A novel idea

A friend of mine is writing a novel. It's her eighth, and this one is to be a departure from her usual rural Irish setting.

"It's to take place on an exotic island where the Sultan is on the look out for his fourth wife and has his eye on a blond stewardess who works for his private airline. I'm still working on the synopsis but I'm trying not to make it too fantastical," she tells me.

I say: "How about the Sultan is a bald middle-aged billionaire lothario who has two known illegitimate children, one with a waitress and the other with an air stewardess. He spots a gorgeous blond athlete 20 years his junior and persuades her to marry him. Just before the wedding she does a runner when rumours of a third love-child emerge and ends up having her passport confiscated and being bundled back to the Sultan's court to go through with the wedding. She does so only when promised she can divorce him as soon as she produces a child. Oh, and on the honeymoon they sleep in separate hotels and go home early to await the results of the DNA tests on his latest alleged love child."

She gives me a you-have-clearly-never-written-a-novel look and says: "It has to be believable, Kate."

I tell her of the latest revelations about Prince Albert of Monaco and his new wife Charlene.

"You see," I say. "Truth really is stranger than fiction."