Eggman words: 2,100 is bit of a side step into HP Lovecraft territory.
To roll backwards in time, the setting for Mandat Culturel is a Lovecraftian universe in which the forces of primeval chaos are not entirely defeated – as yet this is unpublished and I sense another rewrite, or restructure taking shape. An old school friend over in Preston has managed to stuff a POD copy in front of Daniel Lamont, who teaches English Literature at undergraduate level. What will I learn? I did poorly at English Language (fail at ‘O’ level) and never did English Lit. Hope for the best, expect the worst.
Anyway, back to Eggman. I saw how a take on the Mersey pop scene of the ’sixties that could merge with nefarious dealings with the dead / undead / never alive etc. Dastardly doings. Slightly tongue-in-cheek. A first step into short horror fiction. This will be my first submission to the newly reconstituted Creative Writing Group on My Telegraph. I offered to run this group – the payback is feedback. The mechanism for determining the winner is novel, members vote for their favourites and I tot the votes.
02 Feb 11
A side step into Lovecraft territory
Eldest daughter got into Exeter University; she pulled around from a fairly happy-go-lucky existence in sixth form to get decent ‘A’ level results. It’s Geography for her but Exeter is a bit of a hike for my clapped out, 02 Focus. It’s got 200,000 miles on the clock, yet this where she wants to go. Though I'm an accountant, as far as funds to fix the car goes, I'm out of luck.
Most genetic variation of mankind can be found in Africa. The South-West corner of the continent, where the last of the San people hold out, still has significant genetic variation. This is the place of yellowcake – a common term for mined uranium. I looked at their beliefs and their descriptions of their ruling deities. Translations struggled – many terms were repeated. Aristotle (he of Classical Greek thought) says that plot twists work when the rationale on offer is the most likely interpretation. I imagined to myself that although the San had words with no counterpart in English, meaning would follow the least line of resistance. Thus was born the mythology behind A Firmament of Stars. Words: 1,497.
Back to my evolving novel and Daniel Lamont’s feedback. This has prompted a complete rethink of Mandat Culturel. What does the term mean apart from being the title? It’s the political entity that holds sway after the collapse of the West. What will I do with it? Approach each part of the tale at a tangent – the result will be an entirely different story with entirely new treatments. It currently stands at 80k words and, at a guess, I expect the replacement to be 115k to 120k words. This will mean dumping most or all of what has gone before. I’m up for this and at the moment I’m 30k words in. Let’s see how this goes.
28 Aug 11
Non-Western Mythology
Finally release 36 Short Stories 2010/2011 which is a collection by the members of the Creative Writing Group on My Telegraph. This is largely Cutley’s fault.
The original intent to produce this book came from Cutley's desire to raise the profile of the group. At that time I planned to produce a physical edition with a PDF counterpart. Once I'd made it ready for publication, other hands might take over (which isn't how things actually panned out). The discussion progressed and Vie (I think it was) made the case for this to be an e-book; in particular, the Kindle format.
Kindle? Initially I was reticent. It's got a poor rep and learning to code Kindle HTML doesn't sound a great life skill for a wannabe SF author. Were there reasons that convinced me to at least attempt a Kindle friendly edition? It's affordable. It's the only reader anyone I know actually possessed. So off I went to find out about Kindle.
Contents list follows:
Ursa Rising, Wasted, The Siege of Recapitulacion, Occam's Penetralia and The Stone in The Sward appear courtesy of AntB.
Bi-Blouk, In the Distance, Music from a Barge, Carrie, Wending Hall, The Flitter and Little Jimmy appear courtesy of Archie_TP.
Lilac Blossoms and Night in the City appear courtesy of Ariel.
Tick, Tock and Eyes appear courtesy of Ash2062.
To Win One Must First Survive, That’s What Sisters are for, “Care for a pinch of snuff, Sir”, Lightning sometimes strikes twice! and The Last Hurrah! appear courtesy of Atiller.
Ask not for Whom the Bell Tolls, The Stuffed Goat, A Flight of Fantasy (and a close shave), The Basildon Way Incident and Grilled trout……Comanche style appear courtesy of Bleda.
Kingdom of appears courtesy of Claire.
Rules is Rules, The Gravest of Offences, Under the Stars, Pride, Sloth and Envy, The Scottish Play, A Close Shave and The Last German Spy appear courtesy of Cutley.
Points of Reckoning appears courtesy of Julie_T
Making Mischief... appears courtesy of Maisie_O
Stories held back: Under the Moon (May 2011); A Summer Retreat (June 2011); Homecoming (July 2011); Swings and Roundabouts (August 2011). All Vie.
A Walk in Buttes-Chaumont (Archie_TP, February 2011) - my hand is already too heavy on this project.
25 Dec 11
First collection of short stories from My Telegraph
