The Making of Coldbrook
by
Tim Lebbon
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So why the apocalypse, why multiverse theory, and why zombies? The glib answer is –– why not? But in this case glibness would make for a very short, very boring blog. So I’d like to unglib for a moment and tell you about how Coldbrook came about.
Picture the scene –– a handful of writers at a weekend writers retreat. Lebbon, Greenwood, Lewis, Pinborough, Nevill, Meloy. Always a good weekend, they do inevitably involve some drinking and competitive cooking (never let Pinborough near an oven), but they’re also very productive. We work all day, apart from frequent kitchen visits for a cuppa and some biscuits, then sit around chatting long into the night. I’ve been on quite a few weekend now, and as well as being very productive, I always find them inspiring.
The weekend in question I was chatting with Adam Nevill (a good friend and incredible writer, if you haven’t read him I recommend you go out immediately and buy his books. Done it? Okay, we can continue). I was musing about which project to work on next. And Adam muttered those fateful words, “You know, Tim, you could write an amazing zombie novel.”
I’d already been thinking about destroying the world again. By my estimation I’d already killed over thirty billion people in my fiction, so it was time for me to launch into what would be my biggest, largest-scale apocalypse novel. I’ve always loved Wyndham, John Christopher, Ballard, and one of my favourite novels is King’s The Stand.
And so Coldbrook came to be. I spent the rest of that weekend writing notes, and they came thick and fast. I wanted it to be different, not just a traditional ‘and then the zombies ate his face’ novel. I wanted it to edge into science fiction territory, and as is often the case with plotting novels, two random ideas came together to form a concept that, to me, instantly felt whole and rounded. Zombies and the multiverse.
I wasn’t only going to infect one Earth with the zombie infestation. I was going to attack an infinite number of Earths.
I needed a title. Sometimes they leap to mind almost unbidden, sometimes I have to work for them. And sometimes I go on a bike ride, see the name of a big house in the country, and borrow it for the title of my forthcoming novel. Coldbrook it was.
The concept also meant that I had to do something I wasn’t that used to. Indeed, something I often did my best to avoid. The dreaded … ‘research’. Because even as I dipped my toe into multiverse theory, I came to understand that this was much more science than it was fiction. So many renowned and respected scientists put a lot of time and effort into exploring the possibility and existence of multiple universes. I love this quote, “Quantum mechanics: the dreams that stuff is made of.“ And that sums up pretty well the whole idea of multiverse theory. It’s beyond what we think we can understand. It’s around corners, extra-dimensional, unknowable. Try to imagine a new colour that has never been seen, and multiple realities is like that. It fascinated me, and as a writer, of course, it was prime material to work with.
Research for this novel was definitely not a chore.
So I wrote a long proposal for the novel and sold it on that basis, but as usually happens, the actual writing went very differently. I ran with it. Characters formed and took over, certain ideas I’d had were discarded when others popped up, and slowly Coldbrook took shape. I wanted it to be a big-scale novel, following those people ostensibly responsible for the release of the zombie contagion as they tried to put things right. But I also wanted it to be about the characters. There’s no point in destroying the world (or worlds) if you can’t empathise with the characters you’re gleefully putting through hell, and I like to think I came up with a good cast.
As for the ending … that came to me halfway through the novel, and I had to sit back and really think about it. Could I do it? Could I really do that? The fact that I was a little worried about the idea I’d had––what people would think of it, how much controversy it might ignite––was the very reason I knew I had to do it. What a tease, eh?
So in a very short space, that’s the story of the making of Coldbrook. For the story of Coldbrook itself––the research facility deep beneath the Appalachian mountains, the scientists conducting their experiments there, and the people who become inextricably linked with Coldbrook when the first zombie steps through that breach from another Earth––you’ll have to check out the book.
I hope you enjoy it. And remember, somewhere in the infinite sea of universes, this is a true story.
Tim Lebbon
