Harper's Bizarre

I was in the Dolly Peel the other day, having a drink or two with a couple of friends. Like me, Trevor the manager is a Man United fan, and soon the conversation got around to new signings, leavers and the new season. Posh and Becks' new arrival also entered the discussions: Harper Seven is the little girl's name. Of course, we went around the houses, trying to work out which way and what, but in the end Trevor summed it up best:  "I suppose it's better than 'Quarter To Eight!' "
Brought the house down, I can tell you!

Suit hunting

I'll be looking at new suits, soon, as a good friend of mine is getting married on the 30th. I guess I should have been married twice, but both times the relationship fizzled out. Still, it leaves me free to make the mistake once lol I'll have moved house and written a lot of stuff by then. Hopefully, this will be a more permanent move and one which allows me to write with more freedom in my head.
I like weddings. It means there's love in the air and happiness, too. Can't have enough of that!

The Big Push

No, I haven't left work again! The urge to write is taking me over. I'm looking at stuff and seeing how it feels. Over the next two weeks, and into the two weeks off I've got coming up, I'll be exploring more of this new world I've created.
It's not the writing of it that bothers me, it's the storyline. I need to make sure the story is interesting enough and asks big questions of the hero and his friends. The reader has got to want to know more and to keep turning the page. Each chapter ending must entice the reader into the next chapter. I mustn't disappoint.
I like the title of the third book, and its BIG IDEA makes me believe there might even be a fourth. Hmmm, gotta stop getting ahead of myself. But at least all this means I'm full of ideas at this moment. A good feeling to have!

Mobile Homes

Noel the Ultimate Proofreader has got a new mobile phone. He tested it out on me today. One day, a thought will throw up a screen and your intended convo partner will appear in front of you like magic. A hologram, perhaps.
mY aNDY wARTHOL mOMENT lOL

Litopian Dream and Echoes of The Past

Just read Dave Pimm's (Solveig Anderson) latest post on his blog.
You know, when I first joined Litopia, I thought I knew a lot. I did know some things, but there were other things I didn't know about. Solvey says he's indebted to Peter Cox, and I can echo that. Things like going with your gut feeling (which I can say I did, but was never sure if I was right to) and planning - something which I never did, except for a flurry of notes before writing my next chapter. I don't do anything without planning now. My writing now is a positive testament to that, but getting published is another matter.
Let me just say, however, with a great deal of remorse and regret, that my exit from Litopia was rather spectacular, when I championed another member's complaint, which escalated into a rather unseemly argument with me refusing to back down over the level and number of critiques passing as reviews of members' work. The site is now doing what it should have been doing, I believe, but that's not even remotely down to me: more down to the law of supply and demand being allowed to work more naturally. When I think of past disagreements now, and there have been a few, I cringe! I've been part of a few workshops/forums, and not just online but non-internet places. I've helped a lot of people and they've helped me. I've written a full length story and lots of short stories as well as poems, so I have more than paid my dues with respect to 'becoming' a writer. My thoughts were, and are, valid. But I could feel Litopia was going downhill, and after all the hard work done in getting Litopia more active, I wasn't going to stand idle as the site slowly became passive again. Which it was. The success of the site came after I left. I was a lowly chargehand there, so I'm claiming nothing other than 'I told you so'. But I loved the place and still refer people to Litopia when they say they want to learn more about writing. I refer them to Critters, too, as both places have lots to offer.
But I'm not a stranger to arguments online - some things only happen after the air has been cleared - but I've always maintained that I'm brave, perhaps not reticent or politically expedient. The quote 'discretion is the better part of valour' will never apply to me, thank god! Solvey and Richard Howse remain friends from my days at Litopia, something which I class as the most important thing that has happened after my days there.
But here's a curiosity: solvey mentioned The Lord Of The Rings. I did a huge amount of research involving future readers of a similarly-written fantasy. The fantasy wot I wrote! The overwhelming conclusion I reached was that readers wanted a new Tolkien. No matter which way I looked at the answers people gave - the vast majority complained about the lack of Tolkienesque writing. They wanted more, and he was dead.
Now, I can be accused of being a Tolkien copycat. I actually was accused and I blasted back in no uncertain terms. But there was a reason for writing in the manner I chose: history.
Consider these: Ivanhoe, Great Expectations, The Lord Of The Rings. All written in a similar way, modified naturally by the times in which they were written. But, to me, all three could have been written by the same writer.
So what is wrong with writing like Tolkien? He wrote like Dickens, who wrote like Sir Walter Scott. A rhetorical question, as there is no answer that maybe makes sense. Millions of readers can't find the new Tolkien/Dickens/Scott, because he/she won't be published in the modern day. Unless the story fits the picture of this modern time. It comes back to my initial, and still only, reason that makes sense to me: the story that links the chain of these three greats must be a great one. A modern one. It hasn't happened yet. The story, that is. The story, the story, the story. With great people in it. I am trying to write it. Early indications from my wonderful readers are that I'm not far off - I think...
Now, what I'm rambling on about is this: what if The Lord Of The Rings is echoed in solvey's Margrave series. And Dickens' characters came alive there, and Ivanhoe rode through it. Could this be allowed? Tell you what, they wouldn't half sell!!!! (Erm, they already do Ed.)
Good cider, this Stella Artois...

Twitter

There's a guy on twitter who says he likes Joe McElderry. The twitter is not me, nor is the photo! But it's my name!!! I'm not a twitter - just came across it whilst looking, vain-like, for what was against my name on the internet. Eeeh, and there's me thinking I was the one and only lol
Oh well, maybe it's a distant relative or summat.
Joe McElderry... sheesh!

The Viking Sagas

BBC4 showed a documentary tonight on the Viking Sagas. How I'd love to have been let loose on them to rewrite this most peculiar of Legend series.
As a kid in junior school at St Bede's, I was noted for bringing in all kinds of comics - more notably Spiderman, The Fantastic Four and Superman. I also brought in comics such as Thor and his magical hammer. The stories about Thor weren't that great in the mags (or comic books, as MG says they should be called!), but everyone read them, all the same. I remember when our tutor, Mrs Gardner, fell ill and the Head, Mr Hallas, took over our class for the run-up to the 11-plus exam. Picking up my Thor comic, he asked everyone who had read it to put their hands up. Most of the boys did, but none of the girls. Then he asked all of the boys to draw a picture of their own idea of Thor. My pic was useless, as I can't draw to save my life, but one of my mates was a guy called Andrew Keedy, who is now a noted local artist, and his pic was brilliant. He managed to capture the feeling of life in the time of the Vikings, which was a slightly different feeling to that of the image of Thor.
At St Joseph's, I found a book on the Viking Saga, and another on Nordic legends, and was extremely disappointed. They were written by someone who didn't have any feeling for the stuff he/she was writing about. I've read others, and the writers again seemed not to care too much as to whether their intended audience would like what they were reading. Maybe, I wonder, this is the reason why they have failed to take off.
Writing a comic book about Thor, Loki, Asgar and Valhalla is easy with titles like those. Translating them into film is not that difficult a step. Try using other names from the Norse legends and, in most parts of the world, you will turn people off. Therein lies the main problem: attraction. As much as I have read them in the past, I'm not deeply moved to read them again. I'll just get annoyed!
But still, I'd love to rewrite them. Maybe, if I never get published - a probability - I might just do it for my own pleasure, as they are great legends just poorly represented. You never know!

You can't unstitch the past

Nope, you can't... all you can do is not regret too much and try to do things better in the future. Don't kill yourself over your mistakes. Looking ahead is far better than looking over your shoulder - you're less likely to fall over again, for sure... and I've fallen over lots, I can tell you!

But I'm still around, still looking at blank pages and trying to fill them with something. Will it ever amount to anything? Can what you believe is art actually exist if no-one else sees it? The inner turmoil.

Crazy life...

A piece of magic

In the end, I realised I had better map out what was going to happen in the next few chapters, otherwise I was going to get lost. I was glad I did this, as it cleared my head and allowed me to think about things a bit more. Of course, I haven't written a total plan, but the order of events thus far created looks a lot better than the small fog of confusion drifting about my thoughts.
Something must have clicked, though, during this bout of planning, for suddenly I had an idea. A little piece of magic crept in where there wasn't any to be seen. Ha! Amazing what you can achieve with a bit of thought. I'm not saying I would have thought of it later, given that it wasn't originally there, but I do wonder why I thought of it now. Perhaps some magic was needed, or was going to be needed, and I subconsciously picked up on it. Not sure where it will occur within the story, but it must and will! Yeehaa! I'm smiling as I head off to bed.
Two other pieces of magic to reflect on: the first, Manchester United's defeat of Chelsea inches them closer to the title and adds more confidence to everyone as they prepare for the Champions League Final; the second, the tv trailer for Game Of Thrones does give me some hope that my epic fantasy (rejected and set aside for a while) may one day be revisited. But that is a long way away. I don't read it, now; I prefer to keep it fresh and hidden away until I need to go back to it.
So, I'm rather upbeat right now. Not writing quickly, but writing what I hope is something good. At about half way my trusted readers will see what they've helped me with. Fun and the future!

A scene revisited

I did say that I would be returning to the scene that was the ending of the first chapter. And I have - a new extra chapter has been created from it, placed further down the line, all typed up and ready for revision at some future point. Two chapters out of one and both of them necessary to the development of the story: can't be bad, can it? The story is now moving on and heading into deeper waters. Sink or swim lol
Briefly looking through what I've put together, it's apparent that almost all of the chapters have that unfinished feel about them. This is good, as I will want to make them feel finished after reviewing them. I did have a slight dilemma, in that there was a nagging thought that I should go and complete them before moving on. Sanity prevailed, as there are so many chapters still to do and write up that I would have been stalling progress at the very point I needed to be making progress. No contest!
There will come a point when it would seem madness to carry on without ensuring everything was as good as I could have made it. I do know, more or less, where that point is. But, at the moment, I have to keep writing into the future. Feeling good about what's there so far, though :-)

Time to move on, I think...

I've found it a little bit difficult to write where I am. The flat I'm in, though in a nice area and looks nice, is not all it was cracked up to be. You can't sleep in the main bedroom when it's windy; parts of the wiring and other 'home' things could have been done better. Other stuff, as well. It feels more like a run down hotel room. Still, I have the power to move, so I probably will. Part of my policy of not settling for second best. Oh, and I've put a stop to immediate comments on this blog. I need to check them, first. I know I don't write very much of interest in this place, but someone put a rather non-complimentary, anonymous comment here concerning the Mayans and 2012, just because I happened to mention it in a blog post. I was even informed that the world would end in the year 3 thousand and something! Guess I'll just miss it by a few years. Me being me, I'd love to have discussed what was said. Then again: an anonymous comment? Something tells me that whoever it was wasn't being friendly...

Who'd be a writer?

Or should that be 'Who'd try to be a writer?' Solvey's flagging up of yet another internet incident was a reminder of just how tough it can be when you present your thoughts to the writing world in the form of a story. Whatever the rights and wrongs, the whole thing could have been avoided by keeping reviews initially internal, away from the public eye. Both the writer and the reviewer, along with the website administrators, could determine the veracity of the argument. The all-important word integrity needs a look-up. It was self-published ffs. There had been no hammer beforehand by anyone other than the writer. The review that sparked the latest row was actually rather light in terms of assistance to the reader. It lacked substance, which, I believe, caused the negativity - true or false - to stand out. Nothing, though, could have prepared anyone for the writer's response! Don't get me wrong: I've had a blast back at reviewers and commentators in the past. It is everyone's right to defend yourself, especially if you are right. You cannot say 'don't defend yourself in public' if the review is made in public. However, you really must try to determine if you are right if you are going to argue back. Being poked with a pointed stick is no fun, and some people sharpen their sticks for no other reason than jealousy and their own inability to get anywhere, or to be recognised as good in their chosen field. "Look at me! I'm disease free!" is usually the real motive behind the stick. They are trying to impress someone, and may have their backing for any number of reasons. The reviewer is not always right, and if there is no reply, other people who are inexperienced, open to suggestion because of their lack of experience/knowledge, may believe the reviewer is right. What future will they have in the writing world if they follow perceived truths that are anything but the truth? And I'll repeat: it was self-published! Criticisms either way meant nothing. There was no pass or fail along the way. It just went up for sale by personal right. No agent; no traditional publisher. I'll leave the indies out, as the spiral hasn't been fully established yet. Enough said. I've got four trusted readers who I can rely on to give true reviews, as opposed to reviews with ulterior motives: Solvey, Noel, Rich and Becca. They are worth a million would-be fiction reviewers I've encountered. And they work with a view to agent/publisher submissions. Not self-publishing.