I'm very popular in Japan and I have given interviews there a couple of years ago. The Japanese connect to Creasy. They see him as a 'Ronin' - a disgraced Samurai warrior who spends his time trying to redeem himself by doing good deeds.

Yes, I am working on a novel with a working title 'Priests of a Dead God.' It's been delayed because I was ill. I'm o.k. now and should finish it by the end of the year. It's a Creasy novel.

Creasy was based on a mixture of characters that I knew in the sixties and seventies in Africa and Vietnam.

In my field I most admire the American writer Charles McCarry whose 2 books 'Tears of Autumn' and 'The Secret Lovers' I regard as masterpieces... if you can find them I urge you to do so. I also like Len Deighton's early books, particularly 'Funeral in Berlin' and 'Horse Under Water'. I regard his dialogue about the best in the business.

There was no specific event that led me to write 'Man on Fire'. Two things stuck in my mind. Sometime in the sixties the eldest son of a rich Singaporean business man was kidnapped by a triad gang. The man had eleven children. He refused to pay the ransom and his son was murdered. His refusal meant that his other children would never be targets. The will to make that sacrifice fascinated me. Second: The kidnapping of John Paul Getty's son by the Mafia in Rome. When Getty hesitated they cut of the boys ear and sent it to him. To me the kidnapping of an innocent third party is totally abhorrent. I guess the writing of 'Man on Fire' expressed those feelings.

I will be writing a prequel to 'Man on Fire.' It will involve Creasy in Korea and the Vietnam war with the French when he was a young man. Right now I'm working on a film treatment which is another Creasy story.

Yes, the story [Man on Fire] was based on an actual event in Italy in '75.