Sadie Jones interview

In The Guardian, Alison Flood talks to Sadie Jones about her journey from unsuccessful screenwriter to bestselling novelist.

It's possible that Sadie Jones just wasn't a very good screenwriter. After "clawing away" (her words) at the profession for 15 years, things weren't looking good – a "lovely romantic comedy", a thriller, and a "really nice coming of age story" all came to nothing. Then along came The Outcast, the film script of which became a bestselling novel, which in a twist of fate is now becoming a film script again.

"I often thought that if I could have given up, and done something else, I would have done," says Jones. "Retrospectively, I can see that I was learning all the time, but it was often difficult. I was employed sometimes, and I had things in development, but there were a lot of disappointments. It was not so much stubbornness, or even belief, I just carried on writing. To deal with disappointment, I had to write for the sake of writing, not some imaginary reward."