Q&A: novelist Fiona Barton

Could you tell us about the inspiration behind Talking to Strangers?

It probably dates back to childhood... when my mother told me never to talk to strangers. She drummed it into me, evoking the strangers of nightmares - the evil predators in dirty macs who tempted kids with sweeties or puppies before snatching and murdering them. But we all talk to strangers now, don't we? Now that we live online. People become our friends or followers at the click of a button. Or the swipe of a finger.

Fast forward to a lunch with friends, when one announced she had a date with a man she'd never met. "It's on Salisbury Plain," she said, buzzing with excitement. "He's sent me the map co-ordinates." She just laughed when I told her he was clearly an axe murderer with a shovel in the boot of his car. And I realised for her - and many of the women happily dating online - meeting 'The One' was worth the risks.

As a writer, I loved that potential jeopardy, the room for deception, the danger people put themselves in to find their happy endings.