Literary Agent - and what she wants to see in submissions.

Here's the link for the discussion - an agent goes through 60 submissions one-by-one and discusses strengths and weaknesses.

It's a very useful article and, if you are looking to submit novels to agents, you really should give it a read.

The link below goes to the discussion - where you'll find some more points of view.

https://plus.google.com/u/0/106399070312173782419?tab=jX#115284257355174431332/posts/iVqex1JxvHT

Here is the direct link to the web-site:

http://writeoncon.com/08/13/60-queries-in-60-minutes/ 

Six word story.

Following a discussion on another board, here's a quick writing challenge:

Write a story in six words.

It sounds insanely difficult (well, it isn't easy, I'll admit that) but it is a really useful task. I think we're all guilty of using ten words when one will do, as you will no doubt be able to tell from my previous posts, but the professionals have the skill and confidence to hint at ideas rather than just tell us.

A big problem in writing is over-explaining as it takes away the aspects most likely to hook your reader: exploration and discovery. So why not give it a try?

Here are some famous examples:

Ernest Hemingway - Baby shoes for sale. Never worn.

Joss Whedon - Gown removed carelessly. Head, less so.

Stan Lee - Automobile warranty expires. So does engine.

Margaret Atwood - Longed for him. Got him. Shit.

Anyway, have a go - and feel free to post your stories on the comments!

The Hook - how to open your article.

Following on from the last post, looking at a useful structure for writing articles, I’m going to take a quick look at the “hook” paragraph. This is, as we all have drummed into us at school, the opening and introduction to your piece. It is, after all, the first impression you give of yourself and your ideas. Still, it’s easy enough to say that, but how does that work in practice? What is right and wrong? Is there even a right and wrong?

Well, what I come across quite often (I’ll admit it right now, cards on the table, I am an English teacher by day) is an overly formal, formulaic style to these openings. This is possibly a carry-over from essay and report writing structures from other subjects (History, I’m looking at you), where a formal setting out of goals and targets is suitable for an opening.

But it is not useful for magazine articles. Not at all.

What you do want to do is grab people’s attention and illustrate your key idea(s). Not everything you want to say but what you have decided are the most important aspects.

Now, how to grab people’s attention? Should it be linguistic? Should it be through tone or imagery? Should it be through a fact or a key piece of information? Hey, it could be any of those approaches and it’s really dictated by your point of view and what you want to say.

So, we’re looking at 2-3 sentences that need to make an impression. I always consider the impression you give to your reader to be like the impression you want to give to an employer at a job interview. Instead of a suit and tie, we have ideas and our writing style, but it works the same. Like an interviewer faced with a shabbily dressed applicant, decisions are made by the reader within those first few lines and you won’t win them back after that – largely because they will have skipped over to the next site…

Anyway, so you need to think about the key information for your story an how you’re going to convey it. In this way, it is story-telling and the best articles are written by authors who aren’t so quick to draw a dividing line between genres.

For this example, I’ll use The Butterfly and the Bell Jar by Jean-Dominique Bauby (check out the details on wiki, if you’re interested: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Diving_Bell_and_the_Butterfly ).

So it’s an autobiography written by the former editor-in-chief of the French Elle magazine who developed locked-in-syndrome after a massive stroke. So the facts are striking and the subject needs to be dealt with sensitively, but there’s a lot of information to work with.

With Locked-in syndrome leaving the author unable to speak, or move anything except his left eye, the writing of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is as much a reaffirmation of the human spirit as it is an impressive piece of literature. For, as painfully honest and wonderfully written as it is, one cannot but keep returning to the life that birthed the story and reflect on all that was lost. Surely, it must be said, the sign of a successful autobiography.

Ok, so I went for an opening with the most important bits of information: Locked-in syndrome, what that actually means, the autobiography that came from it, and why we should all read it.

You can get a feel very early on for what you want to say, so there is value in listing off the key elements before knitting them together in one efficient sentence. Of course, it can feel a little overloaded and that is for you to judge and edit accordingly. It can be at that point that you trim back, leave a little more for the second sentence or the later paragraphs.

I could have approached it with a colder definition for Locked-in syndrome, giving a bit of distance before we get to know the man. I could also have started with a quote, maybe from the author, possibly from the text, or maybe by anyone with something valuable to say about the themes of the text.

All I am saying really is that there are many ways to get started. There aren’t set rights and wrongs, only your instincts. The instincts come from practice and looking at alternatives. Early on, it would be sensible to try out two or three different ways of introducing your piece before choosing the best one. With practice you will find the right path more instinctively but, until then, you can only plan and practice.
Have fun and get writing!

Tips and structures for writing articles.

Journalism is a difficult career to get into, but a rewarding one. Certainly starting your own blog and writing regularly is the first step – it may feel like you’re working hard and getting nowhere but, if approached in the right way, it should be developing your technique and voice. This is alongside, of course, the undervalued skill of producing material regularly and to tight deadlines. People often slip up by waiting for inspiration to strike them, but that is not a luxury that a blogger or a professional writer has. 

The only way to improve is to read regularly and write continuously. You learn by just doing it. Sure some of the first articles might be weak, but so what? The next ones will be better. The worst thing you can do is fuss too much over the initial pieces – you won’t be learning to write to time and you won’t be getting the practice in.  

If you are looking to get writing and want a helpful structure for writing then Labov and Waletzky’s analysis of the links between oral storytelling and newspaper formats is a good start. It was originally based on conversations, but I think it is a helpful guide for writing articles…

The structure they defined was as follows:

1)      Abstract – This provides the “lead” or “hook” for the story. By that I mean, you are not formally summarising everything that happens, instead you are offering up the interesting POV/take on the story. It needs to be concise (don’t go for more than 2-3 sentences) and well-written. Why should your audience read on?

2)      The Orientation – The who, when and where. This sets the scene for what has occurred.

3)      The Complicating Action – This addresses what actually happened that has made this a story in the first place. Quite often the information in 2 and 3 can be merged but, even if they are in one paragraph, they do tend to work in this order.

4)      The Evaluation – This answers the question – so what? Here you are highlighting the importance of the event/occurrence – quite often by using quotes from people who have experienced the events (along with 2 and 3, this will be the longest section of the newspaper article).

5)      The Resolution – How was it resolved? What might be happening in the future?

6)      Coda – A signing off (less likely in written form of news) – but it is often seen in the form of a paragraph that wraps it up neatly, quite often an aside or tangent to the rest of the piece.

If you’re not sure about this, grab a newspaper and try dividing up the section – you’ll see the boundary points, even if they overlap a little at times. You’ll also notice how, for example, you will start to get the evaluation roughly two thirds in, with all the quotes from witnesses and comments from experts. Once you start applying that template, you’ll see how prevalent it is in writing.

Anyway, if you’re having trouble getting started with writing articles there are plenty of ways to approaching them. This isn’t the only way but it is one way and it might be helpful.

My thought is, when faced with a difficult task, to always divide and conquer; breaking it down to a number of small sections to write is easier than sitting down to one big piece. As such, it can be helpful to use the above as sub-heading to structure your writing whilst you’re getting used to it (delete them out before you post!).

Using story arcs to write a novel

Story arcs are the series of little beginnings, middles and ends that, put together, will build your story. Now that’s straight forward enough, and people get taught that in school, but the part that’s important for writing your novel (or even your short story) is how you build and control the development of a series of strands of information.

For example - the main story might be how the character, we will call him Dave, forms a band and finds fame. I know – great story, it practically writes itself...

Anyway, that’s the main story arc. It requires, for the success at the end to be fulfilling, that it seems unlikely at the very beginning and that challenges are met along the way. So this really dictates how you open the story or write the first chapter - you need to establish the contrast with how you want to end the story.

I’m going to stop right here and offer up a link that might be helpful (http://www.writersstore.com/narrative-structure-and-infinite-creative-possibilities/ ). Well explained and some top tips – certainly worth a look!

Getting back to our story of Dave the Musician, because he is clearly a man defined by his role, another story arc within that might be dealing with a difficult relationship with his father (we'll call him Ed the Father). So Dave the Musician is on his way to fame, but along the way he needs to resolve his relationship with his father, Ed the Father. Clichéd, I know, but just to illustrate a point.

Even that doesn’t really feel enough; your readers are greedy (if they’re anything like me) and they want more to work with. Each story arc offers another puzzle and another opportunity for the reader to feel that they own the story for themselves. Done subtly it engages because they’re always working and joining the dots to understand the characters. Not only that, thinking along these lines help you to work out the character’s motivation and you start to understand them on a deeper level.

For example, returning to Dave the Musician here and his Father (Ed the Father), that flippant comment I made about him being defined by his role has suddenly got me thinking… OK, his self-worth is entirely dictated by his status. He is a man who doesn’t operate on a level of individuality – instead, needing to be understood and perceived a certain way. So does that mean that he accumulated possessions, experiences and friends that will reflect on him in a certain way? He is the sum of the parts of his life… so a series of sub-arcs (or sub-plots if you prefer using actual, real phrases) would help to slowly build these elements of his life and allow them to contribute to your story… Suddenly you find your way to an interesting aspect of the character and you can launch off from that (it’s a good way of forcing writing when you have writer’s block, I must admit).

Really, this needs us to look at character mapping, and I'll do that in a different post. However, when you do have your character traits all set, all mapped out, then you can pace and control how you introduce these ideas. For example, Dave the Musician is selfish in his relationship with Sue the Girlfriend (no doubt because he chose her on the basis of what she says about him) - but how do we show that? How do we pace this revelation?

A good exercise is to list what Dave the Musician could do that was so selfish (Cheat, never clean the house, never ask about work, take her to a certain restaurant becuase he like the food (when she didn't), make excuses and disappear when her family come around...) Anyway, when that'd done I would work the list into an order from subtle selfishness to really obviously a so-in-so. This can give us an order of approaching it in the story. Leap in with the obvious stuff too early and the rest of it becomes redundant ("Yeah, I get it: he's not nice. Get on with it!"), slowly build and the reader starts to suspect there might be something wrong before it's signposted and then feels pleased with themselves when they find out the truth. It also means that the earlier events have reinforced the believability of his later actions.

I hope you don’t misunderstand me; I am not saying that every novel should be densely plotted, but they should be densely layered with information. Even if it’s controlling a slow release of information about a character’s perspective, even if it’s controlling tone, then it all needs to feel purposeful for the reader to trust you and continue reading.

I think there's a danger in wallowing too much in one aspect of a character. It doesn't help you to convey their depth and it leaves the reader tuning out or, worse still, putting down the book. It's like someone taking 45mins to tell you that their boss is awful with one anecdote that made the point in the first minute, or someone taking 700 words to talk about managing sub-plots... uh...oh dear. This is kind of awkward.

Beside the River - by Ben Allan Watkins

I've published an e-book collection of my short stories called "Beside the river" so, if you link any of the free samples on this site, why not give it a go? Any feedback would be welcome too...

It forms a series of interrelated stories set in a small fictional town of Ashwater. All connecting, they aim to build a picture of the community by exploring a variety of relationships, whether within families, amongst friends or between partners.

US purchases: http://www.amazon.com/Beside-river-Stories-Ashwater-ebook/dp/B00AUHY4GE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1368871383&sr=8-1&keywords=beside+the+river+ben+allan+watkins

UK purchases: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Beside-river-Stories-Ashwater-ebook/dp/B00AUHY4GE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1368871271&sr=8-1&keywords=beside+the+river+ben+allan+watkins

SHORT STORY - The Redraft

The Redraft

The air had cooled, the skin on her fore-arms prickling like a breeze caught on the tips of waist-high grass but, for all that, her eyes remained heavy-lidded; sleep had been difficult over the past few weeks.

The chill of evening sun-burn massaged Lena’s legs and she considered turning back. It was just a moment, but longer than she would have expected. Still she reached the edge of the jetty, the sea sucking at the barnacles on the support posts ten feet below.

Her house sat idle and would do until past ten, when Will returned home, but that was still two hours away. She rubbed her hands together and blew between her palms, barely noticing arms glide around her like the sea-breeze.

“Missed you.”

Lena closed her eyes, “Missed you too.”

“You like this beach?”

“Let’s walk.”

“Sure.”

Their footsteps sank in dry sand and slowed them as they left a dusty wake. They didn’t hold hands, Lena wouldn’t allow it, but she knew that anyone who saw them would have understood.

“Did you have work today?”

“Yeah.”

“You going to tell me what you do?”

“Not yet.”

***

She met her mother the next morning, embracing her like they hadn’t seen each other for months before settling into a café. The frail woman nestled a Styrofoam coffee cup in her hands, leaning over it like she was fighting off a bitter chill.

“Good to get out of the sun,” she said absently. “Far, far too bright.”

Lena nodded silently.

“Did you hear from the people? The teaching people?”

“The University?”

“That’s the place!”

“Nothing yet.”

“You have to get...”

“I can’t quit until I have somewhere else to go to.”

Her mother took a few careful sips of her coffee, “Isn’t Will making enough?”  

***

The beach had rapidly become their meeting place and Lena had spent the days between their walks closing her eyes to hear the rolling waves and licking her lips to taste sea-spray. Will had kept hidden in the spare room with his latest project and her Pinot Grigio supply had dried up, leaving her alone with her thoughts.

Friday night was spent sat in a deck-chair in the garden, a blank note-pad in her lap lit by the open living room curtains. A biro hung like a cigarette from her lips as she stared up at the stars and the old oak that grew too close to the house.

Eventually, she heard the padding of saggy trainers and her fiancé stood over her. His shirt was streaked with paint and a dollop of magnolia sat in his hair.  

“Are you... you been okay?”

“I’m tired.”

“True.” Will nodded, then carefully; “Still, there’s something else…”

She was half-tempted to tell the truth and, appropriately, what she said was half true; “It’s the house.”

Will smiled; “Don’t worry, it’ll get there. How’s the writing?”

“I’ve ground to a halt.”

“Tried taking a walk?”

“Yeah,” Lena replied a little hesitantly, “All the time.”

“Didn’t help?”

“No.”

Will sighed, “You got holiday left?”

“Not saved up but maybe six days left for the year.”

“Then take ‘em,” Will said, closing his eyes. “Take ‘em and go on holiday. Go to Corfu and do some travel writing, use the place to write. Do whatever you need to do.”

“I can’t afford it.”

“I can.”

“I can’t take your money.”

“Never stopped you before.”

***

  
A bell sounded over her head as she entered Bluebird, the small surf shop tucked away from the town’s main roads. It was packed but empty. Clothes lined the walls and filled the aisles, even hanging from the ceiling, until she couldn’t progress any further without turning sideways.

Then she heard shuffling sounds, stifled by a half-closed door, drift from the store-room. They were followed by a voice; his voice, “I’m coming.”

He threw the door open but it was cushioned by wetsuits before it met the wall and he scrambled behind the counter. Before he saw her he muttered apologies, then he froze.

“Well howdy there.”

“Hi.”

“What do I owe this pleasure?”

Lena shrugged, smiled.

He looked at his watch, “I thought you were busy during the day.”

“I got away early.”

“Superb,” he smiled, “I wanted to talk to you about something.”

“Really?” he mistook disappointment for surprise.

“I got a brochure for the theatre productions in London…”

Lena shook her head.

“Of course we can,” he said. “We can catch a train there and stay the weekend in a hotel. I haven’t got much money but…”

“I don’t have any.”

“My treat.”

“I have a boyfriend.”

“A boyfriend?” His eyes dulled without a smile, “How long?”

“Seven years. We’re engaged.”

He chewed the inside of his lip, fists clenched in his pockets, “Then I guess that’s it.”

Lena shook her head, “No.” Good sense told her that he was right; there wasn’t anything else to say.

“Why’d you come here?”

“I wanted to talk to you.”

“What more do you have to say?”

“I owe you thirty-four ninety-nine,” she said, producing a crumpled receipt as proof.

“The t-shirt was a present.”

“People write that stuff off and... I want to pay you back.”

“I’m fine.”

“I’m not,” Lena said and fished out her purse. “Thirty-four ninety-nine…”

“Is that why you’re here?” he asked, his voice offering echoes of different accents. “To clear all debts?”

“Just take the money.”

“Fine.”

A pause held amongst the clutter and his blue eyes.

“I can’t write in that house.” Again Lena sought the right words; “It’s just work. Whenever I picture the house I want to live in… it won’t ever be that place.”

She looked up but he was still quiet, watching her and expecting more.

“The other night, I found some old stories,” Lena sighed. “I tried to redraft them but I just made different mistakes.”

“Then leave him.”

“I can’t.”

“Then don’t,” he shrugged. “What do you want me to say?”
The corners of Lena’s eyes chilled with the beginnings of tears, “I love you.”

Getting writing - Novels and the like.

The time investment is massive and, even after that, it's difficult to ask others to invest their time in what you have written. Writing these behemoths can be dispiriting and pretty darn anti-social, but it is so worth it.

Over the next few weeks, nay months, I will be sharing bits of the novels I've been working on and, hopefully, starting a serialised novel to be published fortnightly.

But how to get started with a novel?

1) Wherever the idea comes from (check out out an earlier post on forming characters), the piece starts with an idea. But it's worth thinking about what sets the idea apart - do that at an earlier stage and you might adjust the trajectory of the story the few degrees it needs to be special and different.

2) I've found it helpful with my first novels to break it into a series of arcs, so I can feel in control of it. Looking at it as interrelated narratives, helps it to keep fresh for you and the reader.

3) Try not to make the characters too idealised. Maybe it's just me, but it's the flaws that make a character human. They don't have to be incompetent, but they should be human.

4) Efficiency! This is a bit more specific and I'm paraphrasing advice I've found from a series of books etc:

a) Use adverbs like they cost money and you're writing on a budget. When we're kids we're told be creatively and write "Todd said maddeningly" or "Sarah snapped aggressively". Well "snapped" does enough work there - we do not need "aggressively", especially if the dialogue is chosen wisely.

b) Try and tell us about the charcter in the way they talk as well as what they say. Show don't tell! You'll often find that you are then free to chop out a lot of the information you would otherwise directly tell the reader (why tell us he was unhappy when you can show it to us?). Besides, how often do we say "I watched the film, but the book was much better"? It's not just detail, it's the fact you have to work more with a book and it's more rewarding because of that - It's a puzzle the reader has solved. Give your readers a puzzle and they'll keep reading.

c) Read through your sentences - aloud. I do teach English (don't shoot me!) and the single most common bit of advice I give students is to read their work aloud. They don't even have to read it to anyone else - when you hear what you've written (and you have to read word for word, pausing only for punctuation) you see silly slips you've made and, more importantly, you get a feel for the fluency for the piece. The flow of it.


5) Treat each chapter as a short story with a beginning , middle and end. And when I say end, leave some kind of a cliffhanger to make the reader desperate to learn more. It's one of the reasons Dan Brown is as successful as he is.

6) From drafting and drafting (so much redrafting!) it gets shorter and shorter but, as better authors than me have said, no story is ever ruined by being shorter. It may be painful, but my first tip is to strip it back to the bone. You may fight tooth and nail to keep a sentence, a paragraph, even a chapter... but does it really need to be there? We always have a nagging feeling, this sense that you need someone to say 'cut it', but ignore it until we are forced to do it.

It's painful, but I found my instinct was right. It knew best. Cut the thing. Often what I thought of as flourishes was really a load of old waffle.

Really a lot of tips carry over for whatever you write, but keep them in mind and it'll help you to add a little more polish to your work.

SHORT STORY - 'Making up the numbers' taken from the collection 'Beside the River' by Ben Allan Watkins

Short Story:

The following is a full short story from the collection 'Beside the River' by Ben Allan Watkins. Available as an e-book on kindle, it can be purchased for an introductory price if you click on the following links:

US link: http://www.amazon.com/Beside-river-Stories-Ashwater-ebook/dp/B00AUHY4GE

UK link: http://www.amazon.co.uk/product-reviews/B00AUHY4GE

Otherwise, please enjoy.

Making up the numbers

The best thing. Max had thought about it for a while, rolling a cigarette on a DVD cover and watching curls of tobacco scatter onto the carpet. Sophie had asked him what the best thing was... what the best thing was for the kids.

Autumn had been overcome by winter; the trees had taken a silver sheen to their bare branches and the grass had grown patchy and brown. The kids going to school had started to wear bigger and bigger coats, taking gloves and scarves without complaint.

Well, he’d done the right thing, for sure. Of course he had.

He fished a plastic lighter from his pocket and thumbed it three times before it lit. Always three times. He felt the flame crawl under his nail, burning his skin tight and smooth, before he tossed it back onto the table and put the cigarette to his lips.

His brother, Tom, didn’t mind the smoke. He had no choice, but he didn’t mind it. He had grown up with it, so it smelt like returning home; like day old roses; like Sunday dinner and sitting around the table listening to his grandfather’s old stories. It had always been around him.

Max watched the smoke drift and drool from his lips. They wouldn’t miss him. It would be a badge of honour and, when they’d grown up, they could blame him for anything they liked. It wouldn’t make any difference to him what they said; out of sight, out of mind.

“You still seeing that girl?” Tom asked.

“I’m seeing her, yeah.”

“Seemed nice enough when I saw her.” Even when they were kids they never had conversations like this; funny what a disaster brings out.

“Yeah, I know,” Max nodded, “but you make hay whilst the sun shines.”

Tom shifted, he didn’t really understand but it seemed to him like he should have. He leaned back, digging his shoulders into a sofa soft as dust, and propped his boots on the coffee table. “You need to like your place more,” he sighed. “You need to treat it right, no-one else will otherwise.”

Max dug his chin into his chest, feeling the three day old stubble. “Yeah, I know.”

“You know?”

“Yeah, but it don’t matter none,” Max sighed. “Still, you can take your boots off the table for a start.”

When he was done Max pulled on a hooded jumper, dusting tobacco off his legs as he stood up into his smoke. He found two socks, whether they matched meant little to him, and an old pair of trainers that were worn through in places.

The staircase that led down from the third floor was narrow, old and in need of paint. The air was thick with mould as they made for the front door, prompting Tom to hold his breath behind his brother’s back. Max fished out his key; “I got some paint cans from Sulley,” he said. “No point waiting for the landlord to get himself in gear.”

His new flat was over a chip shop and they got a glimpse of polished stainless steel surfaces as they passed by the side windows. On the walls, high above the counter, old posters offered pies, local fish, some even hinting at the promise of Chinese food. “We’ll grab something on the way back. I know a good place... better than this and cheaper too.”

“Where are we going, Max?”

Max didn’t look back, he was marching. “Got something to show you.”

“Why am I suddenly filled with a sense of dread?”

“Hey, if I weren’t stupid, then I wouldn’t be nothing.”

Whenever Max caught sight of the signs, the billboards and posters that had sprung up over the past few months, Tom saw him chew it over and over in his mind, his eyes distant and furious. Normally it would mean that he would retreat into his shell, pretending that he was checking his laces or some scuff on his shoes, but today was different.

“Hey, hey...” Max said, stopping quite suddenly in front of his brother, “I’ve got something.” He set a hand on Tom’s shoulder and gave it a friendly squeeze. “I found something the other day. I... I was going through some old boxes, stuff Dad left...” He grinned warmly, forgetting himself and allowing a glimpse of his egg-shell teeth. “Remember when we were kids?” he asked. “Those inter-school competitions? The big sports days...”

“I remember you going,” Tom replied.

“Yeah,” Max nodded. “Found this little medal in one of Dad’s boxes.”

Tom took a look at it, reaching over and letting it sit in his hand. It was light, made of cardboard and coated in gold paint. On the front in black was the number one, big and bold as you like. Tom smiled; so he had finally found the time to pick up his share of the things.

“I got it for sprinting,” Max said. “First time I realised that was what I wanted to do with my life. I was seven then. Seventy-nine it was, I guess, and I couldn’t stop running after that.”

“I didn’t even get anything from the little school sports days,” Tom said. “Every year they tried to find something to give me a medal for. They even introduced tiddlywinks to give me a chance. I think I was the only kid who didn’t win a thing.”

Max laughed, thrusting the medal back into his pocket. “I’m not saying anything.”

Past pastry shops, a furniture shop called ‘Seconds’ and a boarded up catering company, they turned left onto Exleigh road. Wider, with shops crammed tight on either side, it ran straight and long, a rare quality for a road in Ashwater. They passed a sign saying “allotments” that pointed down a narrow path that twisted away into the shadows. The buildings were squat and cramped, seemingly creaking with seaside tat and charity shop donations, and overshadowed by old four story homes a garden’s length from the road.

Tom was already looking forward to getting away again. How long before he said that he had to call the wife? How long before there was a problem with the kids and he had to go home?

“You know how much it’s worth?”

“Your medal?”

“Yeah,” Max smiled.

Tom crossed his arms; he wasn’t quite sure where his brother was going with this. “Nothing.”

“Not a bean, yeah,” Max laughed. “But then no-one’s interested in my sporting achievements.” He pointed up to a house, third from the end, and asked, “You know who lives there?”

Tom squinted; he kind of remembered it from when he was a kid. Had a friend lived there? Or maybe one or two doors over... “No.”

“Helen Layland.”

“Is that meant to mean something?”

“You need to work on your community spirit, Thomas. Get away from the ivory tower and take an interest in those around you.” Max found a low wall and parked himself awkwardly on it. “You never heard of Helen Layland?”

Tom shrugged; the disinterest in his body language was quite deliberate.

“She runs the local swimming clubs, the Otters.” Max said proudly. “Thirty years she has and always voluntarily. Four of her kids have gone on to compete in international tournaments. One was at the Olympics. Don’t know how she did.”

“Shelley Holland?”

“That’s her name,” Max grinned, “well done!”

 “So?”

“Again, community spirit.” Max pulled his collar up and dug his hands into his pockets. “She carried the Olympic torch through town. She had a mile with it. Right here.”

“Good for her.”

“It was. You know what they do with the torches?”

“Pass them on?”

“You’d think,” Max replied. “No, they take one home. Everyone who carried the torch took one home.”

“She has one in there?”

“Yep,” Max nodded. “Now ask me how much they’re worth.”

“I figure you’re going to tell me.”

Max smiled, he was enjoying himself. “One sold for over a hundred thousand.”

“Really?”

“People buy any old rubbish on E-bay.”

They sat there a moment, watching the house, before Max stood and un-buttoned his jacket as far as he could bear. Tom watched him: his brother had the same determined look he wore when he was fixing up the old VW van he’d bought, or painting houses for cash, or moving furniture. “I could join the dots for you, but that would just insult your intelligence. So, I’ll just ask this: you gonna help?”

“I’m an office manager,” Tom said helplessly, but he was already standing. He didn’t know why he said yes and, after a few more steps up the path, Tom started to doubt whether he had agreed to it at all. It was daylight, grey and overcast but it was daylight; people were passing by in the street all the time. “I work with insurance…”

The garden was quite long and a little overgrown; grass grew around an over-turned trike and a clay pot that had been split by the roots inside it. The wall was low and uneven, with very little cement left between the stones. It didn’t run straight, instead weaving a little on its way to the house.

Max knocked on the door and took a step back, a breath. Tom always figured that you could learn a lot about a person from their front door; here it was heavy duty and fire retardant with a fresh, but decidedly thin, coat of green paint. So rented accommodation it was.  

“Hello, my name is...”

The door was only half open before she asked, “Are you from the TV company?”

“Yes, my name is Ryan and this is my colleague, Tim.” Max said confidently. “We’re looking forward to talking with you…”

“Well, I just want you to fix the thing.”

Max hesitated, “They didn’t really explain the problem when I got the call.”

Shelley was in her early sixties with her silver hair cut short. She was small and lithe, dressed like she was an artist rather than a swimming coach. She wore tinted glasses and a pashmina scarf that Tom guessed to be more expensive than his coat.

“It’s been terrible,” she sighed. “Really it has. As soon as I turned the thing on the picture becomes all blocky and none of the 3D works.”

“We’ll have to take a look,” Max said sagely, before stepping past her.

The TV was already on when they entered the living room but it had fallen into static. Two pairs of 3D glasses lay haphazardly on a battered old sofa and that was about it for furniture. Tom knew Max’s eyes would be saucers for the thousand pound TV but he was more concerned with the state of the remainder of the room.

“Excuse the mess,” Shelley said, suddenly quite self-conscious, but there hardly seemed to be enough in the room to make a mess even if you wanted to.

“Don’t worry at all,” Max replied as he knelt before the set. “It’s a lovely TV, isn’t it? Hard to believe what we all put up with only a few years ago.”

“Yes...”

“Have you managed to get any picture on it?”

“Yes, for a minute or two.”

“We’ll have to have a look behind it...” Max said, twisting the screen to peer amongst the cables that ran down to the floor. He sat up again, and looked back to her before asking, “Is there a chance of a cup of tea at all?”

Once she was gone he grinned, “The motherload!”

“There’s nothing here...”

“The TV, the Olympic torch, her bingo money... ”

“Where?”

“That’s where you come in,” Max replied. “I think it’s time for a little recon on your part.”

Shelley came back hurriedly, muttering apologies that she only had green tea. Tom thanked her, but barely touched his, and Max drank his so quickly he could barely taste it. “So,” she asked, “Is it fixable?”

“Well,” Max replied with his most sincere expression, “We’ll certainly have a try.”

“Please do,” she said. “The kiddies will be awfully disappointed otherwise.”

So they set about the task with a professional-seeming vigour. Before Max could show himself up, Tom asked for a look at the satellite dish and she led him up to the bedroom. The corridors were neat, if a bit sparse, and the room itself consisted of a double bed, a few scattered boxes and a collection of ornaments set out on the carpet.

After a few minutes of hanging out the window and waiting for her to leave him alone, he climbed back inside the room and pronounced that there was nothing wrong with the alignment on the dish. He quickly shut the window, shivering, and walked back downstairs with her.

“Have you just moved in?”

“No, been here years,” she replied and, when she noticed his surprise, she stopped and grabbed his hand. “I know it’s looking a little empty nowadays, but I couldn’t keep all his things after he left. Not when so many of my family have little kiddies and are struggling at the moment.” She smiled softly, but her grip on his hand tightened. “Promise you won’t tell... they’ll all be so cross at everything I sold.”

When Tom returned to the living room, he had to take back his initial opinion; it was obviously quite possible to make a mess in such an empty room. Max had pulled out most of the wires and, for some reason, dismantled the stand the TV had sat on. His brother froze and bit his lip.

“It doesn’t look like it’s going too well there, sonny,” the old lady said. “Looks like we’ll need to put another pot of tea on.”

Max protested otherwise but she scuttled off to the kitchen before he could stop her. As soon as the door shut, Tom had a hold of his brother’s shirt. “What have you done here?”

“I nearly had it at one point.”

“At one point?”

“Well, not now obviously,” Max shrugged. “Now I think I’ve knackered it.”

“What are we doing here?”

The doorbell rang and they heard Shelley sigh and walk back to the corridor.

“Did you find the torch?”

“No sign of it,” Tom replied. “She doesn’t have much of anything up there, to be honest.”

Faintly, Tom was aware that the front door was opening and “hullos” were sounded. “Wait,” he snapped. “Is that the real repair men?”

They turned in time to see the living room door open as Shelley ushered in a mob of children, all shouting and laughing and bumping into each other. No, Tom thought to himself, if anything it was worse.

“We have to go,” Max said quite apologetically, but he was already half past the old lady and his eyes were on the door. She caught him on the sleeve and her grip was surprisingly tough to let slip. “I’ll have to phone it in to get the right tools for the job...”

Shelley paused then, her head tilting a little. “Well, why didn’t you bring anything like that with you when you came?”

“Daddy!”

Aghast and growing paler Max looked down and saw his daughters clinging on to him, one for each leg. “Hey there, poppets,” he managed with what enthusiasm he could muster. “You look happy there.”

“Because Daddy is here!” Kelly exclaimed, before bursting into tears. Beside her, little Jo looked set to go the same way too.

Max swept them up into his arms, “Why are you crying, dear?”

“I’ve missed you Daddy.”

“We’ve missed you,” Jo corrected with an indignant sniff.

The doorbell rang again. Tom spluttered, “What are you running? A cresh?”

Shelley was moving again and nearly out the door when she called back over her shoulder. “Don’t worry, there shouldn’t be any more kiddies for the party...” she said as she disappeared from sight.

“That’ll be the real repair men then,” Tom snapped, glaring at his brother.

“Uncle Tom!”

“We can’t go,” Max whispered. “What can we do?”

Kelly again: “Why are you going?”

“We have sunk really low with this one,” Tom said. “You do realise I’ll lose my job, don’t you?”

The living room door opened again and this time Shelley was followed by a man dressed in tuxedo and carrying a big suitcase. She called out to the children, “Look kiddies, we have a magician!” and Max and Tom knew that escape was getting more difficult with every passing second.

Despite their protestations, the pleas of the children, determined that they should stay for the show, combined with Shelley’s insistence that they finish the job they started and meant that their escape was as good as blocked. Max slumped back into the sofa as his daughters clambered over him, leaving Tom to slink away to the TV set.

Before Max could do anything, other children followed his daughters onto the sofa, swamping the floral material until it looked set to collapse. Every moment seemed to consist of Kelly grabbing at his sleeve and introducing him to a new friend; names like Sarah, Lilley and Ruth blended together in her excitement. When she finally stopped for air, an older girl called Caitlin, playing mother to the little ones, shook his hand like they were concluding a business deal and gave a little shrug as if to say “kids, eh?”

The magician, an old man who hobbled from years of back pain, lifted his hands as high as he could manage and the room exploded with confetti. “Ta da!” he cried and part of Max couldn’t help but be impressed as he tried to forget himself and clap along with the girls.

The show raced through a number of the old classics: coins from ears, flowers from sleeves and toys made to vanish. Through the different tricks it became clear that one of the children, a little boy that Kelly was friends with, was Shelley’s grandson and the party was for him. The magician’s image had no doubt been tarnished when a film about strippers, also called Magic Mike, had come out but, otherwise, he wasn’t so bad. Max had long thought that most magician’s names could easily been misused in such a way.

“And now for a volunteer...” Magic Mike said rather grandly.

“Daddy, go on Daddy!”

The doorbell sounded again and he hoped that Magic Mike was going to try a vanishing act. Shelley was out of the sofa beside him and children flooded over the seat, filling it instantly. “Don’t you worry yourself,” the old lady said. “Enjoy the show!”

Tom was working with the wires, like if he could fix it then he could save himself, but he seemed to just be getting himself in a muddle. He cursed once, but that particular word didn’t seem to be on the children’s radar just yet.

“Come on then, Daddy,” the old magician said.

Max stood and set his girls down where he’d been sitting. He kissed them each on the top of their head before walking to the old man.

The bell sounded again and Max could hear the front door opening over the old carpet.

The magician stepped beside Max and smiled, “Now, boys and girls, does anyone know what joins and links us all together? The bond we all share?” But Max didn’t hear a word; he was listening, straining to hear the mumble of voices at the front door. “It’s numbers.”

The children booed at that and someone cried out “I hate maths.”

The old man smiled, “You shouldn’t though... numbers are everywhere... not just in maths lessons.”

Max could make out the sound of the door closing and footsteps approaching.

The magician turned back to him, smiling broad as ever. “Now these are not playing cards. They simply have numbers on them. White cards and black numbers. This should be easy for you, sir. I just want you to pick a card, any card, and I will tell you the number on it.”

The sound of footsteps and the door-handle turning.

Still life carried on, it kept moving despite the end being near. Max took a card and looked at it.

The door opened and Shelley returned. Behind her, two wiry men followed in blue overalls. “We’ve jus’ come to fix the TV,” one was saying. “We won’t be no bother.”

Max froze, letting the card slip from his fingers. Tom struggled to his feet but he couldn’t run.

Suddenly the room lit up with a flash of white light until the TV settled on the image of a sprinter at the Olympics, the channel blinking in the top right corner. Max looked to his feet and the card stared right back at him: channel 79 and the card read 79 and the year he fell in love with track, 1979.

Shelley crossed her arms and narrowed her eyes. “If these are the gentlemen sent by the TV company, who are you boys?”

Max hesitated, lost a moment, and glanced over to his brother.

“Daddy!” Kelly called out and Max rushed forward to embrace her and her sister together.

“We wanted to pop around and surprise my girls at the party,” he said. “I know there was a muddle but we thought we could help...”

“...And we did,” Tom added, resting a hand on the TV. Despite his best efforts, he had the look of a particularly skittish bomb disposal man.

The engineers checked over the set before they left and the magician finished his show. At the last, as parents started arriving for their kids, Shelley smiled and put her arms around Max and Tom in turn. “Are you away now?”

Max smiled, “I might stick around with my girls until they’re picked up.”

“No problem, as they say. Thank you both for your help,” she said. “You can be sure that you have a friend in Helen Layland.”

“Helen?”

Tom’s eyes narrowed, “You’re not Shelley Holland?”

“No, of course not,” she snapped, “She lives next door.”

OPINION - favourite authors.

Who are your favourite authors? Teaching English makes this question a particular minefield – one that I dance around carefully and with a full awareness of context: too dry and you’ll scare off students or, worse still, sound like a liar; too light and you’ll sound flaky and, dear God no, a bit low brow.

There are a number of authors I circle around, every so often one repeats him/herself too much and drifts out and another finds their way in.
 

Cormac McCarthy – anything he writes has got me, certainly for the time being. Maybe, in part, because he embraces genre storytelling and then finds something rich and interesting to do with it, but also because his control of prose is so damn good. I challenge anyone to find a single word they would change in The Road or No Country for Old Men. They were superb films, the Coen brothers doing especially well, but the quality come from the texts.

George R R Martin – so much has been written on his works at the moment that it is difficult to add much of note. If you’re cautious about the label ‘fantasy’ then probably there isn’t a lot I can say that would change your mind, still, take my word for it; you’re missing out on well-formed characters from an author with a real mastery of narrative.

Clive Barker – Is an author often unfairly bracketed because he writes adult stories that, at times, require a strong stomach to get through. That said, ever since I discovered him in my early teens, I’ve kept returning to his short-story writing in moments of creative lapse. A walk in his footsteps, even for a little while, is enough to set me right.

Alex Garland – I love his scriptwriting but I keep getting drawn back to The Beach and the Tesseract. They are wonderful novels that, for an aspiring writer, really show how you can translate your own experiences into a fiction environment.

Peter Carey – having taught True History of the Kelly Gang for a number of years, and returned to Oscar and Lucinda in my own time, there is something wonderfully controlled in the way he approaches his topic. Exploring the language of his characters is particularly interesting and his work is something I always point students towards to understand how you can convey characters through the way they talk rather than what they say.
 

There are more, but these are the ones that leap to the front and, over the next few weeks, between offering stories from my own collections, I will be looking to discuss their works a little more.

Review - Short Story: 'The Fly' by Katherine Mansfield.

A quick read you may never have come across:

'The Fly' by Katherine Mansfield.

Don't be fooled by the fact this story is only a few pages long, treat this tale like the very best poetry and you'll get a lot more out of it. For English students and the casual reader, there's a lot to get out of this piece, not least an understanding of the author's own difficult experiences.

Having lost her beloved brother in World War One, Katherine's pain is writ large in the suffering of the main characters. Set in the years following the conflict, this finds a retired and infirm gentleman (Mr.Woodifield) visiting his older, but still working, employer (referred to only as The Boss). There's is a complicated and subtle relationship, two men who, for various reasons, are still dependent on each other; on some levels they remain friends, but their meetings are more selfish than either would like to admit.

As the story progresses, The Boss is left in his plush office with the memories of his son who died at war. For all his pretences at strength and authority, he struggles with how to cope with the fact that his ambitions for his son have been stolen from him.

Then he sees a fly trapped in an ink blot. The tale is an allegory, it offers multiple metaphorical interpretations and leaves the reader to take from it what they want. Most importantly, whatever you decide, you are left with a sense of unease and sadness at the suffering of those left behind.