ACCLAIMED author Magnus Mills doesn't think writing should interfere with your work, especially not if it involves driving a Transit van.

And Magnus readily admits that being a London bus driver played a major part in promoting his first book, The Restraint of Beasts.

But reaching the Booker Prize short list takes more than an ability to negotiate rush hour traffic in the capital. Magnus didn't even realise he had been selected for this prestigious award, until he heard about it while watching Channel 4 news in the staff canteen.

It marked the start of a massive publicity stunt, which took Magnus to Sweden, Brazil, Spain and Finland.

Despite being besieged by paparazzi on his bus routes and persuaded to drive a tram full of journalists, this novelist still claims he hasn't changed.

"I love my day job and only close colleagues know that I write books in my spare time," he said.

Whereas some authors get bogged down with adjectives and metaphors, Magnus has a simple style.

When interviewer, James Rampton, commented on his "spare" prose, he said: "I make my sentences as long as I can get them."

Having completed his fourth novel, Three to See the King, Magnus intended to retire from writing. But another idea intervened and his next creation, The Scheme of Full Employment, is already in its finishing stages.

As much as Magnus wants writing to steer clear of his future, I suspect he is powerless to stop it.