Lunch with Lord Jeffrey Archer

There's few people who are able to write popular novels but not many as infamous as Lord Jeffrey Archer. Known as the greatest living story teller, Lord Archer has been a member of parliament and was engulfed in a scandal that almost left him bankrupt with debts of over ￡400,000. He revived his fortunes by writing more books and they have sold around 330 million copies worldwide.

He was made a life peer in 1992 and subsequently became Conservative candidate to be the first elected Mayor of London.

Lord Jeffrey Archer told me a number of stories when we met, including how he's been married to the lovely Mary for over 52 years. She has stood beside him over the years and together they've withstood many highs and lows, including writing 19 number 1 best sellers, and writing best seller prison diaries as a result of being imprisoned between 2001-2003 for perjury and perverting the course of justice, which ended his elected political career.

Clearly a great story teller, I wondered how I could be inspired by him to put pen to paper and realised of course that the way I would write my story would be by typing it up on Word, using so many of it's features to help improve the structure of my writing with better clarity and conciseness (such as Editor), by making my own Table of Contents automatically and spending a lot less time actually 'writing' by hand. The latest technology means I can dictate my words directly into Word to be typed up as I speak. So, can I come up with a plot?

Thanks Lord Archer for even making me think of writing a story - as a prolific writer who is great at telling stories, he made me laugh when he accused me of being a 'wicked woman' (how does he know?!!) and I was highly entertained by meeting him. I'm looking forward to buying the next book he publishes and wish him all the best getting it to the top of the best sellers lists in both the UK and the United States!