Reader Loyalty

I got to thinking about reader loyalty at the weekend and just how much a loyal reader will put up with if the author’s work takes a dip in quality.

Over thirty years ago – I were just a lad, bless - I came across The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant by Stephen Donaldson and I was head over heels captivated. I read those books through the night, while walking to school – yeah, I was that nerdy - and I counted out the minutes, days and months until the next book in the series became available.

To say I loved the books is like saying David Cameron enjoys the view in his mirror.

Fast forward a few decades, Donaldson revisits his past and I am the middle-aged man all but skipping with delight in the middle of the bookshop.

The third book in the series The Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant is now taking up space on my creaking bookshelf and heaven help me, but I am SO disappointed. I’m not sure if I can even finish it.

It’s called Against All Things Ending and comes in at a door-stopping 743 pages. Which is fine. I like a BIG book. However a BIG book that should have been cut in half...if this had been written by anyone other than Donaldson I wouldn’t have got past page 2. But there’s that pesky reader loyalty dragging me on well past the middle of the book. I skipped a feck of a lot of pages.

Donaldson (perhaps alongside Terry Brooks) is in my humble opinion the daddy of modern epic fantasy. He created a fascinating world and a cast of characters to hang your heart on.  He scripted adventures that held me in their thrall for years of my life. So what’s gone wrong?

I remember reading an article a few years back that said JK Rowling had filled notebook upon notebook upon notebook with details of her characters and their world and their backstory  before starting to write the Harry Potter series. Then – importantly - are you paying attention people? - she used only a fraction of it in the books. So immersed was she in the culture she had created, the books had an incredible feeling of reality.

Perhaps our Stevie D also filled notebook upon notebook before putting finger to keypad and in the earlier series he only used enough to flavour the story and convince us of the land’s reality – but now my impression is that he has decided as he is coming to the end of the series he needs to throw everything at it... and bugger me if it doesn’t slow down the story to the drip of an over-turned jar of treacle.

It takes about 130 pages for something to happen. During that period the characters are all hanging around arguing and debating the implications of the end of the previous book. Something does happen and then the remaining characters spend the next 50 pages debating what just happened...something else happens and then we have another 50 pages of debate.  Getting the drift? If the book wasn’t so heavy, and therefore likely to cause an injury to my delicate frame, I’d have chucked it against the wall.

Then there’s the dialogue. The characters from The Land speak in faux-Shakespearean. Here’s a line for ya... “This power defies both augury and foresight. Assuredly it surpasses the cunning of a-Jeroth, who knows no fealty which is not derived from possession of other mastery.’

Eh?

Donaldson has a prose style that demands he uses six syllables where one might do and his characters, who, let me tell you possess AMAZING powers, are so inept with them that I want to bitch slap them till their ears bleed. Sure, when power of this scale is available to a character the writer needs to make life difficult for them, but here they make incredibly poor errors in judgement. As if in that moment of decision they are taken over by George W. Then there’s the self-pity. And the self-hate. SO wearing. A change of emotional pace now and again would work wonders.

In past books I could overlook the purple prose and the heavy dialogue because the stories were so freakin’ exciting and the characters so engaging. This time, I’m not feeling it, dude.

Normally if I don’t like a book I stay schtum. Anyone who actually creates a novel deserves respect in my view and if it’s not to my taste then someone else will like it – and who am I to trash someone else’s hard work? But Stephen...buddy... you who formally walked on water...WTF?

DISAPPOINTED.

So what’s changed? Undoubtedly my reading tastes have grown over the years, but was I that easily pleased as a yoof? No, it can’t be that.

I’m thinking the editors working for SD’s publisher are scared of him? A wee hug, an arm over his shoulder and a few words in his shell-like could have saved 300 pages and turned this book into the work I was so looking forward to.

Now –those of you who haven’t read any Stephen Donaldson, I demand you forget everything you’ve just read and buy the earlier books. They are wonderful. The stuff of literary legend.

The latest book? Not so much.

Sharing the Joy

Yeah, I know it's an advert but I love it....

Yum!

My son now feels he’s too old to go out on Halloween. We call it “guising” in Scotland. Short for disguise, geddit? But people now call it Trick or Treating. When I were a lad we used to have to do something for the treat, like sing a song, recite a poem or at the very least tell a joke. Nowadays they stand at your doorway with their hand out. While the other hand holds a bag already chock-full of sticky treats.

One year I even wrote a play. I was twelve. It was shit. So sue me. I got my sister (aka Queen of Chaos) and her pal to play the other two parts. We each had about 3 lines of dialogue – I was very fair-minded and all I can remember about it was that someone died horribly at the end.

The neighbours must have laughed up their dinner when we moved on.

So, this year the wee fella is 12 and he’s way too cool to be going out in a disguise. This is me feeling kinda sad and relieved at the same time. It’s cold out there people!





The Wee Fella has never been much of a reader but the school have managed to get him interested in the Fighting Fantasy gamebooks. So, emboldened by this success I place a book beside him on the sofa. It’s a more conventional novel, Ostrich Boys by Keith Gray (a friend of mine) which has won shedloads of awards.

Me: why don’t you have a go at this. It’s won a lot of awards.

The wee fella just looks at me...

...and says, Dad, you’re taking this too far.





Me (on the phone to a friend): Oops, nearly called you a name that rhymes with Rick. (I didn’t want to use rude words while my son was around)

The wee fella: (shouts) Dad, the word is prick!

Me: Don’t you talk like that.

TWF: I don’t. I'd never use a word like that. I call my friends arseholes

It's a joke, so laugh dammit!

A SAMPLE from THE alleged TOP 50 JOKES OF ALL TIME ...


...and not even a mention of David Cameron

1. A woman gets on a bus with her baby. The bus driver says: ''Ugh, that's the ugliest baby I've ever seen!'' The woman walks to the rear of the bus and sits down, fuming. She says to a man next to her: ''The driver just insulted me!'' The man says: ''You go up there and tell him off. Go on, I'll hold your monkey for you.''

2. ''I went to the zoo the other day, there was only one dog in it, it was a shitzu.''

3. ''Dyslexic man walks into a bra''

4. A young blonde woman is distraught because she fears her husband is having an affair, so she goes to a gun shop and buys a handgun. The next day she comes home to find her husband in bed with a beautiful redhead. She grabs the gun and holds it to her own head. The husband jumps out of bed, begging and pleading with her not to shoot herself. Hysterically the blonde responds to the husband, ''Shut up...you're next!''

5. A classic Tommy Cooper gag ''I said to the Gym instructor "Can you teach me to do the splits?'' He said, ''How flexible are you?'' I said, ''I can't make Tuesdays''.

8. Doc, I can't stop singing the 'Green Green Grass of Home'. He said: 'That sounds like Tom Jones syndrome'. 'Is it common?'I asked. 'It's not unusual' he replied.

12. My mother-in-law fell down a wishing well, I was amazed, I never knew they worked.

14. A woman has twins, and gives them up for adoption. One of them goes to a family in Egypt and is named 'Amal.' The other goes to a family in Spain, they name him Juan'. Years later; Juan sends a picture of himself to his mum. Upon receiving the picture, she tells her husband that she wished she also had a picture of Amal. Her husband responds, ''But they are twins. If you've seen Juan, you've seen Amal.''

15. There's two fish in a tank, and one says ''How do you drive this thing?''

18. ''My therapist says I have a preoccupation with vengeance. We'll see about that.''

19. I rang up British Telecom, I said, ''I want to report a nuisance caller'', he said ''Not you again''.

23. A priest, a rabbi and a vicar walk into a bar. The barman says, ''Is this some kind of joke?''

28. A group of chess enthusiasts checked into a hotel and were standing in the lobby discussing their recent tournament victories. After about an hour, the manager came out of the office and asked them to disperse. ''But why?'' they asked, as they moved off. ''because,'' he said ''I can't stand chess nuts boasting in an open foyer.''

37. I swear, the other day I bought a packet of peanuts, and on the packet it said ''may contain nuts.'' Well, YES! That's what I bought the buggers for! You'd be annoyed if you opened it and a socket set fell out!''

38. A lorry-load of tortoises crashed into a trainload of terrapins, What a turtle disaster

41. Two Eskimos sitting in a kayak were chilly. But when they lit a fire in the craft, it sank, proving once and for all that you can't have your kayak and heat it.

42. I've got a friend who's fallen in love with two school bags, he's bisatchel.

44. A three-legged dog walks into a saloon in the Old West. He slides up to the bar and announces: ''I'm looking for the man who shot my paw.''

46. I'll tell you what I love doing more than anything: trying to pack myself in a small suitcase. I can hardly contain myself.

47. So I met this gangster who pulls up the back of people's pants, it was Wedgie Kray.

The study was carried out after –and this is my favourite - Tim Vine's joke "I've just been on a once-in-a-lifetime holiday. I'll tell you what, never again." was voted the best of this year's Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

What’s your favourite?

AND THE WINNER OF THE SIGNED COPY OF FIREBRAND IS....

Before I name the winner - a quick re-cap...I invited you good peeps to leave a message after the interview I posted on May Contain Nuts with the lovely Gillian Philip. Then I was to draw a name from the messages and the winner would receive a signed copy of this fantastic book.

Cue dramatic music.

Dum, de dum, de DUM

Let it build for a minute or two,.

DUM DUM DUM DE DAH

And then drag it out for another thirty seconds.

DAH DUM, DAH DUM

Before I finally announce that the name of the winner is...

DA DA DA DUM!!!
(these lyrics are copyright so don't even bother trying to steal them)


MARLEY DELAROSE.

Congrats to Marley and if I could ask you to email me off-blog with your address and I will get the book off to you in the post as soon as I can drag my fat ass down to the post office.

The Pink Glove Dance

Share the joy...

Time Off

The Bob Blog

He’s getting bigger.

Other Stuff...

What else has been happening? I’m on holiday this week catching up with my reading and writing. Makes me sound like the class dunce, innit?

Also got a man in to do some work around the house, cos I’m hapless, clueless and lots of other kinds of “less” when it comes to DIY. My ex used to laugh at me (note the “at” part of this sentence) whenever I had a screwdriver in my hand – and no, that’s not a euphemism – she said I turned from mild-mannered Clark Kent kinda guy into The Hulk.

No, seriously I would go into a RAGE. And curse like a character from an Irvine Welsh novel. I blame the parents.

So for the good of my blood pressure and for the sanity of my loved ones I no longer attempt anything that requires a tool in any shape that’s different than a laptop. Or a fork, knife and spoon. Or a TV remote.

The Queen of Chaos (my twin sister) recommended a handyman that she has been using . He came round today to do some bibs and bots. His first challenge was to remove a light fitting that has been bugging me since I moved in 4 years ago. It hangs from the ceiling and almost reaches the floor in a series of cream canvas boxes. An Ikea special if you will. It doesn’t work. It has never worked and I friggin’ hate the thing. But being me, it takes a while to get round to doing anything about it. I can hear all of the women reading this going, gawd I’d hate it if my husband was like that.

If he is, my advice: get over it and get a handyman in.

The old fella worked in electrics. Every time he comes over he looks at it and ask me if I have a pair of ladders. The answer of course is – is that shaped anything like a laptop? To be fair, the old fella is just the right side of five feet so he has the disadvantage of assessing where the light fitting connects to the ceiling from the vantage point of a hobbit.

Handyman guy looked at light fitting. He studied the top of the light fitting where it touched the ceiling. I say studied, he screwed his face up in thought and looked at it for about 5 seconds. Where the light fitting touches the ceiling it is shaped like an upside down cup. He twisted this cup thing ...and the whole apparatus lifted off in his hand. It took all of a second to remove.  And no wonder it didn’t work because it was attached to a metal hook. There was nothing even remotely resembling an electric wire anywhere in the vicinity.

Oh how we laughed.

The previous inhabitants of this house must have just liked it as a kind of a feature.

Eejits.

Anyway, who gives a monkey fart about DIY?  I have a giant TBR pile, a book and a shitload of poems to write.

Laters

Talking with Gillian Philip

A couple of weeks ago I attended the launch of the novel Firebrand in Glasgow by the HUGELY talented Gillian Philips. I reviewed the novel on these pages and it has since gone on to be reviewed by Amanda Craig from one of our biggest newspapers (but I got there first) and given the title of Fantasy Book of 2010 by their reviewer.


I caught up with Gillian and asked her some questions on your behalf. Eventually, I caught up with her. ‘Cos she’s rubbish at answering her emails.

Here’s wot happened.


You have 3 words. Describe Firebrand.

My must-write.

Nice answer. Now you have another 20.

Fantasy that's as real as I can make it. Adventure, romance, violence, danger. Hot faeries who are all human.


I love it when people meet their word count. Anywho, when you started to write Firebrand what were you looking to achieve?

I never intended to write it. I was supposed to be writing a contemporary fantasy, but one of the characters took over and demanded a prequel. What could I say? There was no finishing the other book till I'd indulged him. So I was looking to tell his story, I suppose. Or let him tell it.


You are a bloody good writer, Mrs. Nobody goes from scratch to excellent straight away so how did you learn?

Why thank you Mister! Er, yes. I'm so glad you never saw my early efforts. I learned by writing and writing and... well, some of it was diabolical. I wrote romance novels for a while, but they weren't any good. Before that there were other efforts. Saga things, with murders in. I'm so relieved the cockroaches ate them. Anyway, I sort of got the hang of it eventually. I consider it a brilliant stroke of luck that I found out about manuscript advice services (I didn't know they existed), and I had incredibly useful advice and feedback from Hilary Johnson's service in particular. I think I am good at taking advice (almost too good, sometimes. I've occasionally had to change manuscripts back to the way they were in the first place.)

(Note from the blogger – there are other script advice services and this in no way constitutes an advertisement. Unless someone from Hilary’s wants to get in touch and offer a few quid, in which case this is a FANTASTIC service.)

So that was it, really. Writing and rewriting and rewriting again, till I got better and didn't have to rewrite quite so much. I don't think there's any substitute for that.


A faerie tells me that one of the reasons you write such good actions scenes is that you fenced during your (obviously) well-spent (sniggers) youth. Go on spill...

Yes! I used to fence epee once a week. It was fantastic fun and I was actually fit for a while. Best sport in the world. And I especially love epee because you can hit anyone anywhere (within reason). With sabre, for instance, you're restricted to above-the-belt... Well, I had to give it up for a while because of time pressures, but I do want to go back. I don't know if it helps with the action scenes, but maybe it helps to know what a challenge it is to hit someone. I've watched an awful lot of swashbuckler movies, too, in my time, and that probably helps as well...


I invested so much emotionally in your characters in Firebrand to the extent that I was down on my knees giving a football style roar when one of your bad guys received their comeuppance. What is the secret of this reaction?

I don't know! I really don't know, but I'm absolutely thrilled when people have that reaction. I think it must be to do with the fact that I care about the characters enormously, and they're very real inside my head, but I'm not sure how that conveys itself to the page. I only know you can't expect readers to care about characters if you don't, and that's why writing has to be sincere to be convincing.


Why fantasy?

Fantasy because... I like a good fantasy, with lots of action, especially a believable fantasy... and I get very frustrated with a lot of fantasy. You know, the 'Lo, I am the Master of Dragons, yea, it is so prophecied by the Wizardy One...' sort. On the other hand, I adore the really good ones, and I wanted to write one of my own, the kind I'd want to read. And I wanted to set it in Scotland, because you don't see that much Scottish fantasy at the moment. And I wanted to give it a contemporary edge.


Why faeries?

Faeries for... much the same reasons? I wanted Scottish ones, too. There are plenty of human-sized, gorgeous big faeries around the book world at the moment - as is the way of things, faeries became 'big' (in several senses) as soon as I decided it might be a nice original idea - but many of them are Irish Sidhe or fourth/fifth generation American. I wanted mine to be very much the Scottish breed, with their own Scottish attitudes. Highland and Central Belt.


Why that particular period in time for Firebrand?

I'd started to write the series in contemporary times, and I never meant to write a historical episode. The trouble was, my villain/antihero Seth took over my brain, and I felt I absolutely had to tell his story (or let him tell it, anyway). I knew he was about 400 years old, and as it happens that took me back to the time of the Reformation and the Scottish witch trials. As soon as I started to research the period, I was hooked... and let's face it, the best thing for a writer is to have plenty of hideous experiences to throw at characters. And it was a very ugly time...
(Uglier than a naked wrestling match with Jedward and the old fat guy from Borat)
And now a quick-fire and entirely frivolous round to help your readers get to know you a little better.

Butter or Margarine?
Butter. Cows are cool, plastic isn't.

Salad cream or mayonaiise?
Mayonnaise. Salad cream: the dressing of Satan.

Star Wars or Star Trek?
Star Wars. For Darth/Anakin mostly. Even though the prequels are crap.

Boxers or briefs? (Comes under the heading of Try to Make The Interviewee Blush)
Boxers. Just... oh, you know.

PJs or au natural?
PJs. Oh please. I live in the north of Scotland.
And the lady's not for blushing.


Cats or Dogs?
Cats. Even though I feel like a traitor to my dogs.

Wine or beer?
Wine. But it's not a fair question. I need context.
(Context? She wants context? Only a professional would need context for a question like that. Just sayin’)


A lie-in or a jog?
A lie-in. I love my bed in the morning.

Stilettos or wedges?
Stilettoes. You can't feel like a killer bitch in wedges.

Ooh, get you. X-factor or Strictly?
Strictly. It's the frocks. Oh, and I hate X-Factor.


To celebrate the continued success of this wonderful book I have a free signed copy to give away. All you need to do to win is to leave a message that makes me smile (I need to get something out of this malarkey) and I will do the draw out of the hat thing. Except I don’t have a hat since some of the folk I work with laughed at the last one I wore. Yes, you, Ms W.

So instead, I’ll close my eyes and throw a small piece of soggy tissue at my computer screen and the one it sticks to wins.

Judge’s decision (that would be me) is final.

Its National Poetry Day...

...and I had intended to research a poem for you, but as usual I'm at the coo's tail (which is a charming Scots phrase meaning I'm rushin' aboot like a daftie) so I'm just going to have to try and show off, I mean share with you one of mine. ~smile~

This is an old one from my first collection In The Raw which I'd kinda forgotten I'd written until a friend told me she'd been reading through it and this was one of her favourites.

It's about...och, you can work out yourself what it's all about.



Another Kiss?



You offer the benediction of your kiss.
But what worth a kiss when it’s as chaste
as a 10 year old in her communion dress?

How did this spiral
from love in all its colours
to a base transaction?

You allow a touch,
I’ll smile once in a while

You purse your lips, I’ll pay the rent.

An exchange of services
for an exchange of fluids.

And when did the press of lips on that place
where neck meets shoulder meets fire
begin to fail to charge your heart?

And where do you chase your thoughts
when you close your eyes? Do you dwell
on my limbs pressing heavy on yours?

And when at the last our sweat mingles,
does the thin of your desire fade?

And why do I lie in the afterburn
when my heart stutters towards sleep,
turn my face to yours and pray
silent as the worn night
for one more kiss?


Now go and find some more poems and have yourself an experience.

It's the start of the month...

and there are more reviews available for your delectation over at CRIMESQUAD

Here's one of my faves from the last few weeks...

Roger Smith - Wake Up Dead

Synopsis:

It’s a hot, dry night in Cape Town when gun-runner Joe Palmer and his ex-model, American wife Roxy are car-jacked, leaving Joe lying in a pool of blood. As the thieves, meths addict Disco and his sidekick Godwyn, make their getaway, Roxy makes a split-second decision that changes her life forever.

This decision brings her on a collision course with Billy Afrika, a mercenary to whom Joe owes money, Disco's prison-loving gangster “husband” Piper, a would-be African insurgent leader, and a dirty cop determined to use Roxy to escape his dangerous Cape Flats beat.

As these lives collide, old debts are settled and underscored in blood and Roxy is caught in a wave of increasing violence in this beautiful and uncompromising city.

Review:

It simply doesn’t get more “noir” than this. This is easily the most violent book I’ve read this year, with a degree of carnage that could almost push this book into the horror genre. However, it is a violence that is germane to the characters and springs from the author’s understanding of the people he is writing about, rather than violence just for the sake of it.

In Piper we have one of the most loathsome and fearsome characters I’ve come across in crime fiction, but he is a clearly a product of his brutal upbringing. The gang is his family; the jungle of the prison provides his life lessons. Could he have turned out any other way?

Like almost everyone else in this novel Piper is locked into a mindset of poverty, intolerance and ignorance; a mindset that could be argued is the bastard child of apartheid and an outlook that the author demonstrates continues to trouble the inhabitants of this beautiful country.

Indeed, it is this honest portrayal of the city and its inhabitants that offers some form of mitigation for the violence mentioned earlier. Each character, even the ones on the right side of the law, straddle the line between good and bad and each is vividly described giving the reader a strong sense of the physical. Roxy is a beautiful ex-model and the frivolously named Disco is described as a startlingly handsome man, but in this dark fable being endowed with good looks is no blessing and becomes the launch-point to each of these characters’ troubles.

With his neat prose and breakneck pace, Roger Smith has conjured an excellent read. I’m guessing that this is not a book that the South African tourist board will be touting; it is undoubtedly a book that will place this country’s thriller writers in the forefront of a world readership.

The one where he rants about the death of choice...

When I was at Sainsbury’s this morning – I’m in a major huff with Tesco – and I bought my croissants – I’m a weekend croissant-a-holic – the young guy at the bakery counter told me to have “a fantastic day”. Not a great day. A fantastic day.


Now I’m not one of those moaning myrtles who complain about some of the cheesy Americanisms we are adopting on this side of the pond. I like cheese. All that protein, calcium and vits. Yum. The guy who said it wasn’t following some corporate mindwash instructions, he really meant it. And I left the store with a warm, fuzzy feeling and that had nothing to do with my croissant anticipation.

Now about Tesco and my complaint with them and guess what, it surrounds the issue of books.

My three regulars will be aware of the fact that I was giving a reading at a library in Newton Mearns recently and while I was waiting to perform I had a wee blether with the librarian – a big YAY for librarians. Wonderful people. During said chat I asked about the new mammoth shopping mall at Silverburn and what the affect had been on local shops.

Not good, she said.

‘Cos I hate the place, I said. Silverburn has got the same shops as EVERY shopping centre in the country – why we don’t all wear exactly the same clothes is a mystery to me. The floor is too shiny for my shoes and I slip everywhere. AND there’s no book shop. A centre the size of a small town and is has no book shop. WTF?

I put this (a wee bit more politely) to nice lady at the Information Desk in Silverburn. She informed me, yes we have no book shop but Tesco is right over there and they sell books.

I gave her that look.

The one that said I’d rather slam my testicles in a drawer.

Back to the library and the lovely librarian got all gossipy. She even did the Les Dawson over the garden fence thing. If any of my 3 readers are Brits of a certain age they’ll remember a sketch that the comedian Les Dawson used to do. He’d put on a large pinafore, wig and curlers and remove his teeth. Under the pinafore he’d have breasts of epic proportions and he’d have his arms crossed underneath them as if trying to hold them up. Whenever he/ she had a particularly delicious piece of gossip he’d mash his gums, hoik up his breasts and pass on the info.

So – hoiks up boobs - the librarian told me that someone told her – so it’s third hand and don’t even try to sue me Tesco cos I’m skint – that when Silverburn was being built and shops like Tesco, Marks and Spencers, Next and yawn and blah were booking up spaces, one company who bid for a unit in the centre was Waterstones. The only national book chain (how tragic is that?) in the UK.

Guess who put a stop to that with their big hob-nailed boots and corporate greed? And there’s another nail in the coffin of consumer choice.

There are people who are much more eloquent on SUPERMARKET GREED AND THE DEATH OF CHOICE than me but here’s my tuppence worth. The supermarkets and chain stores are killing off our town centres, they’ve decimated the farming community and the book trade is on a very slippery slope.

Go into a Tesco or Asda. Look at the bookshelves. All 3 of them. Read the authors’ names. It’s mainly the usual suspects, innit? Cole, Patterson, Brown et al. If this momentum continues – bookshops become extinct – and Tesco and Asda have 3 bookshelves with the same version of the same books year after year after year after year after year after year after year. How depressing is that? What will happen to all of those wonderful writers who don’t sell more than a million copies? What about all of those writers looking to get into print? If Tesco and Asda don’t think they can sell them they won’t give them room on their 3 shelves. (I’m away to hide under my quilt for a few hours. You don’t want to see a grown man cry.)

And we only have ourselves to blame. They can’t kill off choice without our complicity. They rely on our busy lives and laziness of thought.

Next time I crack open my wallet I’ll be thinking more carefully if my money could be better off spent at the local butcher or baker.

Jeez, my horse is so high I’m gonna break an ankle when I jump off it.

Rant over.

Now I’m off to read a Brent Weeks (HE IS THE BOMB) fantasy novel I bought in Waterstones yesterday.

Y’all have a fantastic day.

Firebrand by Gillian Philip

I was at the Glasgow launch of Firebrand by Gillian Philip last night. Gillian is a writer of young adult books who is going places. Her publisher received an advanced notice of a review that The Times are planning to run in October. A quick quote from their reviewer contained the words “the best fantasy book of the year”.


Praise doesn’t come much higher than that.

So what’s it all about? The blurb runs like this...

“It is the last decade of the sixteenth century: a time of religious wars in the full-mortal world. But the Sithe (pronounced She) are at peace, hidden behind the Veil that protects their world until their queen, Kate NicNiven, determines to destroy it. Seth MacGregor is the half-feral son of a Sithe nobleman. When his father is assassinated, and Seth is exiled with his brother Conal to the full-mortal world, they vow not only to survive, but to return to reclaim their fortress and save the Veil. But even the Veil’s power cannot protect the brothers when the brutal Scottish witch-hunts begin... Brimming with intrigue and rebellion, Firebrand is the first book in the Rebel Angels series by Gillian Philip, the Carnegie Medal-nominated author of Crossing the Line and multi-award nominated Bad Faith.”

Although Gillian is a YA writer this is a book with universal appeal. The themes, the characters, the writing, the action – boy, the action are all elements that will be enjoyed by everyone.

Gillian is one of those writers who writes books that make you forget you are actually reading. So effortlessly convincing is her prose that you experience the book in the screen of your mind rather than on the page. Seriously.

She writes about characters you pin your heart on – I heard a grown woman last night talking about Seth McGregor in terms you only normally hear when the ladies (and quite possibly a few boys) are talking about the likes of Pitt and Clooney.

Her sense of place and time in Firebrand is so strong you’ll think you’ve actually visited 16th century Scotland through some form of time continuum thingummijig. The Tardis in book form if you like.

But all of this will only take you so far without a story and that’s where Gillian excels. Her storytelling ability is wonderful. The cliché “edge of my seat” never was more apt. This is a lost weekend kinda book, so stock up on coffee and cookies, pick it up, dive in and tell your nearest and dearest you are “out” for the duration.

A pie, a pint and a whole load of poetry...

That was what the good people of Newton Mearns in Glasgow enjoyed last Friday. It was part of a week long Food Festival the local council were organising and the local library got in on the act when they asked The Makar Press Poets – Sheila Templeton, Rowena M Love and my good self – to attend and provide the poetry. Unfortunately, Rowena couldn’t take part but Sheila and yours truly were happy to fly the poetry flag.

Around 40 people turned up, a few of whom indicated at the start they had no idea what to expect.

We got so many people approaching us at the end to tell us they enjoyed the event more than they ever anticipated that it shouldn’t surprise us. But it does.

Few people habitually read poetry, even fewer people buy it, but when given the opportunity to enjoy it they appear to lap it up. It would be nice to think that they go home and search out other poets they might enjoy.

Our work is accessible, works at different levels and can be in turns touching and humourous. They’re not my words but comments people have left with us – and we didn’t have to pay them.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that with just a little effort from the great unwashed we poets would be as lauded as anybody in Hollywood, or on the tv or on the sports park.

Ooooh. Did someone just hit me over the head? Like that’s ever going to happen.

Anywho, in the interests of getting more poetry out there here’s one that went down well on Friday. (Hat tip to New Writing Scotland who published it in their collection a couple of years back.)


Wounded Knee

My black trousers stumbled to a point half way
to the skull-grey cap of my knee
while I steered my way through the corrals
of school playtime, avoiding the gunslinger
glare of bullies, who’d queue
to lassoo with threats.


Pencil point stabbed between my shoulders,
beef-jerky breath in my face
and a low growl in my ear…
…."as soon as the bell rings, you’re dead!"

I was faster than any of them
Knees and fists pumping the air,
I was the best rider
the Pony Express never had.

A half-breed scout, I wore
a Colt pistol under my belt
and an Eagle’s tail feather in my hair.
A combination that won
neither friend or foe
from reservation or ranch.

A fall…and the bony plate of my knee
became a wound with hard baked gravel
ground under the torn and grieving skin.

I grew my thumbnail especially
for that moment when the scab was ripe,
when the blood had hardened
to a brown as deep as the colour of apache skin.

I would tease off the scab…
…until baby pink skin winked in the sunlight,
fresh for the next gallop across the prairie
and the race into the unreachable horizon.

In case you missed it...

...the Pope is visiting Britain right now. As a (lapsed) Catholic is was nice to see him being we well received particularly when there was a fear that he would be largely met with indifference. With regards to the politics of his "message" I'll leave that to others who are more qualified.

Anywho I was reading a poem to an audience on the eve of his visit and it seemed apposite to read the one you will find below. When I wrote it ithe poem was really an exercise (suggested by a poetry workshop leader) in bringing together two sensory memories from my childhood - a stolen sip of altar wine - waking up after wetting the bed. It became an exorcism, if that's not too strong a word, as all poems do that are anchored in truth.

As I read it I remembered a comment from an audience member from an earlier reading. He (very politely)accused me of having a go at the Catholic Church. I told him it was a truthful experience and the poem states the facts without judgement. The judgement was his.

Here's the poem...


Drinking Jesus’ Blood


Sister Mary tears me from my dream,
mouth pursed white like the lip of a drawstring bag.
Again, urine had seeped from my Judas bladder.
Pyjamas in deep, wet, cotton folds burn from belly to knee.

Sister Mary, a window-less room and a bath of ice water.
The drum in my ear shivers at the machine gun rattle of my teeth.
Naked, I hide my hairless sex behind bone-thin hands.
‘Get your hands away, you dirty little pervert.’
My mouth opens, my hands move from sin, then back.

Cold water bites flesh. Skin and muscle shrink to a tight sheath.
Her black sleeves rolled up, forearms white as a frosted soul.
She tries to find suds in iced carbolic. I bite on the questions:
will my teeth chip or break from clattering,
how much will the tooth fairy give me if they are in crumbs?
Rubbed with stiff towel till skin heats, blue to pink.

In the Sacristy with Jim Docherty, the other Altar Boy,
itch of shame replaces the nip of urine.
‘Wet The Bed,’ he chants.
‘Shut it, Big Nose,’ I bruise his arm - and don white.
‘Lads,’ says Father Kieran, tousles our brylcreemed heads

and leaves us with a chalice full of communion wine.
The vessel grows until it shrinks the room,
I lean forward to touch it.
Jim’s eyebrows bounce off his hairline, ‘Bet you wouldn’t.’
I grip the stem in answer to his hushed taunt.

Heart charging at my ribcage I moisten lips, and pour.
Teeth and tongue fur sour before I force open my throat.
A blazing bolus flares a trail to my stomach.
Jim, slack mouthed with fear and awe,
‘Oh-oh, that’s a sin. You’ve just drank Jesus’ blood.’

‘Aye, and it tastes like piss!’

long time no speak...

It’s the end of the week, the sun is shining, Bob is darting at my feet as I walk about the house and the wee fella is up in his room shooting up some space bandits on his xbox. At least I think it was “bandit!” I heard him shout at the screen.

I have been delinquent in my blogging duties of late – like you care – so I thought I should post a quickie to say hi.

Hi.

So what’s been happening? It was my birthday this week. The Queen of Chaos who as my 3 regulars will tell you is my twin sister, gave me a card with some cash inside and explained her lack of imagination with the question, ‘What do you buy the man who has everything?’

I answered, ‘More.’

Thing is I’m a long way from having everything, but I’m not really into STUFF anyway. Give me a few gadgets, some RnB and a pile of books and I’m happy. Oh and an e-reader.

I’m continuously tempted to buy one and then I talk myself out of it. I get lots of free books and I like to hold the book in my hand, so why do I want an electronic thingummyjig? Anyone out there got one? What’s your impressions? If I buy one should I go Kindle or Sony or some other version? And why would I want 3G on one?

Anywho, the best present I received wasn’t in fact a present but a review copy of James Lee Burke’s next novel due out in November (I have very kindly provided a photo of the jacket above), and a review copy of Bateman’s next offering, Dr Yes.

Genius.

Oh and a (small indie) publisher asked to see the full book (one of my crime novels) after reading the first three chapters. They also want a marketing plan. I believe this is fairly common on the other side of the pond...is it becoming common practise over here as well? Anybody got any experience of this.

Right better go. Bob has very cleverly managed to pee on the puppy pad (a large absorbent towel thing) but get most of it on the floor.

Something for the weekend...

Police in Florida arranged for a local TV news station to show a store’s surveillance video in which an identified man was seen pistol whipping another dude. The news station appealed for help from their audience to solve this crime and received help from a wholly unexpected source.

The pistol-whipper himself phoned the police department to ask why his picture was on the news.

Eejit.



Just as I’m about to take on the emotional ties of a pet I come across a news article that makes me worry about what might happen should I get too attached. ..

Tsutomu Mizumoto, 31, was arrested early on Wednesday on the northern island of Hokkaido, the Mainichi daily reported.

Police said they responded to an emergency call about 5:45am about a car driving the wrong way on a motorway near the city of Otaru. They spotted the vehicle and pursued the driver, ordering him to stop.

Mizumoto ignored them (as you do when you are upset) and drove on, smashing through five emergency blockades and passing through a tollgate. He finally stopped at about 7:15am. (Did he run out of petrol?)

"I was sad that my pet cat died," he was quoted as telling police. "I wanted to do something crazy."

The average dog lives what, 10-15 years? I have lots of time to think up something nuts to do when he pops off to doggy heaven. Any suggestions?





Driver Bryan Parslow, 19, injured himself and three passengers when he crashed into a tree near Wheatland, N.Y., in May. He was playing "hold your breath" with his passengers and passed out

You’ve got to admire his determination to win, dontcha?



It’s silly season in UK newspapers with everyone (tabloids and broadsheets alike) getting all prissy about William Hague (the Foreign Secretary) and the allegations that were jumping all over the interweb. It appears he’s been found “guilty” of sharing a hotel bedroom with a political aide who happened to be male. Oh the shock of it. Two men sharing a room. They must be gay, was the verdict on the electronic highway.

Grow up, people.

Then proving that smart people do incredibly stupid things Hague compounded matters by using his wife’s miscarriages as “proof” he is a hetero.

WTF, Willy?

Back to men sharing a room –whether they are playing hide the sausage or not – here’s a great big SFW.

I’ll admit to liking my own space when away from home. Part of the joy of having a room to yourself is being able to go about in the buff, fart and snore to your heart’s content without someone else screaming at you to hide your man junk, go to the loo or sleep with a tennis ball sown onto the back of your pyjamas. Just saying.

Its the first of the month and that means...

...that there are some great new books reviewed in the fabulous CRIMESQUAD website.

Go on you. You know you want to.

I first came across Barack Obama while he was a mere Senator and any thoughts of running for office were being kept to himself. I picked up his book Dreams of my Father when I realised it dealt with a theme that I was working on myself – fathers and sons. My first thought was that this man writes like a dream – insightful, honest, poignant and poetic. It was sometime later when I realised who he actually was. You could have pushed me over with a poetry pamphlet: a politician with heart and a lyrical eye for a sentence. Who knew there was such a thing?

Being a writer I admire, I notice when the press talks about books that he is reading. Stand aside Oprah – the book trade is watching Barry these days.

Last summer he reportedly read (among others) Richard Price’s Lush Life – a wonderful crime novel set in New York – and BO rose even higher in my estimation.

This summer, his reading list has caused a wee bit of a stushie in the world of publishing because it was reported that Baz went in to a bookshop and bought Jonathan Franzen’s new book – before the official release date.

A row over nothing because the Pres didn’t buy the book while it was embargoed – he was given a review copy of the book by the publisher. Which is a rather clever marketing wheeze for any publisher with contacts in the Oval Office.

You can now stand back and watch the book fly off the shelves.

Don’t think I’ll go there myself. I read Franzen's last work The Corrections after Oprah blethered on about it. It won awards by the truck load. Which is usually a warning sign in my humble...literary awards often mean style over substance, characters who are dissected until they have no life and a plot that you can describe in two words - going nowhere.

Curiousity won over caution and I bought a copy. AND it was a bit of a letdown to be honest. It was well scribed but –and this is a massive BUT – I detested the characters to a man/ woman. They were whiny and self-obsessed with all the wit and warmth of a loofah.

A loofah that had been sprinkled with itching powder.

The family patriarch, Alfred Lambert is suffering from Parkinson’s and dementia – his wife, Enid can’t cope with the demands he puts on her . Their eldest son, Gary (a banker) suffers from clinical depression (was the author looking into the future?). Chip, the middle child, is a college professor whose disastrous affair with a student sends his life into decline and lands him in the employ of a Lithuanian crime boss. Which always happens to people whose career falls off the chart, doesn’t it? Denise, the youngest of the family, is successful in her career as a chef, but she also fucks up her life by becoming involved with her boss's wife. A little bit of lesbianism to widen the readership, dontcha think?

Sure you need drama in your drama, but you need it to be leavened with some charm and some lighter moments, no? You don’t want to catch yourself shouting at the pages of the book – “ Would you feck off , sack your therapist and watch Frasier for two days?”

Anywho, back to Barack ‘cos I like a politician who admits to reading fiction. Our mob here in Britain give their summer reading lists to their press office and it’s a who’s who of political theory. They’re going on holiday to sit on a lilo, scrunch their toes through the sand and read Divided Government in Comparative Perspective? Yeah right, and I have green goblins hanging out my arse.

They must think that by reporting that their reading material is so cerebral that us lesser munchkins will all be impressed. Wrong. Those of us who are lovers of fiction know how far off-base they are. And now we have the proof. From the boffins at New Scientist magazine no less. They ran some tests. The results concluded that readers of fiction are more insightful, have highly developed empathy and understand the social manners that the world works to, compared to non-readers and readers who read non-fiction only.

So you – yes you reading this – you knew you were nigh on perfect. Now you know why. And you have the excuse to keep on reading – as if you needed it. When your loved ones complain about your nose always being stuck in a book you can say - but darling, sweetheart, dickhead, I am working at maintaining my high degree of insight and empathy making sure that I have an idea how to deal with all you fannies who don’t have enough attention span to read a sentence more than six words long.

Then smile sweetly and go back to reading your novel, cos they won’t have a clue what you’re talking about.

RIP Eddie

Edwin Morgan the Makar of Scotland and one of the literary world's modern greats has passed away. I'm not going to eulogise him here as there are many who better qualified than I to do so. Instead, I'm going to let one of his poems speak for him.

Strawberries

There were never strawberries
like the ones we had
that sultry afternoon
sitting on the step
of the open french window
facing each other
your knees held in mine
the blue plates in our laps
the strawberries glistening
in the hot sunlight
we dipped them in sugar
looking at each other
not hurrying the feast
for one to come
the empty plates
laid on the stone together
with the two forks crossed
and I bent towards you
sweet in that air
in my arms
abandoned like a child
from your eager mouth
the taste of strawberries
in my memory
lean back again
let me love you

let the sun beat
on our forgetfulness
one hour of all
the heat intense
and summer lightning
on the Kilpatrick hills

let the storm wash the plates

Edwin Morgan

The one where he proves books are sexy...

A wee warning before you watch this: don't do it at work. Oh, and don't watch it before you go to work because you'll be singing the catchy refrain all morning - and getting some odd looks.

Forgotten Books

I was recently contacted by PATTI ABBOTT, blogger and reviewer extraordinaire with a request to fill a spot on her Friday's Forgotten Books blog. Any book, she said, any genre that you feel deserves some fresh attention - could you supply a review? So I did. And it's here below...


If you had been anywhere near me in the summer of 2005 I would have worn your ears off talking about this book. I had an enthusiasm bordering on the obsessive and I would have tugged at your shirtsleeve until you picked the book up and bought it for yourself.

Lee Cotton, in his own words “gets himself born in November 18, 1950” in Eureka, Mississippi at the same time as his mother’s neighbour, Jimmy Cooder’s Charolais bull finds itself dangling from a tree. This event causes a media storm “because bulls never show no natural enthusiasm or aptitude for tree-climbing”. And from the off you are aware that you are in the hands of a fascinating narrator.

Lee is a white child born to a black mother and in his early life learns to deal with the problems this presents. His Icelandic father, from whom Lee has inherited his “straw-blonde hair, buttermilk skin and blue eyes” doesn’t hang around to offer explanation to the local populace for this misplaced child. Instead, Lee has to work out how he should observe the customs of the day. Should he sit in the back of the bus with the blacks? What if someone comes on who doesn’t know he’s “a black soul in a white wrapper”, should he then sit in front?

Lee's troubles continue when he's a teenager and falls for the wrong, local (white) girl, Angelina, who is unfortunately the daughter of one of the most violent racists in town. Once Pop discovers his daughter is seeing a black boy (even if he is a white black boy) he organises a violent assault on the kid, leaving him for dead and far from home -- which allows Lee to start over with a new identity. All-white this time.

Lee is drafted, but gets to avoid Vietnam because the beating left him with some special (psychic) abilities that the Army is willing to explore. He gets posted in the middle of nowhere, with a load of other mind-freaks. He doesn't mean to escape from the army, but accidents do happen – on this occasion involving a high-speed car crash and a dangerously placed whisky bottle. He’s rescued by a doped up plastic surgeon and forced to adopt another guise...as a woman.

If all of this appears to be far-fetched it most assuredly is, but such is the writer’s skill that you allow the measured, thinking part of your brain some respite and just hitch along for the ride. And what a ride it is.

Wilson has littered this novel with ideas and surprises that are touching, dramatic and hilarious in turn. He takes great risks as he does so but in his winning narrator, the bold Lee himself, he has created a device that allows him to pull off everything he attempts. Lee Cotton is flighty, quirky, naive and fun and he and his actions are described in an energetic, inventive prose that never lets up for the duration of the “ballad”.

This is a rambunctious, romp of a tale told in faultless American idiom (from an Englishman) that never takes itself too seriously but one which offers much in the way of insight and entertainment.

Quite simply, get yourself a copy, turn off your weird-o-meter and dive in.

The one where you learn how to write a letter of complaint...

This is lazy blogging at its best - with thanks to Marley - this is an apparently genuine letter of complaint sent to a manufacturer of sanitary towels.

Dear Mr. Thatcher,

I have been a loyal user of your 'Always' maxi pads for over 20 years and I appreciate many of their features. Why, without the LeakGuard Core or Dri-Weave absorbency, I'd probably never go horseback riding or salsa dancing, and I'd certainly steer clear of running up and down the beach in tight, white shorts.

But my favorite feature has to be your revolutionary Flexi-Wings. Kudos on being the only company smart enough to realize how crucial it is that maxi pads be aerodynamic I can't tell you how safe and secure I feel each month knowing there's a little F-16 in my pants.

Have you ever had a menstrual period, Mr. Thatcher? I'm guessing you haven't. Well, my time of the month is starting right now. As I type, I can already feel hormonal forces violently surging through my body. Just a few minutes from now, my body will adjust and I'll be transformed into what my husband likes to call 'an inbred hillbilly with knife skills.'

Isn't the human body amazing?

As Brand Manager in the Feminine-Hygiene Division, you've no doubt seen quite a bit of research on what exactly happens during your customer's monthly visits from 'Aunt Flo'. Therefore, you must know about the bloating, puffiness, and cramping we endure, and about our intense mood swings, crying jags, and out-of-control behavior. You surely realize it's a tough time for most women.

The point is, sir, you of all people must realize that America is just crawling with homicidal maniacs in Capri pants... Which brings me to the reason for my letter. Last month, while in the throes of cramping so painful I wanted to reach inside my body and yank out my uterus, I opened an Always maxi-pad, and there, printed on the adhesive backing, were these words: 'Have a Happy Period.'


Are you f------ kidding me? What I mean is, does any part of your tiny middle-manager brain really think happiness - actual smiling, laughing happiness, is possible during a menstrual period? Did anything

mentioned above sound the least bit pleasurable? Well, did it, James? FYI, unless you're some kind of sick S&M freak, there will never be anything 'happy' about a day in which you have to jack yourself up on Motrin and Kahlua and lock yourself in your house just so you don't march down to the local Walgreen's armed with a hunting rifle and a sketchy plan to end your life in a blaze of glory.

For the love of God, pull your head out, man! If you have to slap a moronic message on a maxi pad, wouldn't it make more sense to say something that's actually pertinent, like 'Put down the Hammer' or 'Vehicular Manslaughter is Wrong'.

Sir, please inform your Accounting Department that, effective immediately, there will be an $8 drop in monthly profits, for I have chosen to take my maxi-pad business elsewhere. And though I will certainly miss your Flex-Wings, I will not for one minute miss your brand of condescending bullsh!t. And that's a promise I will keep.

Always. . ...

Wendi Aarons

Austin , TX

The Bob Blog

We decided that it was time the wee fella had a dog. A friend of a friend's dog just had a litter  of 14 and was looking for a good home for them. Don't know if we comply with the elfin safety regulations for a "good home" but we'll give it a damn good try.

The pups are too young to be separated from their mother just yet, but because we are GOOD friends of a friend we got first pick.

When we walked in to the large kennel housing the doggy family, mum was feeding. I didn't know whether to look away or throw water over her screaming - NOooo, and she has 8 breasts!

(For those of you who are crap at irony - I read an article recently about a breast-feeding woman who had water thrown over her by an arsehole who  - well, god only knows why these fuckwits behave the way they do.)

Anywho, the pups were a mass of writhing fur, latching on to a swollen teat while a brother/ sister tried to push it away. The wee fella looked at me and said, 'That looks cute and wrong all at the same time.'

The mummy labrador had 4 golden pups and 10 black ones. The wee fella decided he wanted a golden boy - dog is the correct term I believe - eeesh look at me, not even a dog owner yet and I know all the lingo.

The wee fella picked one of the livelier boys - see above - and is calling him Bob. Awwww.

While we wait for the pup, sorry Bob to open his eyes, grow a little more and get all his jags we have to come up with a Kennel Club name so that his pedigree can be registered. For those of you not in the know - excuse me while I act all superior - get me, doggy expert. I'll be on Dog Whisperer next week - the Kennel Club name has to be long-winded and dramatic. Like Roberto Dawnbreaker Persimmon Badinage. Or Lilly Shuttlebucket Apollo. Or perhaps even Sylvester Scraggyballs Breezebutt.

I'm struggling to pick one. I need something that suggests this dog is fun, lively, caring, comes from a good home and will never hump the legs of innocent bystanders. 

Choices, choices...anybody got a good idea for Bob's Kennel Club name?

Movie Adaptations

As a book lover I’m not too fussed about movie adaptations. I have an image of the characters from the book and an emotional attachment that the movie seldom delivers.

They are both very different mediums, and for the record (yeah, like you care) I LOVE going to the movies, but the experience provided by the book is in my opinion superior.

Two adaptations I watched recently brought all of this to mind. For both movies I had to wait until it arrived in DVD because my local cinema will only show films that appeal to the mass market and celebrity brain washed. Anything that requires a brain cell, fugeddaboutit. And as for them showing a movie with subtitles, you have a better chance of Katie Price becoming a nun. (Mmm, this is me wondering when one of her “books” will be adapted for the big screen. Gawd help us)

One was The Road. Fantastic book; I blogged about it last year, but the movie kinda left me with the overriding feeling of – what was the feckin’ point of that? It stuck very closely to the story of the book, which is fine, but gave me nothing new.

The driver for me through this book was the father/ son relationship and the horrific feeling that the boy was going to die. At times I had to put the book aside so that I could calm down before reading on. The movie gave me nothing of that. It was well made, well acted and suspenseful in parts but it just didn’t get my old heart beating with worry the way that the book did. Would it have been better had I not read the book first? Anybody out there who has watched the movie and not seen the book I’d love to hear from ya.

Another was – big clue at the top of this post – The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. And this is where my theory falls down because this was a fantastic movie. Tense, atmospheric, well acted and beautifully filmed this film held me rapt from beginning to end. This is, of course, the Swedish version – in subtitles –  which brings me back to my earlier grump; does the Odeon chain think that the only movies worth showing are those made in English?

( As for rental stores, it makes me groan/ laugh every time I hire a movie from my local DVD store and the assistant warns me grimly, “This film has sub-titles.” I know, I know lots of people will probably not see the giant sticker on the cover and come in and complain when they start to watch the film and their poor wee brains can't keep up with words and pictures at the same point. Bless 'em.)

Sure, I was familiar with the plot and that detracted from my enjoyment - un peu - (don't ask why I put in some french when talking about a Swedish movie. It's my blog I can do whatever the feck I like) but nonetheless this is a wonderful piece of film-making. I hear that Hollywood is due to make its own version and how can they ignore it given the shitload of books that have been sold?

My advice for what it’s worth; watch the Swedish version before Hollywood ruins it.

Books, glorious books...

What have I been reading recently and what’s on the TBR pile, I hear you ask. You didn’t? Well here goes anyway...

Tana French – Faithful Place

The blurb wallahs are giving us this - The course of Frank Mackey's life was set by one defining moment when he was nineteen. The moment his girlfriend, Rosie Daly, failed to turn up for their rendezvous in Faithful Place, failed to run away with him to London as they had planned. Frank never heard from her again. Twenty years on, Frank is still in Dublin, working as an undercover cop. He's cut all ties with his dysfunctional family. Until his sister calls to say that Rosie's suitcase has been found. Frank embarks on a journey into his past that demands he reevaluate everything he believes to be true.

First line: My father once told me that the most important thing every man should know is what he would die for.

Verdict - this is a 5 out of 5'er. Tana French is a wonderfully evocative writer and she's on top form here.

Caro Ramsay – Dark Water

The promo goes thusly - A bitterly cold February in Glasgow. Hanging from a rope in the attic of a deserted tenement is the body of a criminal believed to have been hiding out on the Costa del Sol these last ten years. His face has been hideously disfigured. Investigating officers DI Anderson and DS Costello believe the dead man to be a suspect in a decade-old case: the rape and attempted murder of a young student by two men. And there are other, similar cases on file. But what has happened to the dead man’s accomplice, ‘Mr Click’? And with the discovery of another young woman who has been brutally attacked, detectives Anderson and Costello realize this terrifying psychopath has started working once more. They must use every trick in the book to stop him. For Mr Click has developed a taste for his bloodthirsty trade. And to satisfy his lust he will strike again and again . . .

First line: Emily Corbett flicked the headlights of the Punto on to full beam, highlighting the puffballs of soft drifting grey fog.

Verdict - not finished yet. Police procedural set in the West of Scotland. Her last 2 were excellent and I'm expecting this to go the same way.

Lin Anderson – The Reborn

When the body of a pregnant teenager is found in a Hall of Mirrors with the full-term foetus surgically removed, forensic scientist Rhona MacLeod is called in to assist the police. Suspicion falls on Jeff Coulter, a psychotic inmate at a nearby hospital whose hobby is making Reborns – chillingly realistic baby dolls intended for bereaved parents or those unable to conceive. But how could he have orchestrated the murder from a secure mental facility?

The investigation leads to a group of teenage girls who seem to have all got pregnant at the same time. Then a Reborn doll is discovered near the crime scene and a second girl from the group is found dead...

First line: It was the fear of the clown that drove Kira inside.

Verdict - not started yet. Lin's career is going from strength to strength with the recent announcement that her books were being adapted for TV. Rankin and Rebus comparisons are fatuous but nevertheless will be delivered by the skipful.

Kate Atkinson – Started Early, Took My Dog

A day like any other for security chief Tracy Waterhouse, until she makes a purchase she hadn't bargained for. One moment of madness is all it takes for Tracy's humdrum world to be turned upside down, the tedium of everyday life replaced by fear and danger at every turn. Witnesses to Tracy's Faustian exchange in the Merrion Centre in Leeds are Tilly, an elderly actress teetering on the brink of her own disaster, and Jackson Brodie who has returned to his home county in search of someone else's roots. All three characters learn that the past is never history and that no good deed goes unpunished. Kate Atkinson dovetails and counterpoints her plots with Dickensian brilliance in a tale peopled with unlikely heroes and villains. "Started Early, Took My Dog" is freighted with wit, wisdom and a fierce moral intelligence. It confirms Kate Atkinson's position as one of the great writers of our time.

Beginning: 1975 9 April – "Leeds: Motorway City of the Seventies". A proud slogan. No irony intended. Gaslight still flickering in some streets. Life in a northern town.

Verdict: Not started yet but I'm expecting BIG things. Kate Atkinson could copy out the phone book and I'd read it. She's THAT good.

Tony Black – Long Time Dead

Gus Dury is back on the drink. While in hospital after a hit-and-run accident, his best friend, Hod, asks him to investigate the ritual, on-campus hanging of an Edinburgh University student. The murder victim's mother is a high-profile actress, who has promised a big-money reward. Gus, desperate for money, goes undercover at the university, taking a janitor's job, and soon uncovers a similar ritualistic hanging which took place in the 70s. Few of the students are prepared to talk about it - until another one of their group turns up dead by the same method. But Gus now moves into very dangerous waters as he begins to discover what and who is really behind it all - and he becomes the next target for the executioner.

First line: The doctor was a non-nonsense west-coaster type that called a spade a shovel and if you didn’t like it would add, You got a problem with that?

Verdict; Squemish much? This is as noir as they come; as dark and intense as a day under the stairs of  a haunted house.

As per, the reviews will end up on te crimesquad.com website eventually.

A couple of things occur to me as I write this – thing 1 – most of these writers are based in Scotland – Tana French is in Ireland which is as good as (and thing 1B - all are bloody brilliant) – thing 2 – four of them are women.

Thing 2 reminds me of a comment from the stage at Harrogate Crime Writers Festival last year (if you haven’t been yet and you love crime fiction, do yourself a favour and go). The comment was that male readers don’t read female writers. And it was Val McDermid who made it. A woman who surely knows her crime writing onions.

For me it’s all about the quality of the writing and being captivated by the storytelling. I NEVER check the gender of the writer first. When I look at the books on my book shelves, floor, stairs, bathroom floor – pretty much everywhere in my house – the gender mix is pretty even, with I have to be honest a leaning towards male names.

Am I out on a limb here? One of the enlightened few?

Tell me what you think, fellas.

Seven (or eight) Stages of Writer's Grief...

I came back home from my holidays to receive some free books – more of which anon – and a couple of rejections. Such is a writer’s life. You’d think you’d get used to it, but NO, each one takes a day or two to convalesce. During that time it’s like recovering from being dumped. You know how it is, you drag your feet, your heart is like a stone in your chest and you think you’ll never be able to met anyone else (or write another word).

It’s fair to say that you go through the various stages of grief.

Denial – No, not again. No, not having it. This is not happening to me! Is that addressed to me? Is it even my book? They’ve sent it to the wrong person surely. It’s a mix up. They read mine and loved it. Read another and hated it and then they mixed up the responses. Simples. I’ll just send them a polite enquiry. Hey, fuckwit, did you mean to send this to me?

And this leads nicely on to...

Anger – What do these people know? Feckin’ numpties. Couldn’t spot a potential hit if it had BESTSELLER written all over it. Halfwits the lot of ‘em. Bet they were the ones that turned down Rowling. Don’t they recognise I have the readability of King, the lyricism of James Lee Burke, the pace of Dan Brown, the insight of Freud? Can’t they SEE that, or are their heads so far up their own arses they need a torch just so they can brush their teeth? I’ll show them. I’ll fucking show them...

Which brings us rather neatly to...

Bargaining – Right, I’ll send them a letter. No, I’ll phone them. That will show them that I’m serious about my craft. The bastards. Ooops, slipping back into ANGER there. Calm. Breathe. No, better not phone them, sitting there in their fucking ivory towers with their double-barrelled names and their trust funds from mummy and daddy. Oops, with the anger again. Calm. Breathe.

No. I’ll write and ask them what I should do to improve. Ask what needs working on. Plot? Character? Pace? Setting? What else should I do? Should I get myself on TV, would that help? What if I was on I’m A Celebrity Get Me A Brain Cell, I bet that would get me a book deal? What if I shag somebody famous? I know, I’ll get a penis extension and they can film it for a documentary. Nah, not liking that idea. You should never allow a scalpel anywhere near your man junk. I’ll get a boob job. A wee wax and a D cup should do it.

Depression – I bet they wouldn’t go for the boob job. They’ll think it’s a bit lame. They’ll complain that writers are supposed to be hiding behind their desks, not hogging the lime-light. We’re all blushing violets with the marketing skills of a plank of wood and we should speak only when phoned up by The Times. Like that’s ever going to happen.

Why do I bother? Just set myself up for disappointment every time. I should realise I’m a fraud, a fake, a failure and I have all the talent of a pus-filled boil on David Cameron’s arse. (He has got feck all to do with writing, I like to have a go at him every now and again.) I’ll just go and cower under my quilt. I might pop out now and again, wearing baggy shorts, socks up to my knees and a vest that is more holes than vest to eat cornflakes straight from the box with a second course of a bucket of Hagen-Daz ice cream.

Acceptance – Well...that last one was maybe not good enough YET, but I can learn from it, no? I got in a lot of practise and I can read through it and see where it could be improved upon. The feedback from the publisher was a bit vague and contradicted the feedback from the last publisher, which means that really most of them know fuck all and they’re as clueless as the rest of us. Oh for chrissake there I go slipping into anger again.

No, I’m calm.

I’m one more NO closer to a YES. I just have to learn more and practise more and be even better than the guys and gals who are currently being published. My middle name is Nike and I can do it.

That is the accepted seven stages of grief. For writers we should then add another item...

Outrageous Optimism - Actually now that I’ve roused myself sufficiently to begin the next book and after having set aside the 2000 words I wrote a fortnight ago to settle and having just read over them I realise that I’m nothing short of a fucking literary genius. How can they possibly say no? I’m willing to bet my mortgage that EVERYBODY who sees this is going to love it. There’s going to be a bidding war. Publishers will be queuing up to offer ridiculous sums. I’ll knock Katie Price off the gossip mags and I’ve only got tiny tits. I’ll be in all the papers. ITV2 will want to film me as I sit at my desk pretending to blush like a violet. BRING ON THE WORLD. Play the trumpets. Let the lions roar.

The next work of creative brilliance is on its way.

The week after the week that was...

So after our exertions in Blackpool the wee man and I are having a quiet week.


Do you want to go out?

No.

Fancy going to the movies, I ask him. I’m a wee bit huffed that he went to see The A-Team with his mum and trying to hide it.

Nope.

How about we go down the beach?

NO.

He’s now wearing a face that suggests I’m an idiot several points north of his village.

Dad, when will you people realise I’m happy to just hang out at home?

You people? That would be me and your mum?

Yes.

Are you going to get out of those pyjamas any time soon?

What time is it?

Three pm.

Cool, he grins, I’ve always wanted to have a day in my p.j’s.



This, to be fair works well with my cunning plan. Keep him entertained in a way that allows me to catch up on some writing. Nice one.

So yesterday I got torn into my latest book. It’s crime. It’s low-down, dirty and nasty and I’m loving it.

The wee fella came over to see what I was doing. And of course, on a page full of words he happened to see the one that spelled out F-U-C-K.

Daaad, I can’t believe you’re swearing in front of me.

That’s not me swearing, I say, it’s one of my characters.

He just looks at me - And who puts the words in their mouths?

That would be me, yes. But in this occasion his friend has been attacked and the swearing is justified.

So if I come home from school and my pal has been bullied I can say the f-word?

Not a chance, buddy, I say thinking, here we go another hour’s debate about swearing.

But you just did it, dad.

That wasn’t me...

I get it, it was your – he makes the speech comma sign with his fingers in the air – character.

Oh look, I point at the TV, Kim Kardashian’s not wearing very many clothes.

Oh – he says, she’s hot.

And I’m momentarily off the hook.