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Jeffrey Archer, one of the world's bestselling novelists, is still an incorrigible flirt.
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Archer → see → novelists
Enter our photographer with his pretty young assistant and Jeffrey is entranced.
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Jeffrey → enter → assistant
Before I know it, we're all in his penthouse bedroom, admiring both the spectacular London skyscape through vast floor-to-ceiling windows – and Jeffrey's magnificent, intricately carved 17th century four-poster bed.
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we → know → windows
Above the bed, a huge Lichtenstein speech balloon Pop Art cartoon proclaims: 'Oh Jeff… I love you too.
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I → proclaim → you
Lord Archer's long-serving PR is mildly incredulous.
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PR → serve → ?
'I've only been in this room a couple of times and I've known Jeffrey for decades,' she says.
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she → know → decades
Jeffrey, 86, chats animatedly to the 20-something photographic assistant who, it emerges, also works as a stunt double.
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it → chat → double
'You're such a flirt,' I tell him.
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I → tell → him
What man isn't?' he replies.
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he → reply → ?
'But you can't act on it these days,' I remind him.
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I → act → him
Following a cancer diagnosis in 2015, Lord Archer of Weston-super-Mare had surgery to remove his prostate, which he revealed, rendered him permanently impotent.
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him → follow → prostate
'I'd rather have a life.
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I → have → life
It's not much of a choice, is it?' he told me last time we met.
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we → tell → me
'Was this loss of libido like being unshackled from a madman?'
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loss → unshackle → madman
I ask now.
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I → ask → ?
'Don't get cheeky,' he scolds and goes on to explain why the combination of brains and beauty is so intoxicating.
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combination → get → brains
Lord Jeffrey Archer with wife Mary at their home in London
Jeffrey and his wife Mary are pictured on their wedding day
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Jeffrey → picture → day
Here the author is pictured alongside former prime minister Margaret Thatcher in 1986
Jeffrey reveres strong, attractive, intelligent women.
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Jeffrey → picture → women
He surrounds himself with them.
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He → surround → them
His novels, which have sold more than 300million copies in 115 countries – and funded three glorious homes and a collection of priceless art works – are also brimful of beautiful, independent, feisty females.
And now his legions of fans worldwide have a final blockbuster to savour, with a spirited and stunning heroine at its heart.
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legions → sell → heart
You read that correctly: Jeffrey Archer, master of the page turner, consummate storyteller, has written his last novel, exactly 50 years since his first (Not A Penny More, Not A Penny Less) – and chosen to give his farewell interview exclusively to the Daily Mail.
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Archer → read → Mail
Adam & Eve, set in the tumult of the Second World War, is published next month.
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Adam → set → War
It is, in many ways, a bookend to his first international bestseller Kane and Abel – which sold a million copies in its first week alone – sharing the premise of two children, both born on the same day (Armistice Day 1918) but to families at either end of the social spectrum.
Adam is a shepherd's son; Eve the daughter of an Earl.
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Eve → sell → Earl
Racing along at a cracking pace, with all the trademark Archer plot twists and cliff-hangers, it examines a popular theme in his fiction: the gap between where people's lives start and where they end.
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they → race → fiction
Why has he chosen to make this novel his last?
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novel → choose → ?
'It's my most ambitious yet and I genuinely think the best I've ever written,' he says.
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he → think → best
I don't think I could do it again.
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I → think → it
I write every word in longhand with felt tip pen on a 32-line pad.
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I → write → pad
I hand-wrote 18 drafts over two years.
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I → write → years
I don't know how to turn on a computer.
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I → know → computer
They go on too long.
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They → go → ?
Some even go on writing after their death 'with help from' co-authors.
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Some → go → authors
I've put in my will that that can't happen.
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that → put → will
It's swindling the public – but the public aren't stupid.
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public → swindle → public
'I find old age tiresome,' he adds.
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he → find → ?
'I don't think I'd like to live to 100.
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I → think → 100
I have a hip problem.
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I → have → problem
I can't move as fast as I'd like to but thankfully Mary and I both seem to be firing on all cylinders mentally.
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Mary → move → cylinders
'Alzheimer's is my biggest dread, so I test my memory all the time; for names, places, events.'
Jeffrey loves a drama.
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Jeffrey → test → drama
He does not merely speak but harrumphs, squawks and guffaws; his voice ranging through the octaves from grumbling baritone to indignant falsetto.
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voice → speak → falsetto
…and 97 more, not listed.
The Aporia
