pillars of the Earth, and his 30th, Edge of Eternity (Macmillan £20), will be published on September 16. He lives in Hertfordshire with his wife, Barbara, a former Labour ministerx