Back in Black

On Boxing Day I found myself running across some sand dunes in Minehead. Not especially exciting I grant you, but I had a strong feeling of déjà vu. You see dear reader, it was on the same route seven years ago that I originally had the idea for ‘Oblivion Black’.

Sian, myself and some merry pranksters would travel to Minehead Butlin’s for the much missed ‘All Tomorrow’s Party’ festival, which was always lots of drunken indie fun (where I first saw the mighty Low). One ATP festival to slightly mitigate the damage was doing to my internal organs I went for a run and as I was running - I my imagination - I could see a figure walking towards me in a full hazmat suit. I knew that this figure - whoever they were - hadn’t been outside for a few years because of some catastrophe which they’d been hiding from, and that they had reluctantly come outside on an urgent mission, and the book was born with a series of questions about what was happening and why. What I did know was the person had travelled from an underground bunker called The Sanctuary. There was a lot of work, some mistakes but ‘Oblivion Black’ was more successful than I could have ever hoped, and soon I started to think about how the story would continue. The illustrations featured here are by the hugely talented Neil Davies for the hardback edition. The first draft came very easily and around the third or fourth a new big bad appeared who I’ve really enjoyed writing for. Then can the edits.

Going for the run on Boxing Day on the same route had a nice continuity as I wait for the final edits for ‘Oblivion Black: Poisoned Kingdom’ the sequel, which we’re launching in San Diego at the end of May. I am, of course, as nervous as fuck, but nothing worth doing didn’t come with a high level of anxiety. The story in Poisoned Kingdom takes the characters and situations from the first book and expands the world, with a new big bad who I loved writing for. As my long suffering editor - Helen Woodhouse - pointed out around half way through writing the second book I realized that there was a lot more story to tell. In fact there was a whole other final book to write, and I had the idea of how that was to start when I was running on the sand dunes in Minehead on Boxing Day.