Novelist Jeffrey Archer mum on upcoming book

Hyderabad: Sipping on a glass of cold beer and a pizza at a city restaurant, Jeffrey Archer begins the conversation with a disclaimer, “I am slightly deaf, please be loud.”

In Hyderabad to promote his fifth and latest book in the Clifton Chronicles series, Mightier Than the Sword, the author says that he has already completed the first draft of the next book. What keeps the man going at 74?

I am very driven and I constantly keep at it because I write up to 14 drafts for each of my books. So if I am not dead by next year, the sixth book will be out followed by the final novel the year after.

This is Archer’s third visit to Hyderabad but quite like his earlier  trips, he has barely gotten to see the city.

I got off the plane on Thursday morning and have been going about places since. But I was quite impressed by the students at the Indian School of Business. They are quite a feisty bunch - especially the women.

He adds that for every 1,000 books written only one is published. And even if a novel is published, it is the public who decides if an author will ever write again.

My book for example released in the UK three days back and has sold 35,000 copies there. But i still fear if anyone will pick up the book tomorrow.

Archer remains tight-lipped about his upcoming book and the fates of the protagonists Harry Clifton and Emma Barrington.

 But I can assure you that I am not killing them off in the next book.