From the archives of the Write Stuff

As you probably know, each Sunday I write an article for the Write Stuff website. It's always been my intention to repost these articles on my own site, after allowing a sufficient length of time to elapse. This is my very first article for the site, from November 11, 2007. The original text can be found here.

Truth is often duller than fiction…

I have only recently begun to call myself “a writer”. Previously it was a title I shied away from. Sure, it was something I wanted to be, someday, perhaps, if I had the time, but it was not how I earned a living, so I never felt I was justified in saying that it is was what I did.

I have got over that now, and whenever people ask what I do, I tell them that I am a writer.

People have some very strange ideas about what a writer is like. Some assume I lead a glamorous life of book launches and society parties, that I spend my nights sat round dinner tables making humorous quips, like a modern day Oscar Wilde. Others imagine that there is something wrong with me, that I am a disturbed and twisted individual, especially when they find out the kind of things I write about. After all, what sort of a person would spend so much time envisaging new and interesting ways to kill people, and how to evocatively describe that?

I have an active imagination, but that does not mean I have anything wrong with me. And while I can come up with the odd humorous observation, you need to give me a few hours’ advance notice, and several attempts. My life, like those of the vast majority of writers, is perfectly normal. I eat, I sleep, sometimes I go to the cinema, I watch TV. I have hobbies, I go running. I talk to friends and generally “hang out”. I even have a regular, normal job! In addition to all this, sometimes I invent entire lives, entire worlds, and commit them to paper. In all other respects, I am just like everyone else.

But to those who do not write, we appear different. Very different.

I know who I blame for this perception of the writer – writers themselves!

The public perception of writers, as with the public perception of many professions, is disproportionately influenced by fiction. And who is more responsible for fictional portrayals than writers?

Think of some recent examples of writers in fiction. The character of Hank Moody in Californication, or how about Melvin in As Good As It Gets? Fascinating characters, but as human beings they are complete train-wrecks! This is hardly representative of the average writer, but well within the popular conception of the writer as a dissolute wastrel.

Every profession gets stereotyped, but writers are unique in that we control the stereotype, and appear to perpetuate it. And probably with good reason. If a writer writes about a writer, then that character is going to have to be pretty interesting, because I do not know anyone who has the patience to sit through page after page of “Paul sits in front of his laptop, typing away. Sometimes he makes some coffee. Scene continues for the next several hours…”

The fact that these characters are writers is incidental to the story being told about them. They could belong to any profession. But somewhere along the lines I think that detail gets lost, and people confuse the character’s personality with the incidental detail of the character’s profession, and then that becomes fixed in their mind as what a writer is like.

So, how do people react to you when you tell them that you are a writer? What is the strangest assumption people have made about you because you write?

Tags: Write Stuff Sunday Writer Paul Anderson

Fiction Friday - 28 March 2008

This Week's Theme: Describe a time your character was wronged; even though it was insignificant to the one who wronged them, your character never got over it.

---

"God we've changed"

"I can't believe my hair used to look like that!"

"Mate, I can't believe you used to have hair!"

Jen stood back from the crowd thronging around the noticeboard of graduation pictures. Ten years on, and although everyone looked different, some people still acted the same.

She swallowed hard and took a deep breath to calm her nerves. She strode towards the noticeboard, jostling through the crowd to reach the name tag hanging beneath her photo. As she pinned it to her dress, she smiled sweetly at two of the loudest members of the crowd. "Maria. Dave. Nice to see you again." Then she walked away triumphantly, as female eyes narrowed spitefully, whilst male eyes widened. She had to bite her lip to suppress the grin. She would never have recognised Maria without the name badge. The past decade must have been tough on her...

Of course, it hadn't been particularly easy on Jen either. She glanced down at her badge, with the small reproduction of her photo on it. The awkward 18 year old stared back. Jen had never been anything of note at school, always falling between two stools. She was never so fat or ugly that she was ostracised or mocked, but then never so thin or pretty that she was considered popular. She had been plain. Average. She had never stood out.

University had been good for her - getting away from people she knew, the life she had been used to. It pushed her out of her comfort zone and had made her take control of herself. She had also discovered life, fun, a confidence in herself to experiment with fashion, make-up (proper make-up, not cheap junk) and to do what she wanted, not what people expected. Success and failure, highs and lows had made her into the woman she was now. A late blooming rose, but definitely championship material.

She sauntered over to the free bar, her dress swishing the ground as her hips swayed gently. Sipping from a glass of champagne, she surveyed the room, and caught the glances. She was making an impact. Good. Now, where was he...?

"Jenny?" She started at the sound of his voice. Dammit. She felt her stomach doing flip-flops. OK, time for Plan B. He had found her, but she could still do this.

With a smile she turned to look at Mike. He hadn't changed much. A few lines around the eyes, but they still sparkled mischeviously. Dark hair cropped much shorter now, and a few lines of grey, giving him a far more serious image. Like Jen, but unlike the others, he appeared to have taken good care of himself. She had missed him, but she still hadn't forgiven him.

"Michael, wow, how long has it been?"

He laughed. "Oh, I don't know, maybe ten years, like everyone else?" She saw his eyes dart briefly down from her eye level, before returning. Reel him in, nice and slow Jen...

She raised her glass. "Here's to ten years then." He picked a glass from the bar and clinked it against hers. "I can't believe it's been ten years, time just flew by." She reached out to touch his arm briefly as she spoke, smiling and batting her eyelashes. His face flushed slightly, and she knew she was in control. They fell into an easy conversation, as if no time had passed since the days when they used to walk home from school together. If your school days are meant to be the happiest days of your life, that was when Jen was happiest.

Throughout the conversation she kept close, maintained eye contact, gently brushed her hand against his. Not too much, but just enough.

"You, uh... you look really... wow." Mike began to mumble, then cleared his throat. "Would you maybe, I mean if you're not busy, or, unless there's someone... maybe go for dinner sometime?"

She gazed into his eyes, smile fixed. "Do you want to know a secret? When we were in high school, I was so in love with you. More than just best friends. I would have given anything to have been your girlfriend."

She stopped smiling, and put her drink down. "Do you remember the prom? The last dance? Do you remember when I asked you to dance, and you refused? That's all I wanted, one dance. The chance to be closer to you than I'd ever been. To pretend, for just one moment, that someone like you..." She stopped, realising that her voice was rising. She would not lose control now. "You hurt me so much that night. I wasn't worth looking at back then, and all of a sudden I am now? Yeah, I know I look good now. But I'm still who I was then. And that wasn't good enough for you. I didn't think you were that shallow Mike, but I guess you are. So no, I don't want to have dinner with you. Goodbye."

She half-walked, half-ran from him. No tears, no hysterics. She had promised. She had said her peace, now time to move on. So why were her hands shaking, and why did it hurt so bad?

She paused outside, breathing in deeply, breathing out slowly. "Jen!" Mike's voice cut through the silence.

"Go away Mike, I've said everything that needs to be said."

"You always did need to have the last word. But maybe you should listen to what I have to say."

She looked up at him, expecting to see anger, pity, a mocking smile. Instead she saw the same look that had been on his face that night ten years ago. Pale, lip trembling slightly. "Ten years ago, I was a stupid teenager. A stupid teenager who only wanted to dance with the girl he was in love with. And when she asked, he got so scared that he would do something wrong, he pushed her away. And he knew straight away that he'd made the biggest mistake of his life."

"Don't lie to me Mike."

"I'm not lying." He reached into his pocket. "You didn't speak to me after the prom, so you probably didn't wonder why I didn't ask you to sign my yearbook." In his hand was a wallet, which he opened, and pulled out a scrap of paper. "It was because there wasn't a space for you to sign it. Your picture wasn't in there." He unfolded the paper and handed it to Jen. It was worn with age, but it was her. The school photo from their final year. And underneath, the letters "M&J 4 EVER".

"I thought you only saw me as a friend. But you were always more to me Jen. I just didn't know how to tell you."

She had promised herself no tears, but when she looked from the picture to him, it was a promise she could no longer keep. He held his hand out to her. "If the offer's still open, I would love to dance with you Jen."

Tags: fiction Fiction Friday

Coming out of the Austen closet...

As much as I hate to say it (and the Y chromosome in me is rebelling as I even think this sentence) but...

... I actually quite like Jane Austen. There. I said it.

This is of course all spurred on by a recent Easter break to Derbyshire, and a visit to the Chatsworth Estate, which was used as the setting for Mr Darcy's Pemberley in the 2005 film version of Pride and Prejudice (which by coincidence was on television the night before).

In the summer of 1996, in the transition between my penultimate and final years at high school, our advanced English class was set the task of reading three of Austen's novels: Pride and Prejudice, Emma and Mansfield Park. Naturally, the boys in the class rebelled against this thought. Jane Austen was, after all, chick-lit. Novels for girls. Yuck!

But I read them, and although I wouldn't admit it at the time, I enjoyed them. Whilst reading Emma, I raged and railed about what a stupid and annoying character Emma was, without ever stopping to realise that Austen intended us to view her that way, and had done it so skillfully that I never considered it to be intentional. And by the end even I was willing Mr Knightley and Emma to finally get together.

Ultimately, the summer reading that year was purposeless, because on arrival back at school for the final year, another teacher had been appointed to my class, who wanted to do the works of Thomas Hardy, rather than Jane Austen. Purposeless perhaps, but not useless. I never regret having read a classic, even if I hated it, and my attitudes over a decade ago might be seen more as protesting too much.

Despite the styles of stories I dream up, I'm a sucker for a romantic storyline, and dammit, Pride and Prejudice is a near perfect book. Dramatic, witty, sentimental without being cloying, and truly, deeply romantic. Women may go weak at the knees over Mr Darcy, but many men out there view themselves as being like Mr Darcy - in the novel his manner is presented as being due to his pride. I think most men would recognise his attitude of cold disdain more similar to the adolescent mask we wear when trying to hide our true feelings about things. I think, rather than just pride, the following better sums up Darcy's character:

"I certainly have not the talent which some people possess," said Darcy, "of conversing easily with those I have never seen before. I cannot catch their tone of conversation, or appear interested in their concerns, as I often see done."

What appears as disdain, haughtiness and pride is far from it. It is shyness. Darcy is a shy man, unsure of his ability to talk with people. So he avoids it, and puts on an aloof air. Which must make for a lonely life. This was how I interpreted the character as a teenager, it was a trait I displayed in spades back then (and to a lesser extent now), and it was what made me feel a connection to the character.

As might be expected, Chatsworth makes a rather big deal about the recent connection to Pride and Prejudice, and all things Austen, which then leads into a literary connection. Despite two disappointing visits to bookstores in Derbyshire, I managed to pick up one or two literary trinkets for myself at Chatsworth. A CD of classical pieces inspired by literary works or themes (perfect for getting my mood right for reading/writing) and a dip pen & ink set (I think adding illustrations from Austen's books on the ink pot was really stretching it though). In this day and age of e-mail and text messages, it might be nice to go back to pen and ink. I have a wonderful fountain pen that I use, but it might be an interesting exercise to go further back in time, and try writing with a dip pen. As someone who had/has atrocious handwriting, but conversely is an excellent calligrapher, this should provide some interesting results to say the least.

Tags: Jane Austen Pride and Prejudice literary confession Chatsworth Estate

What Tarot Card Are You?

I thought this was interesting, since I'm writing a series of short stories based on the cards in the Major Arcana. Props to Catherine at The Fountain Pen where I saw this. Check out the daily verse from the Tao Te Ching while you're there. That little book was a revelation for me in my last few years at high school.

You are The Devil
Materiality. Material Force. Material temptation; sometimes obsession.

The Devil is often a great card for business success; hard work and ambition.

Perhaps the most misunderstood of all the major arcana, the Devil is not really "Satan" at all, but Pan the half-goat nature god and/or Dionysius. These are gods of pleasure and abandon, of wild behavior and unbridled desires. This is a card about ambitions; it is also synonymous with temptation and addiction. On the flip side, however, the card can be a warning to someone who is too restrained, someone who never allows themselves to get passionate or messy or wild - or ambitious. This, too, is a form of enslavement. As a person, the Devil can stand for a man of money or erotic power, aggressive, controlling, or just persuasive. This is not to say a bad man, but certainly a powerful man who is hard to resist. The important thing is to remember that any chain is freely worn. In most cases, you are enslaved only because you allow it.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

The Grand Old Man of science fiction

Arthur C Clarke, visionary science fiction writer and seer of the modern age has died at the age of 90.

Clarke was most famous for his book 2001: A Space Odyssey, and for popularising the concept of the geostationary satellite.

The biggest influence Arthur C Clarke had over me was not, however, through his science fiction (I was always more of a Ray Bradbury fan) but through the television show Arthur C Clarke's Mysterious World, and the subsequent series World of Strange Powers and Mysterious Universe.

A man so synonymous with "hard" science fiction, with imagining futures that realistically would come true, also held a fascination for the mysterious, the fortean, the supernatural. Clarke brought a spirit of open-minded scientific enquiry to often overlooked areas at the fringes of our understanding, at a time when I was a "true believer" in all such things. And it is as a rational guide to the mysterious that I will remember Clarke.

That and the creepy crystal skulls in the opening credit sequences...

There are very few of "the greats" remaining now. Where is the next generation of giants, those who transcend the confines of their genres and are known to all, even to those who are not readers?

Tags: Arthur C Clarke science fiction giants of literature

Fiction Friday - 14 March 2008

This Week's Theme: Backstory: Tell about your characters feelings toward animals, and why she feels that way.

---

Posted early this week so my Antipodean audience will still read it on Friday, because I may not be in a fit state to post over the next 24 hours!

One hand gently cups the slender barrel, the stock nestling in my shoulder. The other hand gently curls around the trigger guard, my index finger poised and waiting. I shut my weak eye, and peer through the sniper sight with my strong eye.

And then wait. The game is on.

I can sit here for hours, immobile, waiting for the big game to pass. I laugh when people tell me there are laws against this kind of thing. Laws? Please. Out here it is the law of nature, kill or be killed. They are dangerous creatures. They could kill me, just as easily as I kill them.

Some do it for the money. Poaching is a huge moneyspinner, so what I and my colleagues do is very well rewarded. But it's not about the money for me. It's the sport. It's the kill. You spot them, shuffling about, and you drop one. Quick, clean, efficient.

Even though the ivory trade is illegal, the trade carries on. And here comes the valuables. A nice little herd. A few young ones, some juveniles. There. A bull elephant. Look at those tusks. Worth a pretty penny if you know who to sell them to. I tense up the rifle slightly. Here we go...

I pick my target. Best place is right between the eyes, into the brain cavity. Good aim, keep steady. One breath in and hold. Now, gently, squeeze...

The thundercrack of the rifle scatters the herd in all directions, but my bullet is faster. In a fraction of a second, it finds flesh and bone, and as the herd stampedes I emerge from my hiding place, and calmly walk over to my trophy.

The body lies half in and half out of the underbrush. I kick the rifle away, an automatic reaction, but I knew he was dead before I pulled the trigger. A quick glance shows that he hasn't got any colleagues. One less poacher in the world. One more day the elephants live.

Tags: fiction Fiction Friday

Fiction Friday - 7 March 2008

Tags: fiction Fiction Friday

This Week's Theme: Start your entry with a fire.

---

If this is hell, then it isn't so bad.

Crouching low to the ground, I keep my breath shallow to avoid taking in too much smoke. I can feel my eyes drying out from the heat, and I squeeze them shut to protect them. Where to now?

And why did I even come in here? The heat is so.. comforting... I could just...

Focus! I snap open my eyes and shake my head, adrenalin flooding my system and bringing me back to alertness. Just in time. I dive out of the way as the smouldering timber breaks free and swings from the ceiling, smashing into the wall, passing through the space I had just been in. I crawl along the floor, trying to reach safety. Fear is knotting my stomach, and as I hear the popping and bubbling noise, I almost lose control. It is not your flesh. It is the paint and the timber. Focus...

If I should die here, at least I'm doing something worthy, for once. Perhaps the universe would notice how you died, and what you died for. Passing through the inferno, would it exempt me from one beyond this life?

I'd laugh, but I'd choke I think. These are not the thoughts I believed I would have at the end.

There! The room. That's where I heard the shouts from, that's where I need to go. I rush for the door, and without hesitation shoulder it open. There, in the corner, alive? Please god alive...

Red and amber devils with hot tongues have followed me, surrounding us, blocking the path out of here. There is only one way out, the window, escape... life! I scoop her up and turn my back on the flames. One way out. One chance. Holding her tight, I raise the sash with my left hand, and duck out on to the narrow ledge. Only one storey. What is that short distance, compared to the fate that the flames have in mind. I pull her closer, and pray. I feel her arms tighten around my neck. Alive! Thank god! Reassured, I steel myself, and leap, away from hell and to the safety of the ground below. I turn us in the air, so that I take the brunt of the impact. As we fall, gracefully to earth, she opens her eyes and smiles. Recognition. Thanks. Perhaps more?

Then the impact, and blackness...

I awaken to the final roar of the building consuming itself, and I am bruised, but live to tell another day. And she? She looks peaceful, at rest. Please... the gentle rise and fall of her chest. The slightest quiver of eyelids. Signs to reassure me. I wipe my face with soot-smudged hands, ash and embers falling around us like snow. Open your eyes. You're safe now.

My inspirations - H.P. Lovecraft

Tags: favourite authors inspirations HP Lovecraft

A second installment of the occasional series about the writers who influence me.

H.P. Lovecraft is a writer who is not as well known to the general public as his work might otherwise be, despite the influence upon popular culture he has had. In terms of direct adaptations of his work, these have been rare (and of patchy quality - although I blame the, at times, inherent difficulty in adapting the source material) but his influence on those who came after has been enormous, and surprising. Horror writers like Stephen King, Clive Barker, film director John Carpenter (his remake of The Thing is very Lovecraftian) and Neil Gaiman, famous for his The Sandman comicbook, and most recently the movie adaptation of Stardust.

The Chthulhu Mythos has been referenced in many works of popular science fiction, including Doctor Who, and the philosophies behind his work can be found in stories like The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

A very niche writer in his lifetime, Lovecraft's work became "cult" after his death. His stories often describe the indescribable. A pantheon of otherworldly and alien creatures that are, to mere humans, like gods. These creatures are so far beyond the capability of the human mind to conceive that to see them is to invite madness, terror and death. You can see why I'm drawn to his work.

Although he deals in magic, mysticism and tales of arcane cults and rituals, his stories are not "supernatural" as traditionally thought of. His "gods" are unashamedly alien. His stories are like the paranormal for atheists.

Given the subject matter, the question is not so much whether I would like Lovecraft, but rather why it took me so long to discover him! I didn't discover Lovecraft until 2005, and that was after a decade of reading the Fortean Times...

Like Edgar Allan Poe (one of Lovecraft's inspirations, and mine), Lovecraft specialises in the short story, the form of writing I have been most comfortable with until now. Horror is not a genre I read very often (which may surprise you) but when I have read horror, I have rarely ever been "horrified". I don't scare easy. Horror stories don't scare me, and only two horror films have ever creeped me out (The Exorcist and Hallowe'en, and both of those had something to do with the circumstances of watching them...)

However, Lovecraft's story The Thing on the Doorstep brought chills up and down my spine. He is the only writer to have genuinely un-nerved me. Go check it out. But not in the dark. And not on your own...

If you have read any of The Long Watch samples I've posted, or even the recent little short Tube Nightmare then you can see a little bit of the influence creeping through, although I do veer more towards the avowedly supernatural. However there are some explicit Mythos references in The Long Watch (Maria's background is steeped in Lovecraftian references).

Cthulhu fhtagn everyone!

BUPA London 10,000 - Sponsor Me?

Tags: BUPA London 10000 British Red Cross sponsor me

On 28th May 2008 I will be taking part in a 10k run in London. I will be running on behalf of the British Red Cross (the British Red Cross is a registered charity, number 220949).

If you want to support the British Red Cross by sponsoring me, then please visit my sponsorship page on JustGiving. All currencies are accepted, and if you are UK resident for tax purposes then please use the GiftAid option.

Wish me luck!