Lee Green-based author Claire Seeber talks about her new book, Bad Friends. Inspired by her time working in TV, it takes a darker look at the industry.

I grew up in Greenwich after my parents moved here from abroad. I was born in the old hospital in Greenwich which was recently knocked down and have never strayed too far. I went to school in Blackheath and even learnt how to type at Lewisham College after I did a degree at Surrey University. I did a creative writing course at Goldsmiths Uni too.

Bad Friends is the story of a disillusioned TV producer, Maggie Warren, who hails from Greenwich (though she lives in Borough Market for most of the book, but her dad still lives in Greenwich). When she's involved in a tragic accident on the way back from ending a destructive love affair, she is somehow talked into appearing on the chat-show she works on, and soon afterwards finds herself acquiring a stalker. It looks at the nature of obsessive love, fame and who should be responsible for the welfare of those who appear on TV. It's my 2nd novel, the first - Lullaby - was published a year ago and is about a young mother (who lives in Blackheath) whose baby and husband go missing on a day-trip to the Tate Modern.

Having worked in TV for years, when I had my first baby in 2004 I finally had the chance to attend a creative writing course at Goldsmiths University. At the same time I wrote the opening chapter of Lullaby for a competition on Richard and Judy and although it didn't win (49,000 people entered apparently) it just took off from there after I read it to my class and they liked it - I just kept going.

The inspiration for the book Bad Friends came when I was still working in documentary TV, years ago. I was talking to a counsellor on the phone while I was researching a Channel 4 series on sex therapy and something she said made me think about giving advice to vulnerable people and how sometimes it might be misinterpreted or how someone might blame the advice-giver afterwards for things that then happen in their lives. It was the trigger for the idea. I'd started my TV career at MTV but had moved onto an ITV chat show called The Time, The Place hosted by John Stapleton, which was axed eventually for the more racy Vanessa show. I knew on these chat shows a lot depends on firing the participants up behind the scenes, encouraging them to be very opinionated and to argue with those they don't agree with - and some of my colleagues had very few scruples when it came to getting a good show out of the people who appeared on them. I married the two ideas, and there we have the idea for Bad Friends.

The aim of the book ultimately is to be a really gripping read I hope, a page-turner if you like. But I also like to comment on what's going on socially and without being overly moral. I do worry about the nature of TV and where we're headed with it in this X-Factor, Big Brother age where all kids just want to be on TV and fame seems more important than anything else. To the detriment of some people's mental health sometimes if they're not strong enough to deal with the fall-out or rejection etc afterwards. As a writer, I like to put a twist on situations which seem normal and to keep the reader guessing what that twist is, hopefully until near the end.

I find it almost impossible to write when my kids are round my feet so I have to wait until they're in the cupboard - I mean playschool - or I write at night though that's my worst time really because it's very hard to switch off afterwards and sleep. Or I write when my husband's around and can entertain them. I like writing best in the morning but that's not always possible. It has been a question of writing when I can find a spare second more than having a favourite time.

I am just starting work on my third novel which is about a woman whose life looks perfect on the outside but maybe all is not as it seems. I'm also writing a play as my background was in drama, I was an actress for a while but gave it up when I got asked to be entertaining with a Pringle crisp in an audition.

I like all sorts of writers from the classics like Austen and Dickens, to Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca (one of the first books that I stayed up all night reading, desperate to know the twist), through to modern thriller writers like Nicci French. My guilty pleasure used to be Jilly Cooper - though I think she might have gone off the boil a bit lately.

Bad Friends by Claire Seeber, published by Avon is out now, priced £6.99.