Nina Bawden

I am not a victim. I am an angry survivor.

Margaret Thatcher was in my year, and our first-year college photograph shows us standing side by side in the back row. We were both grammar school girls on state scholarships.

I dislike the word 'victim.' I dislike being told that I 'lost' my husband - as if I had idly abandoned you by the side of the railway track like an unwanted pair of old shoes.

Most reporters who come to me get their stories directly from press releases. Very few do what one would consider to be their professional duty.

I've always been very determined, ever since I was a little girl, to make my way.

I was a bit challenged when I was younger to stay on the right path.