Q&A with Patience Agbabi
The Circle Breakers is the third book in the series by Patience Agbabi with a fourth still to come. We were recently given the opportunity to ask Patience a bit about her books and plans for the series. Thank you to Patience for the superb answers.
Can you tell us a bit about this series for any who are new to The Leap Cycle books?
The Leap Cycle’s a time-travel adventure series featuring Elle and her friends. They’re all Leaplings, born on the 29th of February with a rare Gift: the ability to leap through time. My Leaplings often have names relating to time or maths like Big Ben, MC2 and GMT. They call themselves The Infinites and fight crime across time which involves coming up against some pretty unique villains who were great fun to create. The first book, The Infinite, takes place mainly in the year 2048; The Time-Thief, in 1752; and the new book, The Circle Breakers, involves leaping back to the Victorian era, the Age of the Railway.
Elle is back and has some big decisions to make. How have you developed her character over the three books?
One of the exciting challenges of writing this series is to watch my character grow up. At times, it feels like I’m raising her alongside my own children! Elle is autistic and at the beginning of The Infinite she has one close friend, Big Ben, but she’s bullied in school. I wanted to show Elle develop that friendship, make more friends and find a strategy for dealing with the bully with the support of the school and her new mates. As the books progress, I enabled Elle to grow in confidence and emotional intelligence which helps her face more and more difficult challenges as she grows up. On the physical side, Elle has strong sensory sensitivities, especially around the colour of food and by the later books she finds strategies to manage them. She’s also an athlete and grows in strength, speed and skill as she gets taller and stronger. That makes her even better at leaping through time.
What research did you do for these stories?
For The Infinite, I read a lot of online articles about what life might be like in the year 2050, the closest year to the leap year 2048 where much of the book was set. Most of them focused on the potential impact of climate change if we don’t change the way we live in time. I researched the weather, food and transport. I also looked at current inventions like flying cars, ecobots that eat waste and jetpacks and imagined how they might be commonplace in a future society.
For The Time-Thief I spent several wonderful hours in Dr Johnson’s house in London just before the first lockdown and read about the 18th century. Three books were invaluable: The Fortunes of Francis Barber by Michael Bundock helped me recreate a 10-year-old version of Francis; Dr Johnson’s London by Liza Picard had lots of fun tiny quirky chapters and I downloaded Johnson’s Dictionary to get a feel for 18th century words and expressions to weave into the narrative.
For The Circle Breakers, I read lots online about the impact of the railway in changing the way we manage time. One book was particularly compelling: The Railways, Nation, Network and People by Simon Bradley. And I had lots of chats with my railfan boys! I also researched the character of the composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor who has a central role in the book and The Song Of Hiawatha by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, the poem he based his cantatas on.
Where did the idea come from to have Leaplings, those born on the 29th of February?
From the character of Elle. I made her in my own image, an athletics fan, loving the Summer Olympics that usually take place in leap years. Her favourite athlete of all time is Bob Beamon who still holds the Olympic record for his phenomenal 8 metres 90 centimetre leap in Mexico City, 1968. One day I thought, why not make her a leapling? It would accentuate her obsession with leap years. The word leap recurring gave me that eureka moment: what if Elle was a leapling who could leap through time? Such Leaplings had to have a capital L.
Action packed and filled with brilliant characters, these books have been praised highly- does that spur you on to write more and extend the series?
Thanks. The response has been great and that has definitely given me more impetus for writing the next books. But there were always going to be a maximum of four. The Leap Cycle series is conceptual, launched in real time: the first book came out in the leap year 2020; the fourth book will come out in 2024.
What is your writing process like? Do you have a more productive time of day? Do you need caffeine, treats or music to encourage you?
Like most novelists, I write in the morning between 8am and 1pm. I get my best ideas when I’m still half awake so I like to harness that creative energy as soon as possible. Once the children are off to school, the house is mine. I drink green tea with honey every morning and stop around 11 for a snack which is usually something like peanuts or rice cakes as I’m a veteran athlete so I try to eat sensible foods most of the time! For The Infinite I went through a stage listening to music from 1968 and a bit of rap to get into MC2’s headspace. And recently I’ve found listening to early grime gives me more get up and go on those dark Winter mornings.
Are you working on anything you can share details about?
Yes. I’m writing Book 4 of The Leap Cycle. Key scenes take place on the millennium and beyond so watch this space…
The Leap Cycle series is written by Patience Agbabi and is published by Canongate. The first three books are available now.
Views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the Federation.