Tim Lebbon has two new novels out this month – his adaptation of the screenplay for Kong: Skull Island, and the first in a new trilogy, Relics (see our review here), in which his characters encounter the darker side of London… and of life… As part of his blog tour, Lebbon kindly answered a few questions from Paul Simpson…

What was the inspiration for the story – was there a specific incident or character that came to mind?

I wrote a short story for an anthology called Streets of Shadows, featuring a trade in the relics of mythological creatures, and that was really the seed of the idea. I was also toying with writing thrillers at the time (which I eventually did with The Hunt and The Family Man), so the idea for Relics came together pretty quickly. It was one of those novel ideas that felt nice and whole from the beginning, not the sort that has to be bashed and beaten into shape. That’s not to say it wasn’t hard to write––I never find writing easy. But once I had the basic concept, it was a pleasure finding all the elements and slipping them into place. I guess it was the novel I really wanted to write at the time, blending horror, fantasy, and thriller elements.

Why did you set the story specifically in London?

From the first, it was always set in London. I couldn’t imagine it working anywhere else. Curiously, I think it was the crime/thriller element that really demanded that, as much as the deep history I needed to feel behind the novel for the wider mythology to work. Plus, I know London better than any other big city. Although in truth, of course, I hardly know it at all. I wish I’d had the time to get beneath the streets into some of those hidden places, but I did spend a while wandering the London streets, and each main location in the novel is based on places I’ve been or know.

And why an American female lead?

The story is going to expand in future books, and the second novel is set largely in the USA. So although Relics begins feeling quite confined, I wanted to plant the seed that the story will open up in future novels. Also, I quite liked the idea of having someone who wasn’t a Londoner travelling around the city and searching its shadowy places for her lost loved one. Angela is pretty strong and capable, but I think this makes her task even more challenging.

How much of the worldbuilding (with regard to the creatures encountered) did you do upfront, and how much developed during the writing?

A little upfront, but most during the writing. That’s how I work on most of my novels actually. I don’t plan and plot out in great detail, because to do that I feel can take some of the discovery and immediacy out of writing. Of course, there’s always a proposal (to sell the novel in the first place), but that often ends up in a drawer never to be read again! I usually plan 3 or 4 chapters ahead while I’m writing, and although I had a pretty firm idea of the world I wanted Relics set in, it definitely expanded and grew as I was writing and coming up with new ideas.

We’ve had a couple of straight thrillers, and an SF trilogy from you in recent times – do you find you’re stretching different writing muscles in a fantasy story?

I like writing in different genres and challenging myself. I think it’s essential. I couldn’t write three supernatural novels every year, year after year, it would drive me mad and, more importantly, I think my work would grow stale. So I like to challenge myself––the Rage War trilogy, although Alien and Predator properties, was a big scale military SF story, and that was a huge undertaking which I thoroughly enjoyed. As for fantasy… I’ve written 6 fantasy novels for Bantam in the USA, and Allison & Busby and Orbit in the UK, and although I’ve not written alternate world fantasy for a few years, I still really love world building. So yes, while dipping my toe in different genres does exercise other muscles, that’s a good thing. Otherwise they’d atrophy.

When we spoke in October 2015, you were waiting for edit notes on Relics – how much did the story alter from your original conception to the finished book? Did you move material into later books, for example?

No, there were no significant changes, it was more a fine-tune than a revision. Which is how I like it!

Apart from the other books in this trilogy, what else are you working on at the moment – any more Alien/Predator books in the pipeline?

No more Alien and Predator novels at present, no. I’m finishing a big fantasy novel with Christopher Golden, and I’m hoping to be writing some more thrillers pretty soon too, I really enjoyed working on The Hunt and The Family Man. I’m also writing an original novel based in a universe some of your readers will be big fans of, but I can’t say more about that yet. Keep an eye on my website.

There are several movie projects which I’m hoping will progress soon. One of them is Playtime, the script I wrote with Stephen Volk, which is with a producer and director and moving forward well. Another is a possible movie of The Hunt, written by Derek Kolstad (the writer behind the wonderful John Wick films). Exciting times!

 

 

 Relics is out now from Titan Books; and don’t miss the other stops on Tim Lebbon’s blog tour!