Q&A with Ellery Lloyd

  

 

 

Ellery Lloyd, the pen name for husband-and-wife writing team Collette Lyons and Paul Vlitos, is the author of the new novel Time to Burn. Their other books include People Like Her. They live in London.

 

Q: What inspired you to write Time to Burn, and how did you create your characters Inigo Frank and Phoebe Hunt?

 

A: It’s always a patchwork of inspiration, which is why all of our novels have been so different.

 

We both love time travel stories, and when you’re plotting one, you have to make an early decision about the mechanics of it: is it driven by magic or technology?

 

We chose technology, specifically technology perfected by a billionaire with a singular obsession and the resources to realise it, who makes it available only to the super-rich. Basically, time travel as a super-exclusive leisure activity. Sound familiar?

 

Anyway, that’s how Inigo Frank came about.

 

Inigo is definitely tech-bro adjacent – you won’t have to look too hard to find real-world parallels. He’s an extremely clever mathematician who is so single-minded that he unleashes a new technology on the world without considering – or really caring – how it might affect ordinary people.

 

Plus, of course, he has secrets of his own that would destroy him if they were uncovered.

 

Phoebe’s role was born from another idea we found interesting. We had been watching a lot of documentaries on Netflix that had been executive produced by their subjects.

 

We thought making Phoebe a serious, award-winning director commissioned by Inigo to make something similar about him would provide a really interesting window into his world, because she’s trying to be objective while Inigo fully expects to be the hero of the piece.

 

Then, as things go wrong and events unfold, she realises the story is much more personal than she ever imagined.

 

Q: Why did you choose the London Blitz as the time period to which your travelers would go?

 

A: One thing we always knew was that we wanted a really atmospheric and dramatic opening to the novel. We loved the idea that, if you carried out enough historical research – which Inigo’s company, Tempus Tours, claims to do – then, with 20/20 hindsight, you could plot a safe route through even something as dangerous as the Blitz.

 

Q: How did you research the book, and what did you learn that especially surprised you?

 

A: We did quite a lot of walking around London while researching the novel, including a tour of one of London’s ghost Tube stations, which had been used as offices during the Blitz and then basically not touched since.

 

We were probably also influenced by living in the East End of London, which was heavily bombed. We pass the plaque commemorating where the first V2 rocket fell every day on the school run.

 

The biggest challenge was working out the mechanics of the time travel, with its own internal logic and set of rules. We didn't want it to become a lecture, though, so we tried to arrive at just enough of the theoretical physics for it to feel plausible without swamping the reader.

 

We also researched the sort of commune where Phoebe and Sasha grew up, which plays a big role in the novel. That was fascinating, and probably the most surprising thing we discovered was that we actually know several people who had grown up in similar communities, so we had lots of questions for them.

 

Q: Do you have any other favorite time travel novels?

 

A: The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley, the novella By His Bootstraps by Robert A. Heinlein, and Ray Bradbury’s short story “A Sound of Thunder.”

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: Lots of things! We’re working on some concepts for TV and a few short stories, while plotting our next novel.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: A fun Ellery Lloyd fact: we cannot work in the same room because we’re both incredibly loud typers!

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Ellery Lloyd.