Steve Blackman: 'Readers only feel tension when they understand exactly what’s at stake'
BY Maya Fernandes
7th Jul 2026
In this interview Steve Blackman, author of the debut middle grade adventure novel Zero Override, shares his advice for building tension in action sequences.
'When I write an action-filled scene, though, I need to envisage every moment, so I imagine it taking place on a screen. As with a film or TV show, those scenes demand diligent choreography.'
We caught up with Steve to discuss his time studying with us, his writing routine and the authors who have most inspired him.
Zero Override is an action-paced adventure story, featuring a group of young underground hackers who steal from the rich in a near-future London where humans and humanoid bots live side by side. What first gave you the idea for this story?
It is a widely held truth that the best way to ignore the existential uncertainty of the submission process is to busy oneself with a new story. That was the situation I faced in late 2024, when I was in desperate need of distraction from repeatedly pressing the RETURN key – like that might somehow hurry publishing along. At that time, a regular theme in book industry news pieces – and bookish conversation generally – was the misuse of AI by bad actors. Hundreds of authors were joining the class action against Anthropic, which had illegally used their stories to train its AI. Cases such as this reinforced a growing narrative that AI was inherently harmful, and when one considers the films and series that have featured forms of artificial intelligence, that’s hardly surprising.
As someone who’s worked in and around digital technology for many years, I don’t believe that AI can be good or bad, although the way we use it can be. And that was the stepping off point for Zero Override. As soon as I began writing, it became obvious that the best way to characterise technology was to give it a personality: a face and a body. And so, the world of the story rapidly populated with different kinds of robots. Once I’d given them personalities rather than simply functions, they seemed to arrive faster than I could write them down.
Your protagonist, thirteen-year-old Zero, is racing against the clock to save his younger sister, Grace. What did you enjoy most about developing Zero as a character, and what challenges did you face in bringing him to life on the page?
I love writing characters who surprise me. Every time I thought I’d worked Zero out, he’d say or do something that reminded me he was so much more than ‘the hacker’. And he’s so full of contradictions – yes, he’s an incredible hacker, but he’s humble about it. He treats sarcasm as both a hobby and a defense mechanism. He hides behind snark and rarely takes anything seriously, and yet beneath that surface he’s deeply sensitive. Nowhere is that more obvious than in his commitment to caring for Grace. The loss of their parents, the time he and Grace spent in care, and his fierce loyalty to his chosen family all help define who he is. I’ve long believed that one of the best ways to understand a character is through the people around him, and I hope that Zero’s friendships reveal as much about him as his own actions.
There were two key challenges. The first was balancing Zero’s age with the amount of agency he has in the story. Zero’s only thirteen, but he must carry the plot and drive the action. Readers need to believe he could be the one steering the powerboat or hacking into the bank’s servers from a hammock seat, without throwing the book across the room.
The other challenge was one I hadn’t anticipated. When I was growing up, we were a foster family and often became a found family for children who desperately needed security and stability. Sadly, that ended when my mum died too young. Writing about Zero’s found family, and about the loss of his parents, surfaced memories and emotions for which I was entirely unprepared. Difficult though it was at times, I did my best to channel them into the story. And looking back, maybe that was the story I wanted to tell all along.
The novel maintains a strong sense of pace and tension throughout. How do you approach writing high-stakes scenes, and do you have any advice for writers who struggle to build suspense in their own work?
Fast-paced stories and scenes filled with action are my absolute favourites to write. They’re a bit like conducting an orchestra, except everyone’s running around, something’s on fire and one of the musicians is a robot. I’m neither a plotter nor a panster, but fall somewhere in the middle, needing the waymarkers of the story’s key beats while retaining the flexibility to take a non-linear route to arrive at them. When I write an action-filled scene, though, I need to envisage every moment, so I imagine it taking place on a screen. As with a film or TV show, those scenes demand diligent choreography. In this respect, Post-It notes and Sharpies are my friends, as they allow me to stand back and view the scene as a whole, while tweaking pace and structure where needed. Of course, that also means that my office (okay, the dining room) frequently resembles the wall of a detective who’s had too much coffee. (See below.) Once it makes narrative and physical sense, I dive happily into the writing.
If I were offering advice to writers struggling with suspense, it would be to focus on clarity before timing. Readers only feel tension when they understand exactly what’s happening, what’s at stake and exactly what could go wrong. Let’s face it – readers are remarkably clever; they'll forgive almost anything except confusion.
What is your typical writing routine like?
I’m not sure there is a typical routine as every day is so different. I tend to wake early and that’s normally because words are trapped in my head and it’s best to let them out before they recruit others. Sometimes I need silence to write, other times I prefer the buzz of a cafe or music, and for that reason I have a selection of Spotify playlists that deliver many hours of movie soundtracks. It’s great for matching the vibe of the day, but does mean I might answer emails accompanied by the score of Inception.
In addition to writing stories I’m a copywriter, and so when I have a job for a client, I always tackle that in the morning, then at some point switch to writing fiction. It’s like treating myself to dessert after finishing my vegetables, and there’s usually a moment where I stop thinking about sentences and realise I’ve disappeared into the story. That’s always the best part of the day. Don’t get me wrong, some days are hard work, of course, but even then I'd rather be wrestling with a chapter than doing almost anything else. I’m very lucky in that I can write anywhere and, because I use Google Docs (a very reassuring way of never losing a draft), I can write just as easily on my phone or my laptop. Voice notes are really useful too – especially now they can auto-transcribe. The one constant in all of this is access to coffee. Coffee isn’t part of the writing process. It is the writing process.
Are there any authors or books that influenced the way you write action, or that you looked to for inspiration when creating Zero Override?
It’s really hard to pick individuals, but I’ll do my best. When I was young, I read a lot of Ursula K Le Guin, Terry Brooks and Tolkien. And as my reading taste developed, I incorporated Sci-Fi, devouring Asimov, Philip K Dick and William Gibson, then John Wyndham, Stephen King, JG Ballard, Margaret Atwood. The great skill of these writers trained me to visualise different worlds in sharp detail, and then place a protagonist in peril within that world. And it’s their books to which I frequently return when I need inspiration or a reminder that everybody else’s first drafts are probably just as alarming as mine.
Recent books that have given me that Schrödinger feeling of wanting to start writing immediately while also never writing again (because I’ll never be that good) are Private Rites by Julia Armfield and Rose/House by Arkady Martine. The latter is a taut thriller in which an entire house is an AI and, potentially, a murderer. Incredible.
You studied with us on our Writing YA & Children’s Fiction – Three Months course. How did your time with us shape your approach to writing?
In undertaking the course, I wanted to develop my craft and improve how I approach the process of writing. And of course, I hoped it might start me on a path to becoming a published author. The quality of my prose definitely improved, and the voice of our incredible tutor, Catherine Johnson, still lives rent-free in my head, encouraging me to make hard decisions and trust my gut. But the thing for which I’m most grateful – the thing that benefits me every single day – was learning how to interrogate stories. On the course we gained this through our critiquing sessions, in which every one of us learned how to structure and deliver effective feedback, and how to receive it. But I also developed a whole other awareness and vocabulary I had not anticipated. I was able to view the books I’d read and loved differently – to see what I liked about them and why. I began to recognise the levers of plotting and pacing, and how different choices produced different effects. The more I understood how stories worked, the more I loved trying to build them myself. For this I will be forever grateful.
Many of our students find lifelong writing friends on our courses. Are you still in touch with anyone you met on the course?
This is one of the outcomes for which I have the most gratitude. I applied to join the course late in 2019 and was thrilled to be accepted, then impatient for the course to begin the following April. What we didn’t know, of course, was that the course would begin in the second week of the first lockdown. In that time of chaos and uncertainty, the course, Catherine, and my fellow students became a source of huge stimulation and stability. We bonded quickly, and really immersed ourselves in the coursework. While we no longer critique one another’s work as frequently, our WhatsApp group – the Dead Pets Society – remains a place of enormous support, reassurance, friendship and fun. (The conversations are definitely less disturbing than the group name.) Two students in particular – Carrie Sellon and Will Dobson, huge talents both – are now close friends, and my most trusted first readers.
And finally, what’s next for your writing journey?
I’m currently writing the closing chapters of the sequel to Zero Override. It takes place after the events of the first book and follows the same characters, plus a few new ones. As with book one, I’m having enormous fun asking, ‘What’s the worst thing that could happen next?’ And unfortunately for Zero, I usually come up with an answer. In this new story I’m looking at another area in which technology is misused with disastrous consequences. There are so many themes to explore in this subject, and I’d love the chance to do so, especially if it means I continue to work with my incredible editor, Julia Sanderson. Hopefully readers will enjoy returning to Zero’s world as much as I enjoy spending time there – even if I do put the poor characters through rather a lot.
Get your hands on a copy of Zero Override, out now with Scholastic.
Steve was a student on our Writing YA & Children's Fiction – Three Months course in 2020.
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