What gave you the idea for Time Runners?

I don’t really remember, actually. It was probably a combination of lots of things. I’ve always been fascinated with time travel and with the problems and paradoxes it can throw up – I’m a big fan of Doctor Who, of course! Also, my older son Julian had just started at secondary school – going from a very small village school (there were 36 pupils in the school when he started) to a school where there were about 2,000. He didn’t seem to have any of the problems that Jamie does adapting and settling in – he loved it! But a lot of the business of coming up with ideas is thinking ‘what if..?’

Another thought was a fear which I think a lot of children go through at one time or another – the fear that they might come home and find they don’t live there any more – everything’s changed, everyone has gone. Combine that with the fear we all have of being ignored or just not being noticed, and I had a few things to think about!


Is Jamie like you?

I suppose he is a bit. Time Runners is the first thing I’ve written – of any length – in the first person. So I suppose even more of the author than usual rubs off on the main character. Having said that, all writers are actors at heart – we play out different roles, on paper rather than on a stage. So, yes – there are some similarities, but no – Jamie’s nothing like me really.

One of the challenges of writing in the character of a child of Jamie’s age is that to explain things and realise what’s going on, the character often has to have wisdom and experience that seems to go beyond their age and background. With Jamie that’s less of a problem – he could be much much older now, though he always seems to be 12 – telling us about events that took place a long time ago. Or telling someone, anyway. Is he talking to us, or to someone else?!


What else are you working on at the moment?

I’m always busy with my work on the Doctor Who range that BBC Books published. I am Creative Director, which sound very grand, and actually means I advise on what we should publish and then edit the books before they come out. I write some of them too, of course. I’ve just finished a monsters book that comes out in May 2007 – Creatures and Demons. I’m not working on writing a Doctor Who novel at the moment, though I may do another one soon.

I do a lot of other writing for Doctor Who books too – short stories for the Doctor Who Files for BBC Children’s Books, for example. Some bits and pieces for the Doctor Who Adventures comic… I’ve just completed a draft of the third Time Runners novel – called Past Forward – in which Jamie and Anna end up in America in the near future. There’s dangerous time experiments, and street gangs, and a Monster. Oh, and Midnight may be lurking in there somewhere up to no good…

I have a book for older children – The Chaos Code – due out in April from Faber and Faber here in the UK. That’s very exciting and I’m very pleased with it. Also for Faber I’m in the middle of writing a sequel to The Death Collector. Well, it’s not really a sequel – you don’t have to read Death Collector first – but it features the same characters and set-up. That’s called The Parliament of Blood and is out in spring 2008.

I recently collaborated with Jack Higgins – who is a terrific writer of amazing adult thrillers and one of my favourite authors. We wrote a children’s adventure called Sure Fire, which is out in hardback from Harper Collins now and comes out in paperback in May 2007. We’re working on a second in that series to come out in October 2007, but it doesn’t have a title yet. Rather, it has about a dozen titles and we’re trying to decide on our favourite!

Apart from that, not much o just now!


What do you plan to write next?

Well, as you can tell, I like to keep busy – so there will be something. I’m certainly doing a fourth Time Runners book, and I’ll be starting properly on that soon. And I am committed to doing a fourth book for Faber as well which I have some ideas about and am looking forward to starting…
After that – we'll see.


Will Jamie ever get home?

Ah, now that would be telling. I do know the answer. I know what happens at the end of Jamie’s story, whenever that turns out to be. But I mustn’t spoil it for you! Keep reading, and you’ll find out.