I’m a journalist, which is why, at first, I was shy to admit that I was writing a novel. After all, fiction is a funny thing. Part art, part science — it’s the kernel of truth, the real moment of an experience lived — distorted, reframed and made to matter. Isn’t fact — undistorted and unfettered — what matters most? Isn’t that why I have dedicated my life to the telling of truth, listening to thousands of stories shared with me at kitchen tables, polling stations and small businesses across