How Gillian F. Taylor put a TV star into another orbit
THE RETURN OF THE SPACE COWBOYS

Gillian Taylor

A long time ago, in a living-room in rural England, I used to watch a sci-fi TV series called Blake's 7. The series followed the adventures of an ill-assorted bunch of freedom fighters and criminals who were rebelling against the fascist Terran Federation. It ran for four series and has survived as a cult in spite of woefully low budgets and subsequently dodgy special effects. The strong points were the writing and acting, which created characters that viewers cared deeply about.

The two longest-serving characters were Avon and Vila, played by Paul Darrow and Michael Keating. Both characters were criminals, who escaped with the freedom fighter Blake, and who somewhat reluctantly continued his fight after Blake's disappearance. Avon was the computer genius, who tried to avoid getting emotionally close to his companions, and who insisted he could manage better alone. Vila was a cowardly, compulsive thief from the opposite end of the social spectrum, who thrived on the company of others. In spite of their differences, they respected each other's talents, and shared a degree of self-interest that sometimes united them against the idealism of other crew members. Both characters remain very popular with fans, who treasure their way with words.

Before takeoff . . . Paul Darrow (Avon,left), and Michael Keating (Vila).

Vila: 'I've got this shocking pain right behind the eyes.'
Avon: 'Have you considered amputation?'

As a fan, I collected Blake's 7 merchandise, which included a monthly magazine. In one magazine, Paul Darrow said that he would love to appear in a western. Years later, when I was writing westerns, I decided to honour this wish, if not quite in the way he'd hoped for. I couldn't cast Paul in a film, but I could use his name in a book. So could I fit Avon, and of course Vila, into a western?

The characters have appeared in other forms of fiction before. My dictionary defines the word "avatar" as "The manifestation of a deity in human or animal form, or a visible manifestation of an abstract concept". In writing now, avatar is commonly used to describe a character based on, or directly inspired by, a character from another book, or film/TV series.

In my case, I followed the lead of writers such as Tanith Lee and Lois McMaster Bujold, by "borrowing" characters from the 1970s Blake's 7. Tanith Lee, the fantasy author, wrote two episodes of Blake's 7, and subsequently wrote a novel called Kill The Dead, which featured Avon- and Vila-inspired characters. One is called Parl Dro, which is pretty much what Paul Darrow's autograph looks like.

From Spaceships to Horses

So how to suit Avon and Vila to the Wild West? I wanted to write a novel set in a town, rather than on the range, so I took the two anti-authority characters and make them into lawmen, while still keeping the basic flavour of the characters.

Both Darrow and Keating are rather reluctant lawmen. It was impossible to see Avon/Sheriff Darrow as anything other than aristocratic, so I made him into a Southern gentleman. His family fortune has been lost in the Civil War so he becomes Sheriff simply to earn a living even though he openly refers to the little rail town as a "God-forsaken backwoods town".

Like Avon, Sheriff Darrow is something of a loner, who doesn't like to admit any dependence on others. He has little patience with fools and uses his forceful personality to bully weaker characters but can be surprisingly gentle with the harmless and innocent.

I have a book on English gentlemen in the West, and wanted to explore this idea. Although in the TV series, Vila was a low-grade citizen, I decided to make Deputy Hugh into an English gentleman. More than a few of the wealthy Englishmen in the West were black sheep, sent out there by their families. Given Vila's weakness for wine, women and gambling, those flaws in Hugh would help explain what he was doing in a little Wyoming railroad town. Hugh has an income from his family, so he doesn't really need the deputy's job. As Vila stays with Avon for security and because he needs companions, so Hugh stays in Govan because he knows Darrow will look out for him, and because he has made friends there.

The first Darrow title was Darrow's Law, followed by Darrow's Word and, in June 2005, Darrow's Badge. The characters have grown and developed, moving away slightly from their sci-fi originals, but perhaps presenting a version of what might have happened to those people in other circumstances. Their town, Govan, has grown with them, acquiring new characters, buildings and streets. Charting the growth of the town is interesting in its own right. Towns of the west prided themselves on their success; the opening of a new school or church was often the centre of a public celebration. Having Darrow and Hugh as the lawmen of this growing town puts them in the centre of public life. They attend town functions such as the Thanksgiving Supper, they control the supply of food within the town when a blizzard causes shortages and have a say in local issues like the building of a new footbridge.

A whole new scene. Back for more.

Darrow's Badge

Darrow and Hugh soon began to write their own stories. Having introduced Minnie Davis in the first book, and having got Hugh to the point of proposing marriage at the end of the second, the next event would be their wedding. I thought about Hugh's older brother coming to Wyoming, and seeing how Hugh had changed, and about Minnie meeting these wealthy, upper-class English people and being given a dowry of jewels that would be something completely remote from her previous experience. All very interesting, but not the stuff of an action-packed western adventure. I was talking about this to my friend, Sarah McEvoy, who remarked: "What if someone stole the jewels?"

Doh! Of course! Thanks, Sarah. So now I had the perfect excuse to make Hugh's wedding the centre of the next story. Out of that I got a story of a robbery and a battle of wits between sheriff and thieves.

I also wanted to write something about a travelling circus, or a carnival. Carnivals appear in western films like My Name Is Nobody and Ride the High Country. Internet research proved frustrating, but then I remembered that the National Fairground Archive happens to be in Sheffield University library, about five minutes' walk from my home. What's more, the curator of the archive is an old acquaintance from my university days. I contacted Vanessa Toulmin, who was very helpful, and spent a lovely few hours browsing the collection. Most of it related to the English fairground and circus, but Vanessa helped me to find relevant material. Researching westerns is certainly educational!

I'm a great believer in recycling, in stories, as well as in my house. Darrow's Badge features a case of book imitating TV, imitating film. In The Magnificent Seven, James Coburn shoots a fleeing bandit off his horse. When praised for his shooting, he retorts that he had been aiming for the horse. This was deliberately referenced in the Blake's 7 episode Orac. Avon saves Blake's life by shooting arch-enemy Travis's gun-hand. When praised by Blake on his shooting, Avon answers tetchily that he had been aiming for Travis's head.

The latest.

In Darrow's Badge, Darrow accompanies Hugh, Minnie and Hugh's brother and his wife, on an off-duty trip to the carnival. After the others have a try at the shooting gallery, Darrow is expected to do the same:

Hugh looked at Darrow expectantly. The sheriff stared coolly back.

'Why should I waste a dime in order to win some tasteless knick-knack?' he drawled.

'So that you can donate it to the next Church tombola and pretend to have a heart,' Hugh shot back.

Darrow pretended not to have heard, and picked up one of the light rifles..In his opinion, the least offensive gewgaw he could win was the glass ashtray. Having calculated the score he needed to win it, the sheriff carefully aimed and fired his five shots. Each hit home close to the centre of the card. The last one was dead centre of the ace of hearts.

'Oh, good shot,' Hugh's brother said generously.

Darrow wasn't pleased with himself. 'I was aiming for the king.'

A Wish is Granted

Having got Sheriff Darrow into print, I sent a copy of Darrow's Law to Paul Darrow, who was delighted by it, and is continuing to follow the adventures of his namesake. Paul is the wrong age to play the sheriff on screen now, but it would be lovely to hear him reading audio versions of the books. I saw him playing Elvis Presley in 1988, complete with Southern accent, and he's also a good mimic. I saw him on stage ten years later, playing Captain Vimes in an excellent adaptation of Terry Pratchett's Guards! Guards!. Paul was having a whale of a time, using the excuse to do his best Humphrey Bogart and Clint Eastwood impressions.

I've also had good feedback from Blake's 7 fans. I took copies of Darrow's Word along to a Blake's 7 convention last year, and sold some there. Selling westerns at a sci-fi convention has to be some kind of an achievement!

Ultimately though, the Darrow westerns are westerns. When writing them I switch fully to western mode. Good writing in any genre requires the same elements of good plotting, description and characterization, but there's a satisfaction in using them to conjure up a particular time and place. I enjoy visiting the West and I believe that Avon and Vila have settled in so comfortably that readers who don't know anything about Blake's 7 will never guess that Sheriff Darrow and Deputy Keating have close cousins somewhere in outer space.

So what next for Darrow and Hugh? Well, I have this title, Darrow's Debt, and a few elements of the story. I just need to figure out how it all goes together. . . .