I'm a New York Times and Sunday Times bestselling thriller author

[Bestseller101]

• ask me anything!

Ruth Kelly?

I think you're Claire Douglas!

@DragonMama3 I get asked this at least ten times a day by readers, the admin it would create is mayhem, let alone giving my address out...

Do you write under your real name or a pseudonym?

@ATerrorofLeftovers four books

What happens to your royalties when you die? Can you leave them as an inheritance?

Are you with one of the big 5? Is your agent a biggie? Congratulations (from a rom com writer - self published who’s in awe!)

My guess is Lucy Clarke

Gillian McAllister's career started in 2017. She also refers to herself constantly as ST and NYT bestseller. I think you're her.

You wrote four books as-well as doing a day job? That is impressive.

@Lookingforbiscoff I appreciate that. It's a difficult question actually as a contract may contain an NDA, but also my income stream is multiple: foreign publishers, tv and film options, the fee the government pay per library loan, America, Germany, the UK (the big three markets), royalties, foreign royalties. I actually do not know what I earn net, and it is not like a paye job at all because one might earn a large amount for two books, split into six payments (signature of the contract x2, delivery of the book x2, publication of the book x2 but split into paperback and hardback. So that money might come in bursts over an 18 month period). But largely I do not ever have to worry about money again.

How old were you when you first developed an interest in writing stories?

@Thehardestthingaboutwritinganoveliswritingit yes but it was not a big career day job.

My partner thinks using AI to write novels will be normal in future (I hope not!) Do you think it will?

@stayathomer yes to both.

No correct guesses so far. Perhaps am less well known than I think

@Summerbee3 nah. The best novels are so human.

Thanks for doing this! What would you regard as a healthy number of sales for a specific book?

Still very disciplined that’s what I lack. Discipline. Do you have children?

Do you publish under your own name or a pen name?

I really want you to be KD.

Do you write a series and if so, do you already know the complete story arc or do your characters grow and go their own way?

@Goinggoinggone12345 depends entirely on the advance really. A bestseller, 100k in the UK, including kindle?

Gillian is that you?

@Thehardestthingaboutwritinganoveliswritingit no kids

who was your favourite author when you were a child?

Yes, it was a bit unfair not to answer about adding book club type questions at the end of the books, seems a perfectly innocuous thing to ask for.