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I can gabble on now, but I couldn't when I was a kid, so I spent a lot of time in my own head on the moors by myself. It felt like writing was the right way to express myself.

But I think there's something wonderful and extraordinary about climbing on your own and just that kind of relationship to the environment. I'm very addicted to the mountains. You know, so, I do like that solitude.

It's very kind of 'Wuthering Heights' where my parents' house is, moors and deserted. It's very wild and mystic.

I'm a bit claustrophobic, I don't like crowds, I live by the sea - that's what I see when I come out of my house in Bridlington.

I am attached to the west coast of Scotland - it's gorgeous to look at and challenging. You have to contend with the possibility of being blown away or rained on. And in the summer months you can be eaten alive by midges.

In this journey, the fear creeps in from time to time. The hint of that is there because there's an unknown factor to everything. That's true in everyone's life. I don't choose to live there; I let it spark me.

When I look back at my childhood on the Ayrshire coast, I recall a basic devotion to the idea that human nature and national character are as unknowable as the weather's rationale.

You have to accept the storms and the rainy days and the things in life that you sometimes don't want to face.