Interview: Steve Emmerson

Author of Dark Progeny in conversation with Clara Beam.

The house is very large, surrounded by well-established and well-maintained laurel shrubs and an assorted variety of rose bushes just coming into bloom. The sweeping gravel approach contains a 1914 Rolls Royce Silver Ghost parked ostentatiously near the majestic front entrance.

As I pull up, my Nissan Micra blushes to be left in such austere company. My first thought is "why does Steve Emmerson write these Doctor Who books? It's quite obviously not for the money."

Steve greets me as I clamber out of my little car. He's wearing jeans and a T-shirt with a pair of old trainers. Not at all what you'd expect of a man who lives in such luxurious surroundings. I am at once fascinated by this reclusive personality. It's taken me months of phone calls to set up this meeting today at his private residence.

"I've arranged for tea by the pool," Steve informs me, and shows me through the impressive gardens.

We eventually reach an open-air swimming pool that has a table by the side of it upon which is arranged a china tea set. We settle to a cup of Earl Grey, and I voice my admiration for Steve's home.

He smiles dismissively. "The family pile. It's a lovely place to live. Away from the hustle and bustle of the city. I value my solitude."

I understand Steve is an accountantå

"Yes. I run my own business. Long hours and very hard work, but it has its upsides. I have a wonderful diversity of clients. All kinds of people. I spend many happy hours a week discussing all sorts of things with them besides their profits and tax. I suppose people feel that when you've been rummaging around in their most private financial affairs they've pretty much bared their soul to you anyway.

A good number of my clients also become good friends. The job can provide a real insight into human nature. It's wonderful work for someone who also happens to write."

I ask him about his new book for the BBC's Doctor Who range, due out in August. What's it about, exactly?

"It's about the 'human condition', of course, like any book. I suppose it's really "about" an awful lot of stuff. It's a book that's much bigger on the inside than it appears on the outside. It's dimensionally transcendental."

Steve sips his tea thoughtfully.

"It's about what immense damage we're doing to our world, how hopeless the situation is when we're faced with such mind-boggling human greed and arrogance. How all sense of balance and nature has been completely lost to us. This insolent attitude that homo-sapiens are somehow ensconced at the top of Creation's tree, just one little step down from God.

"It's about how our children inherit our values and continue to rape the Earth despite understanding the terrible truth about what they're doing. It's about how powerful is the inheritance of human social values (or, rather, the deficiency of them). It's about our children and their children's children. Our very own dark progeny. And it's partly about how huge organisations reflect the personality of the people, or the kind of people, that run them.

"But don't think this is a deep well of despondency. It's not." Steve flashes me a Tom Baker kind of a grin. "It's primarily a rollicking good sci-fi romp. The anxieties are pretty well submerged beneath a story that pelts along. At least, I hope it does. I wanted to write something that was choppy and stimulating. That you only realised was about "issues" when you sat down and thought back over it after you'd finished.

"You need to delve between the lines to get to the issues of Progeny. It's not preachy or didactic in any way, but there is a conversation going on in there as well as a story. I'm a firm believer that you can see the universe in a grain of sand. From the day to day situation of individuals you can see a picture of the whole human cosmos."

Sounds intriguing. Are there any striking similarities with his first book for the range, Casualties of War?

"Apart from the fact that they've both got my name on the cover, not a lot, actually. Caz was a more traditionally styled story that I wanted to reflect the time it was set.

"Progeny is set in the year 2847 on an alien planet, so it has a very different feel. At least – that's what I was striving for. It's a much busier story, with a lot more to pack in, so the pace should crack along faster than Casualties. I suppose the only real similarity is that I've tried to still capture solid, strong characters that the reader can get very involved with.'

Is he pleased with the end result?

þYou never really know until the reaction comes in. I get so close to my writing that it's hard to judge it clearly unless you can put some space between you and it. I had some reservations when I first finished it, but the people who read through the first draft for me were all very enthusiastic, so hopefully I've achieved what I set out to achieve.'

What inspired Steve to write Dark Progeny?

"Many things. One of them was a quote that I use to start off the book. It begins- 'Your children are not your children'. It was used by a relative in her card to us on the birth of our baby boy in November 1996. Its meaning stuck in my brain ever since. I'm not saying I agree with what it says, but it makes a wonderful starting point for a book about children, and these children particularly.

"Another inspiration was seeing the experiences of a close friend who lived in an idyllic little cottage surrounded by giant old trees. The trees had preservation orders on them. His neighbour illegally cut down all those beautiful old trees in order to build a huge new edifice right over the fence from this little cottage. Completely ruined the area but the bloke got planning permission nevertheless because it was too late by the time he'd chopped the trees.

The wildlife didn't even come into the equation. Somebody wanted a house, so that's what happened, regardless of the cost to the environment. It just drove home the desperation for building-space these days and the sheer bloody-minded arrogance of people.

We're living in a world that's getting very overpopulated and we really need to take stock of what effect we're having on our environment. That's a result of many scientific and social factors that human beings need to get to grips with, and these are basically what are being discussed in Dark Progeny."

Is he a fully paid-up member of Green Peace, then?

Steve laughs. "Having children focuses you on certain things, I think. I'm not an activist or anything, but I think we really just need to discuss what's going on here. No, I'm not a member of Green Peace."

I'm interested to know which writers Steve admires, or feels he takes inspiration from.

"Writing that leaves you a slightly different person at the end of the book is writing that I admire. I like 'books' as opposed to 'writers'. The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro is a good example. It's an incredible achievement. You're just completely gutted by the time you get to the end of it, and I really think it changed something in me. You can see why it took the Booker. That's just one example of writing that I admire. There are too many others to list and discuss."

So what's the attraction of Doctor Who?

Steve looks wistful. "I grew up with Doctor Who from about the age of nine so the Doctor had a profound influence on me, I suppose. I have very fond memories of getting completely lost in the TV stories, particularly the mid to late 'seventies. I wanted to be Tom Baker. In terms of story telling it's quite simply a limitless premise. You can do anything, anywhere, anytime. It's magic."

But despite his admiration for Tom Baker he's concentrated on Eighth Doctor novels so far. Is there a reason for that?

"Steve Cole (then Range Consultant) wanted me to write an Eighth Doctor story for my first book for some reason. And Casualties of War just accidentally fitted in thematically with what they wanted to do with the Eighth Doctor Adventures at the time. Dark Progeny was one of the ideas I submitted to Steve before they decided to go for Caz.

"It was never exclusively an Eighth Doctor story, but it did feel right with the Eighth rather than any of the others, so when I submitted my follow-up proposal for book two it just sort of naturally became another Eighth Doctor Adventure. When I originally sent in my first proposal and sample, I was very careful to point out that although it was written as an Eighth Doctor Adventure it might well work as a Seventh Doctor Adventure. I didn't mind which strand I wrote for. I just wanted to write a Doctor Who book."

So what are Steve's plans for his next book? Another Eighth Doctor story?

At this point there is some disturbance in the distance, and Steve jumps up. He thinks it must be Titchmarsh, his gardener, but he better go check. I am left sipping Earl Grey in the sunshine. There is the sound of birdsong and the rustle of the breeze through the surrounding shrubs. There is the scent of roses and the sunlight reflects off the dappled surface of the pool.

Then a tall, wire-haired man appears nearby, dressed in tweed jacket and moleskin jodhpurs.

"Who on Earth," he asks snootily down his long hooked nose, "might you be?"

At that same moment I hear barking dogs in the background. Large dogs, by the sound of them. Distant bushes crashingå then a strangled cry.

"Gerroff! Gerroff! You vicious little – "

***

The police were very understanding. After only a couple of hours of form-filling I was on my way. I believe Steve Emmerson was detained for some hours in the cells, although I'm not sure exactly what happened to him. I haven't been able to contact him again since that day.

I understand the house he was using belonged to Sir William Archbold, the haulage tycoon. I'm not sure if Sir William pressed charges. I don't think Steve caused any actual damage to the property, apart from slightly injuring one of the dogs. But then the dog inflicted much more serious injuries on Steve's backside, I was informed by the police.

So, there you have it. My brief experience of Steve Emmerson. Something of a dark horse, it seems.

Clara Beam.

• Steve Emmerson
  

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