Sunday, 24 October 2010
Saturday, 23 October 2010
Friday, 22 October 2010
Write a novel in a month
November is National Novel-Writing Month and the organisers invite the public to dust off the keyboard and get started on that novel they've been meaning to write all these years.
The goal is simple: On 1 November, start writing your novel with the goal of producing 50,000 words by 30 November. Personally, I'd have preferred a month with 31 days, but there you are. That means you need to write about 1,700 words every day, which is not as hard as it sounds. The idea is not to sit and fuss over every word or turn of phrase; it's to crank out as much as you can in the given time. What you'll end up with won't win you the Booker Prize (though by today's standards, I wouldn't be too sure), but you'll have that hardest part of novel writing out of the way: A first draught. December is when you sit down and start polishing it.
This comes along at a very good time for me. For the past eight months I've been making notes for a new novel and this seems like as good an excuse as any to get started on it. Next month, I'll be cranking out my 1,700 words and posting a diary of my progress here on The Quill & The Keyboard. You're invited to tag along and hopefully it will inspire a few procrastinators to sharpen their pen nibs, smooth the foolscap, and freshen that bowl of roses on the writing desk.
For more tips on getting started, Wired has a wiki on National Novel-Writing Month.
The goal is simple: On 1 November, start writing your novel with the goal of producing 50,000 words by 30 November. Personally, I'd have preferred a month with 31 days, but there you are. That means you need to write about 1,700 words every day, which is not as hard as it sounds. The idea is not to sit and fuss over every word or turn of phrase; it's to crank out as much as you can in the given time. What you'll end up with won't win you the Booker Prize (though by today's standards, I wouldn't be too sure), but you'll have that hardest part of novel writing out of the way: A first draught. December is when you sit down and start polishing it.
This comes along at a very good time for me. For the past eight months I've been making notes for a new novel and this seems like as good an excuse as any to get started on it. Next month, I'll be cranking out my 1,700 words and posting a diary of my progress here on The Quill & The Keyboard. You're invited to tag along and hopefully it will inspire a few procrastinators to sharpen their pen nibs, smooth the foolscap, and freshen that bowl of roses on the writing desk.
For more tips on getting started, Wired has a wiki on National Novel-Writing Month.
Thursday, 21 October 2010
Review: The Winds of Gath
But what really makes the Dumarest Saga so successful is Tubb's title character, Earl Dumarest. A loner, soldier of fortune, infinitely resourceful and with a strong sense of honour, Dumarest is a man who can never stay in any one place or form normal human relationships because he is driven by a terrible need to find the home he ran away from as a ten-year old boy; the planet Earth.
The Dumarest Saga is set in the far future after mankind has colonised most of the galaxy. Centuries after the collapse of a Galactic Empire that has left the galaxy a collection of feudal states, life has become hard with a technologically advanced nobility lording over planets reduced to near peasantry. Dumarest is a Traveller; part of a fringe group that roam the spaceways in search of adventure, fortune, or just a better life. It's a hard life with the risk of being stranded on a backward planet with no way of earning a passage off–provided one hasn't suffered in the one in five chance of dying while travelling "Low" in freezer compartments designed for livestock. Dumarest risks this, and the many other perils, in his search to find Earth. Unfortunately, Earth has passed into legend and scarcely anyone believes him when he says that it actually exists and that he came from there. Worse, in his travels, Dumarest soon makes powerful enemies such as the emotionless Cyclan, a brotherhood dedicated to pure logic bent on galactic domination who see Dumarest as an obstacle to their goals.
The Winds of Gath sets the tone for the series with Dumarest awakening from his frozen sleep to discover that the freighter he'd booked passage on has been diverted by a powerful noble to the planet Gath; a desolate, barely habitable world without agriculture, industry, or even proper settlements; a deathtrap for a man like Dumarest. The only inhabitants of Gath are other travellers who've been stranded and face the prospect of starving to death in their tiny shanty town and the retinues of wealthy tourists who exploit the hapless travellers like beasts of burden. The tourists themselves are there to experience Gath's one attraction: The Winds.
In a desperate bid to earn a ticket off Gath before he starves, Dumaerst enters a bloody gladiatorial contest organised by the sadistic Prince of Emmened. Defeating the Prince's champion, Dumarest falls under the protection of the Matriarch of Kund and her ward, the Lady Seena Thoth. As is expected in these sort of situations, a romance begins to blossom between Dumarest and the Lady Thoth, which is complicated by repeated attempts on her life. Or is Dumarest the target? And who is behind the attacks? The vengeful prince? The Matriarch's Cyclan adviser? Someone else?
Intrigues and violence move the story along at a fast clip until the story is torn apart by one of Tubb's signature plot devices: A natural phenomenon that borders on the metaphysical. The Winds of Gath that the toursits have come to experience are caused by a peculiar crystals that form a coastal mountain range. When the seasonal winds blow against them, they produce sounds that make the people who hear them think that they are reliving past experiences. Long dead parents can be heard, lost lovers found again, old triumphs revisited, and past sorrows eased. It's all very nice, except this year the winds turn into a howling gale that bring not just memories, but death and madness. It also neatly kicks over the traces that allow Dumarest to solve the mysteries and get off Gath with a whole skin.
No one would pretend that The Winds of Gath is high literature, but as simple escapist entertainment it excels and Tubb's writing style and characterisations make the Dumarest Saga one series well worth revisiting.
Wednesday, 20 October 2010
Quote of the day
I am returning this otherwise good typing paper to you because someone has printed gibberish all over it and put your name at the top.
English Professor, Ohio University
Review: The Specialty of the House
"The Specialty of the House" by Stanley Ellin (Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, May 1948) is one of those stories that follows you around and taps you on the shoulder at least expected moments. It's a very short story and one that is deceptively simple with it's plot about two men who frequent an out-of-the-way gourmet restaurant run by an eccentric proprietor who only serves one dish per night, but what at first seems like a '40s version of My Dinner with Andre soon becomes a tale of subtle horror. Indeed, I can't cook lamb or even read about certain dining experiences without having a feeling of cold fingers brushing against my neck.
If you haven't read it, I shan't spoil the surprise for you. In fact, that would be rather hard to do because within the first couple of pages you'll figure out what is going to happen. That is not a flaw, by the way, that is what makes "The Specialty of the House" so gripping. We follow metropolitan businessman Costain as his boss Laffler, a man of solitary habits, invites him to share the unique experience of dining at Sbirro's. We enter the dark, old fashioned dining room that was a rarity even in the '40s. We share Costain's bemusement at the clientele being composed only of men who bend over their plates like solemn worshipers of some pagan god. We feel his puzzlement at the menu that offers no choice and the lack of alcohol or even condiments on the table. We then experience his and Laffler's near orgasmic reaction to their meal that is vivid and just a bit repellent.
After dinner, Laffler explains to Costain why he is disappointed that the rarely served "special" wasn't on the menu that night–a dish available nowhere else on Earth:
'Ah,' said Laffler delightedly. 'And that is only part of the story. You heard me mention the special which unfortunately was not on the menu tonight. What you have just eaten is as nothing when compared to the absolute delights of that special!'
'Good Lord!' cried Costain. 'What is it? Nightingale's tongues? Filet of unicorn?'
'Neither,' said Laffler. 'It is lamb.'
'Lamb?'
Laffler remained lost in thought for a minute. 'If,' he said at last, 'I were to give you in my own unstinted words my opinion of this dish, you would judge me completely insane. That is how deeply the mere thought of it affects me. It is neither the fatty chop, nor the too solid leg; it is, instead, a select portion of the rarest sheep in existence and is named after the species - lamb Amirstan.'
The air of intrigue introduced by the mention of lamb Armistan is magnified by the appearance of the Sbirro himself, a Cheshire cat of a man who is a restaurateur with a bit of high priest thrown in as well. His explanation of his epicurean philosophy, of how his restaurant is a haven that provides a sense of security and fulfills a human need, and of why lamb Amirstan is so rarely offered only confirms what we already suspect. When a fortnight later a waiter warns Laffler not to go into the kitchen, we realise that the word "lamb" has a particular significance.
The power of the story lies in Ellin's talent for suggestion. Nothing actually happens in the story that would attract a modern horror buff. Nothing overt happens at all. Ellin tells us early on what is going to happen and his steady drip of clues only confirms what we already know. What is maddening is that his protagonists remain utterly unaware of what is going on and we have no way of changing that.
The propriety and quiet of the dining room only makes things worse. Indeed, it is in many ways a very English story. That's probably why when it was adapted for television on Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Laffler was played by Robert Morley and two later, and I feel superior, versions were produced by the BBC for Fear on Four and The Price of Fear. Perhaps that's why I always think of the story as set in London rather than New York.
In all, "The Specialty of the House" is a story that works well on several levels and shows what a writer can do when he uses the reader's imagination to do the heavy lifting in a story.
It's also the best argument for dining ala carte that I've yet come across.
Tuesday, 19 October 2010
Quote of the day
Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion. I myself prefer to laugh, since there is less cleaning up to do afterward.
Kurt Vonnegut
Review: Wilt in Nowhere
The fourth of the Wilt novels, Wilt in Nowhere finds the eternally put-upon Henry Wilt once again longing for a temporary escape from his teaching job at the insanely PC Fenlands College of Arts and Technology; his loving, dim-witted, yet formidable wife Eva; and most especially his ghastly quadruplet of pubescent daughters who could drive Albert Schweitzer to kicking his dog inside of five minutes. He hits on the idea of bundling his family off to visit their wealthy relatives in the United States while Wilt, begging off because of fictional teaching commitment, goes on a walking holiday where he plans to rediscover England by wandering the countryside without map or guide until he hasn't a clue to where he is.
This being a Tom Sharpe novel, the plan starts to unravel the moment Wilt steps out the door. Before they realise it, Eva and her daughters are the centre of an international drug smuggling investigation, their American relatives are having the details of their sex lives blasted across the countryside at 10,000 decibels, and Wilt is in hospital feigning amnesia–which is just as well because he's unknowingly been swept up in an arson/murder/paedophila case involving a shadow cabinet minister.
The one drawback of a Tom Sharpe novel is that, being a farce, it's impossible to relate how incredibly funny a particular episode is. The humour doesn't come from a neat turn of language, although some of Sharpe's descriptions and character reactions are priceless, but rather from the horrible train wreck that you can see coming even if no one on the page can. Where Sharpe excels is in always allowing the train to hit and making sure that the thing hit is filled with satirical fresh eggs. It also helps that Sharpe never hesitates in making his opinions known and that he is never one to let political correctness prevent him from driving his point home. In fact, if he manages to skewer the PC brigade like a beetle on a pin while doing so, that's a bonus.
Also, Sharpe has found in his alter ego of Henry Wilt a brilliant comic creation. He's not only a perfect everyman figure who embodies what most middle-aged men really think about their lives when they are completely honest with themselves, but he exhibits an incredible talent as the only sane man in an insane world. It's a sanity that allows Wilt to drive others completely 'round the bend by making seemingly innocent and reasonable remarks that turn out to be logical time bombs waiting to go off.
Wilt in Nowhere isn't the best of the Wilt novels. It lacks the go-for-the-jugular sense of the first two and it's disappointing that Wilt spends the entire middle part of the book unconscious, but it's still a solid bit of work that shows that Mr Sharpe hasn't gone dull. Sorry, the pun was just lying there.
Monday, 18 October 2010
Quote of the day
Everyone feels benevolent if nothing happens to be annoying him at the moment.
C. S. Lewis
Sunday, 17 October 2010
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