'My great grandfather and grandfather sailed the Horn, in steam and diesel, out of Liverpool. I was the first generation not to sail the Horn or fight a war. Instead, I would go to the end of the world, beyond Patagonia, to Tierra del Fuego. I would do more, I would see the Horn and find lost tribes. The child in me could go even further and sail the waters of Coleridge's albatross and enter the watercolours' blue horizons of my first novel, and sit on Robinson Crusoe's imaginary shore. I had imagined these places; they must exist. All I had to do was look for them.'