It’s not every day you’ll come across a book that packs references to Wanaka, climate change, aliens and the origins of the band name Foo Fighters all into 250 pages, but local businessman Derek Lilly has written one.

Invasion AI, released last month, is Derek’s first novel. Set between the present and 2035, with events taking place in and around Wanaka, as well as in America and beyond, the book explores a future in which global warming is threatening mankind, and artificial intelligence is helping to save the world - or is it?

The genesis of the story came about approximately eight years ago, when Derek witnessed an unexplained ball of orange light in the sky above the Pisa Range. He combined this experience with his knowledge of Foo Fighters, which before becoming the namesake for Dave Grohl’s band, was what Allied pilots in World War II called the unidentified flying objects they witnessed in the Pacific and European theatres of operation. (The military attributed the sightings to ball lightning, or St Elmo’s Fire. That’s what they told the public, anyway.) "That’s where the storyline came from,” Derek said.

Derek is a big fan of sci-fi, especially of the Alien films, with their "mixture of horror, sci-fi and suspense, plus a few guns.” He thinks it’s an enduringly popular genre because of a natural human inclination to look to the future and wonder what it will be like. He said the response to the novel has been very positive so far. "Lots of people call it a page-turner,” he said.

The book includes a wealth of information, both scientific and historic, which Derek said involved a huge amount of research, mainly on Google and Wikipedia. He says he likes to think of the book as "science faction” as opposed to science fiction: "it’s not Star Wars, in a galaxy far far away, it’s here.”

As for publishing his work, he said it’s not hard to do these days, thanks to services like Amazon’s CreateSpace, which he used for Invasion AI. "What took the time is the writing - it was about three months start to finish,” he said.

Originally from Plymouth in England, Derek is a trained mechanical/marine engineer. He spent five years as a soldier in the British Army working in the Royal Corps of Transport (his miltary experince was "handy” when it came to writing some parts of the novel). Although this is his first full-length book, Derek has done a bit of writing in the past. He used to sing in and write songs for a punk/new wave band, a sign of the times he grew up in. "I went to see the Sex Pistols in Plymouth, but they wouldn’t let me in. I was too young,” he laughed.

Today, he is the CEO of the kitchen refurbishment company Dream Doors in Australasia and North America, a business he co-founded in the UK. Derek ended up to Wanaka after selling 50 percent of Dream Doors and embarking on a world tour to decide where to settle; he had a friend who lived in Wanaka and invited him to come have a look, saying he’d found "the best place in the world.” He visited in 2006, and came back to live for good with his wife and two kids in 2007.

Funnily, it was Dream Doors that launched Derek’s foray into novel writing. Richard Prout, his business partner in Wanaka, said he thought Derek should write a book on franchising and entrepreneurship, as it would be good for the business. "So I went home and had a good think. A long weekend was coming up, and I just couldn’t do it – it’s what I do all day, every day. But then I thought, ‘I wonder.’ I started writing a sci-fi novel instead, and within a weekend, I’d written four or five chapters.”

The book will be especially interesting to Wanaka locals, with many familiar landmarks appearing, including the Pisas, Mount Aspiring College and the Lake Hawea Hotel. And while he explained he doesn't yet think of himself as an author as such, his writing career isn’t over with the publication of Invasion AI. He said there will definitely be more than one installment of the story, which could possible become a trilogy. And several readers have indicated they think it would make a good film. "If Peter Jackson rings me up one day, I’d say, great.”

For now, though, Derek said, "I’ve been really pleased that people I trust and respect really enjoyed it. They have been so lovely in their responses. It’s been humbling.”

To read more about Invasion AI, and to order a print or digital copy, visit the book’s website (click on MORE below).

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