It’s often said of copywriters that we’re all frustrated novelists. So, in the interests of research, I’ve been putting this to the test.

By the end of this weekend, I hope to have completed 12,000 words and my third chapter, at which point a friendly literary agent has agreed to have a gander at my efforts.

As I can now speak from experience, I would say it’s highly unlikely that there are many frustrated novelists in the copywriting fraternity. Copywriting’s about brevity; novels demand a colossal 90,000 words and, frankly, are all about spinning stuff out as much as you can get away with.

I now see novels through new eyes. If the writer’s inserted a letter or a newspaper report into the text, I smile knowingly and think: ‘Aha, they only did that to eat up another 400 words’.