How do you research something that hasn’t happened yet? This is a question that writers of dystopian novels ask themselves all the time. What we write is not quite fantasy and not quite science fiction – it is a guess about a near future, an exploration of what might happen and why it is important to prevent that future. So how has this way of thinking affected the research of The Immortal Towermy new alternative future, totalitarian Britain?
There’s a myth that you don’t need to do research when writing novels. And in some aspects of writing, that’s true. As writers, we can dream up magical systems, create entire fake continents, and create alien creatures with no basis in reality. But does that really mean we don’t need to do any research at all? Absolutely not! One of the most important jobs of writers is to make the reader feel like they’re in the shoes of our main characters. That means they need to use real-world details to help the reader develop as much empathy with that character as possible. The reader may never have been to Mars, but researching what that environment is really like will help them feel like they’re there. In our world, there are no dragons for the reader to connect with, but maybe researching how the mechanics of a large lizard work will help them ground themselves in that reality.
The Immortal Tower has a lot of universal themes that I hope explored deeply enough to resonate with readers, including death, grief, environmentalism, and, in some ways, hope. These are all emotions that real people experience every day, and so it was important to me to create a world where these themes not only resonate with the reader, but in many ways reflect the world we all live in. In dystopian fiction, we often hold up a ‘black mirror’ to the world we live in and create something that reflects reality. In that respect, it was important to me to create a dystopian world that feels like it could really happen, despite the immortal twist.
Overpopulation is a good example of a threat to our ecosystem that I wanted to explore using my Undying characters. I designed them to live no longer than 25 years old based on my research into when the human body is fully developed according to the WHO. I looked at what impact this might have on the environment using previous population booms and the data we have and concluded that if CO2 levels rose enough to melt the ice caps, the world would be flooded. I compared the flood map data to a map of the UK to determine which parts would still be viable and which would be underwater, and how the degradation of the land might affect our viability, especially as a larger population.
I even visited Chernobyl in 2017 and saw the effects of both nuclear radiation and mass human flight on the environment, which I used to think about the impact of radioactive fallout in the world. The Immortal TowerChernobyl was particularly useful as a research trip because it allowed me to experience a barren landscape for myself and use all my senses to recreate it for the reader. The emotional toll of what happened there has not escaped me either, and it is a common thread running through all my dystopian books.
I’m a planner, so I usually finish all my research before I commit to a big plot plan. One of the last things I found while scouring the internet for plausible immortality ideas was actually the immortal jellyfish, a type of biologically, naturally occurring, immortal fish. The immortal jellyfish is the only animal we know of that reverts to a sexually immature state in “old age,” which isn’t necessarily what happens to my immortal characters, but it felt like the final piece of the story puzzle at the time, the last bit of research inspiration to solidify my worldbuilding and make it seem real enough for me to start writing.
So, basically, all writers do research. We need to do it to inspire ourselves and to reassure our readers. So the next time you find yourself down a Google rabbit hole feeling guilty about wasting your writing time, have no fear: you might just find your very own immortal jellyfish.
