Award-winning actor Christopher Eccleston is helping to bring Preston-based thriller Cold Bath Street to life by narrating the audiobook.

Ex Doctor Who Christopher – who has been nominated for the BAFTAs and won multiple awards including an Emmy for his role in Accused – has voiced the book written by New York Times best-selling author and Prestonian A.J. Hartley.

Cold Bath Street centres around the Miley Tunnels that lie under Preston and are supposedly haunted.

A thoroughly Preston affair, the book was produced by students on UCLan’s MA Publishing course in the only student-led, student-run publishing house in the world, UCLan Publishing.

Review: Cold Bath Street is a perfect Preston ghost story

Christopher said: “Cold Bath Street is just a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant book. I was so happy to narrate the audiobook because I think Andrew’s writing is superb. The book is an anthem for our times and it is wonderful that it is set in the North.

“I think what UCLan Publishing is doing, especially in improving regional diversity, is amazing and I was very glad to give my time for this cause.”

Christopher got involved after playing Macbeth for the Royal Shakespeare Company, when it was pointed out that the play’s themes of the supernatural, ghosts and death draw many parallels with Cold Bath Street.

In an interview with The Bookseller, Christopher said: “We did an event where Andrew talked about his book and his notion of the supernatural, and I spoke about playing Macbeth and my notions of the supernatural.

“It helps that the book is set in Preston, Lancashire, and I’m from Salford in Lancashire. We’re from a very similar generation. We seem to have an odd understanding of each other.”

The Cold Bath Street audiobook will be launched at the prestigious London Book Fair on 11 March. The launch will include a panel event fronted by A.J., Christopher and UCLan Associate Professor of Publishing and Head of the Publishing House Debbie Williams.

Debbie said: “This is another exciting development for Cold Bath Street and I want to thank Christopher for lending his support to a book that’s really put Preston and UCLan Publishing on the map.

“We’re a small publishing company competing against huge, well-established publishing houses and the success that we’ve experienced with Cold Bath Street has been phenomenal.”

Read more: Book set in Preston’s haunted tunnels up for global literature award

Following the book’s success, A.J. is already working on a sequel that’s due to be published in October. The book, called Written Stone Lane, is based on a ghost myth around the Written Stone near Longridge.

UCLan Publishing is also working with A.J. on another book, Monsters in the Mirror. It’s due to be published on Friday 1 March and is available for pre-order on Amazon. A.J. will be promoting the book at Preston Waterstones at 2pm on Saturday 9 March.

Have you read Cold Bath Street? What do you think of Christopher Eccleston narrating the audiobook? Let us know in the comments below.