by Robert Webb
Come Again is an adventure story and while I doubt that it will be accused of burdening the reader with a superabundance of detailed research, I do have some people to thank. In advising me that certain events in the story are unlikely but not impossible: thanks go to Sarah Logan, Niraj and Shama Goyal, Tom Hilton, James Bachman and Ellis Sareen. All howling implausibilities in the fields of medicine, Karate, computer science and national security are entirely my own but I thank them for the advice offered.
Thank you, fellow writers. I ruined what could have been a nice lunch with the brilliant Robert Thorogood by pitching the entire book at him while whining about having to write it. Absurdly under-exploited given their copious talents, Mark Evans was consulted on a crossword clue and Jason Hazeley advised on the funniest musical note. The idea of performing a musical on a single note was one which I thought I had stolen from Robert Popper but turned out I had actually stolen from Peter Serafinowicz. Thanks Peter.
God knows what I’ve stolen from David Mitchell. Every so often I came across an idea or a turn of phrase and thought, ‘Was that me just now or was that David in 1996?’ David had no influence on this particular book and every imaginable influence on the writer who wrote it. I’m going to have to thank him forever, aren’t I? Yes! Thank you, David.
Speaking of long marriages between writer/performers, let me begin to thank my wife, Abigail Burdess. I thought that the character of Madeleine Theroux was an admiring but comic characterisation of Abbie’s mother, Marion. It has been pointed out to me over several calm and sophisticated marital conversations that I am mistaken. Madeleine is not my version of Marion. Madeleine is my version of Abbie’s version of Marion, which Abbie has been writing and performing for a good twenty years: notably in Abbie’s beautiful play, All The Single Ladies but in many other forms. I would also like to say to Marion – we love you. You only keep turning up in this stuff because you’re magnificent.
More generally I’d like to thank Abbie for her advice on the structure of the story which considerably improved it. And more than anything for the love and support she has offered over these years.
She is, of course, the original Girl From the Future.
‘A truly great read, full of heart’
Dawn French
‘A rollicking time-hopping fantasy’
Observer
‘Astounding’
Lena Dunham
