Turning it up to 11. When a scene needs as much as you can give it. #parodies #competition .@HeideGoody .@IainMGrant #wip #writingworld #writertips .@rararesources

Scene Writing

By

Heide Goody and Iain M Grant

On a scale of one to ten, how extreme do you want your scene to be?
If it’s comedy or horror then you should consider dialling it up to eleven.
So, what exactly do we mean by that? Let’s imagine a comedy scene where we want the comedy to come from our main character suffering social embarrassment when they’re on a first date.
What might we think of doing to our character?
– they lose all of their money somehow and cannot pay for anything.
– they dye their hair for the occasion and it goes wrong, so they CANNOT remove their hat.

Either could work. What would we score them: maybe eight out of ten?

How might we turn them up to eleven?
– they lose all of their money somehow and cannot pay for anything — they work out a deal with the restaurant where they will do some waiting in lieu of payment. The downside is that the restaurant wants them to do it NOW as there is a rush on, so our hero must keep disappearing from the date to go and secretly wait on other tables, all the while attempting to keep things “normal”.
– they dye their hair for the occasion and it goes wrong, so they CANNOT remove their hat. Every possible reason for removing a hat must subsequently be encountered, from minor etiquette reasons to an animal getting inside the hat. It should culminate in someone important demanding the removal of the hat.

This is where it can be very useful to write in a partnership, or find some other way to stretch your ideas. It is a muscle that you can develop yourself, if you routinely make the assumption that your first idea might be pedestrian or cliched. What does your second or third idea look like? Keep going until you have the idea that feels as though you have really maxed out the concept you were aiming for.

What about horror?

If you’re going for any kind of gross-out horror, then the concept is very similar.
Here’s an example from our novel A Heart in the Right Place:

Nick has broken into his neighbour’s house to retrieve something of his, and we wanted him to be incriminated by finding a body. The person could have been poisoned or stabbed, but we wanted something spectacularly horrible, so we came up with the idea of using a power tool. In our version of turning it up to eleven, we decided to use all of the power tools.

“In the middle of the hallway was a Black and Decker workbench. He recognised it because his dad owned one just like it. There were several power tools clamped to the workbench. Nick wasn’t sure what they all were, but knew his dad would not only know what each was called, he’d also know how to operate them and what sort of job they’d be used for. Nick was pretty sure the scenario in front of him was not one recommended by any of the manufacturers. Each of the tools had its gouging, drilling, sawing bits turned upwards, and the mutilated remains of a man’s body lay face down on them. The whirring sound Nick heard from outside was made by several tools which were running. Some of them stuck out from the back and side of the man’s body. There was even a lengthy drill bit, still spinning, poking out through the skull.

“Oz?” asked Nick. He felt like an idiot. He felt sick.

Oz was in no state to confirm or deny his identity. Chunks of his body had splattered the walls. Blood had pooled on the hall rug, seeping through and spreading to the skirting boards. The parts left on the bench juddered with the tools’ movements, as if Oz was having sex with his workbench. The dog was licking at the dead man’s dangling hand. Perversely, Nick thought this was particularly wrong.

“No. No. This isn’t right?” he heard his mouth say. 

~

Introducing…

A Heart in the Right Place

All Nick wants to do is take his dying father for a perfect father-son weekend in the Scottish Highlands. It’s not much to ask, is it? A log cabin, a roaring fire, a bottle of fine whisky and two days to paper over the cracks in their relationship.

Amazon

However, Nick didn’t plan on making the trip with a dead neighbour in the back of his car. Or the neighbour’s dog. He really didn’t plan on being pursued by a psychotic female assassin intent on collecting body parts. And he really, really didn’t plan on encountering a platoon of heavily armed mercenaries, or some very hungry boars, or a werewolf.

A Heart in the Right Place - a horror comedy about setting out with the very best intentions and then messing everything up.

Facebook | Website | Twitter Heide | Twitter Iain | Amazon

About the authors:

Heide Goody is the stupid one in the writing partnership and Iain Grant is the sensible one. Together, they are the authors of over a dozen books.

The ‘Clovenhoof’ series (in which Satan loses his job and has to move to Birmingham) has recently been optioned by a Hollywood production company.

Heide and Iain are both married, but not to each other.

And now for the competition!

Giveaway – Win a gorgeous Moleskine Passion Traveller's Journal (Open Internationally)

The Moleskine Traveller’s Journal is a structured before and after record of every journey you make, from weekends away to life-changing trips and everything in between. 

Note down your travel plans before you leave and list all the things you hope to see and do, then add maps, photos, tickets and keepsakes when you return. 

The Traveller’s Journal is a place to dream, get practical and create a unique and lasting paper archive of your travels that you’ll want to revisit again and again.

·        premium box with themed graphics related to your passion
·        hard cover with themed debossing, rounded corners, elastic closure
·        2 ribbon bookmarks
·        double expandable inner pocket
·        front endpaper with ‘in case of loss’ notice
·        ivory-coloured 70 g/m² acid-free paper
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·        themed introductory pages
·        400 pages 
·        themed stickers to customize your journal
·        Moleskine S.r.l. creates and sells FSC®-certified products "

*Terms and Conditions –Worldwide entries welcome.  Please enter using the Rafflecopter box below.  The winner will be selected at random via Rafflecopter from all valid entries and will be notified by Twitter and/or email. If no response is received within 7 days then Rachel’s Random Resources reserves the right to select an alternative winner. Open to all entrants aged 18 or over.  Any personal data given as part of the competition entry is used for this purpose only and will not be shared with third parties, with the exception of the winners’ information. This will be passed to the giveaway organiser and used only for fulfilment of the prize, after which time Rachel’s Random Resources will delete the data.  I am not responsible for despatch or delivery of the prize.

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OR if you don’t like html or are on WordPress

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Described as a 'hillbilly Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy' and definitely not for children! .@roberteggleton1 #android #scifi #adutbooks

Rarity from the Hollow

by

Robert Eggleton

Lacy Dawn's father relives the Gulf War, her mother's teeth are rotting out, and her best friend is murdered by the meanest daddy on Earth.

Life in the hollow is hard.

She has one advantage -- an android was inserted into her life and is working with her to cure her parents. But, he wants something in exchange.

It's up to her to save the Universe.

Lacy Dawn doesn't mind saving the universe, but her family and friends come first.

Rarity from the Hollow is adult literary science fiction filled with tragedy, comedy and satire. A Children’s Story. For Adults. 

Paperback | Kindle

 Half of author proceeds are donated to Children’s Home Society of West Virginia for the prevention of child maltreatment

Excerpt from chapter 32

Rarity from the Hollow

 “The First Sexual Harassment Complaint on Shptiludrp”

Scene Prologue: Lacy Dawn, the eleven year old protagonist, is a most unlikely savior of the universe. An android named DotCom (a recurring pun in the story) was sent to Earth to recruit and train Lacy to fulfill her destiny. She changed the android’s name to “Bucky” to cover-up its true nature, assembled and prepared a team to diagnose and address the threat, and took her team to planet Shptiludrp (Shop Until You Drop), a giant shopping mall and the center of economic governance for the universe. The following scene is the team’s first meeting with the Manager of the Mall and takes place in the only high rise office building on the planet, now easily identifiable as Trump Tower.   

 ~

…Lacy Dawn scanned across a desk larger than her bedroom and lowered her gaze until just above the desk top. In an oversized swivel chair behind the desk sat a humanoid…. Mr. Prump stood up…. He extended a small hand with six fingers, each of which had at least two overly large golden rings.

“It's very nice to meet you, Lacy Dawn,” he ignored the others….

“He looks almost just like that short guy on those taxi cab reruns,” Dwayne whispered. “What’s that actor’s name?” (Dwayne, Lacy’s father, is an Iraq War damaged Vet who suffered from PTSD, night terrors and anger outbursts until cured by the android since he had refused treatment by the VA hospital. Dwayne, an expert used car salesman, plays an important role on the team and worked very hard to save the universe in an effort to achieve Lacy’s forgiveness for his past abusive behaviors.)

“Shhhh,” Lacy Dawn glared.

“I have a complaint to make,” Lacy said to Mr. Prump.

“Oh?” Mr. Prump sat down, opened a drawer, and shoved a form across his desk in her direction. “Please call me Mr. Prump.”

Hospitality has been extended to her entourage.

The form ran out of momentum half-way across the desk. Lacy Dawn extended and retracted because it stopped well short of her reach.

That's too far regardless of obligatory respect.

“I was not aware of any dissatisfaction of any type, sir,” Bucky reverted to his role as DotCom in the presence of his long-term authority figure. Lacy Dawn gave him The Look and trumped.

“Your elevator operator just told me that I have a nice ass,” she said.

Dwayne started for the office exit to get the offender. Lacy Dawn pushed him toward one of the chairs in front of the desk. Tom grabbed Dwayne’s arm. (Tom is Lacy’s neighbor. He is a wealthy “back to the land” marijuana dealer who relocated to The Hollow when he concluded that city life aggravated his Bipolar Disorder.) Then, Tom and Lacy Dawn had to restrain Bucky’s attempt to go after the offender. 

Lacy and Jenny stood alone in front of the desk while the males sat. Jenny moved to her daughter's side. (Jenny is Lacy’s formerly downtrodden mother whose self-esteem had been enhanced after the android had replaced her rotting teeth with new ones.) Brownie growled. So did Bucky. (Brownie is the family mutt and the only member of the team with enough empathy skills to communicate with, at this point in the story, vile invaders of the universe.)….

Mr. Prump shoved another form in her direction with the same result. The complaint forms were the only papers on the desk….

“Tree says that to me all the time,” the receptionist said from the doorway. “Would anybody like something to drink or a snack?”

Nobody responded except Mr. Prump. He extended a cup that had been on his desk, but the gesture was ignored.

"That's different, you…" Tom started but Lacy Dawn's look cut him short.

“The females of those people got no figures at all -- straight up and down,” the receptionist said. “I wouldn’t take it personally, Lacy. All males from that planet become infatuated with any curve on any body that they think is female. He's a nice person once you get to know him.”

“Regardless, it was inappropriate for him to tell me that I have a nice ass.”

“Yeah,” her team said in unison. DotCom was the loudest except for Brownie’s bark followed by another growl.

“I ought to kick his ass for talking trash to my little girl,” Dwayne said.

I'm such a juvenile.

Lacy glared at him again.

“Sorry,” Dwayne hung his head.

“Further,” Lacy Dawn continued. “I'm not about to do business with any planet that permits the sexual harassment of its visitors or employees to go undisciplined.”

Jenny sat down.

“Yeah,” the receptionist said.

Mr. Prump sank deeper into his seat….

“I’m never going to sit on your lap again unless I want to,” the receptionist said. “And, as for anything else, you can just forget it from now on unless you take care of this. Take care of the whole problem on the whole planet -- equal respect for all people -- within their financial means, of course.”

“Take a memo to Division Managers with a copy to All Staff.”

Lacy Dawn stood alone before the desk. He dictated the memo and she listened.

It's pretty good. There's procedure for making sexual harassment complaints, investigation, due process, and penalty.

“That’s all for now. I'll contact you tomorrow to begin negotiation of terms,” she said.

Mr. Prump asked her what time but she didn't answer. Lacy Dawn had concluded her first meeting with the most powerful being in the universe and had beaten him in negotiations.

Paperback | Kindle

“The most enjoyable science fiction novel I have read in years.”

—Temple Emmet Williams, Author, former editor for Reader’s Digest

“Quirky, profane, disturbing… In the space between a few lines we go from hardscrabble realism to pure sci-fi/fantasy. It’s quite a trip.”

—    Evelyn Somers, The Missouri Review

. "…a hillbilly version of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy…what I would have thought impossible; taken serious subjects like poverty, ignorance, abuse…tongue-in-cheek humor without trivializing them…profound…a funny book that most sci-fi fans will thoroughly enjoy." -- Awesome Indies (Gold Medal)

“…sneaks up you and, before you know it, you are either laughing like crazy or crying in despair, but the one thing you won’t be is unmoved…a brilliant writer.” --Readers’ Favorite (Gold Medal)

“Rarity from the Hollow is an original and interesting story of a backwoods girl who saves the Universe in her fashion. Not for the prudish.” —Piers Anthony, New York Times bestselling author

“…Good satire is hard to find and science fiction satire is even harder to find.” -- The Baryon Review

"…Brilliant satires such as this are genius works of literature in the same class as Orwell’s 'Animal Farm.' I can picture American Lit professors sometime in the distant future placing this masterpiece on their reading list." -- Marcha’s Two-Cents Worth

"…I know this all sounds pretty whack, and it is, but it's also quite moving. Lacy Dawn and her supporting cast - even Brownie, the dog - are some of the most engaging characters I've run across in a novel in some time…."  -- Danehy-Oakes, Critic whose book reviews often appear in the New York Review of Science Fiction

"… The author gives us much pause for thought as we read this uniquely crafted story about some real life situations handled in very unorthodox ways filled with humor, sarcasm, heartfelt situations and fun." -- Fran Lewis: Just Reviews/MJ Magazine

 Website | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads

Little Guide to Unhip

book by 

Kate Rigby

Have you ever worried about not being quite hip enough?  Or maybe you are one of those who flaunts your unhipness with abandon?

Either way, The Little Unhip Guide is for you. Although it charts my own personal unhip top 50 with the likes of Gilbert O’Sullivan, Morris Dancing, Vicar of Dibley, Sanitary Towels (with wings), and the colour beige to name but a few, I picked those characters, characteristics, attributes or material objetcs with a universally unhip feeling to them.  Each is given an unhip rating up to five for you to keep a count of your own unhip rating, and some sections include a few personal anecdotes.  There is also a ‘bubbling under’ list for a further 14  unhip things not quite making the top 50. 

This book carries a warning: some readers may seriously dent their coolness if caught reading this material!

Kate Rigby has been been writing for over thirty years and has released many titles. Her latest is Little Guide to Unhip by Night Publishing. Little Guide to Unhip is a comedy lightly based on the author's own experiences as she blundered through her teen years to adulthood. Not targeted at any particular audience, but probably better suited to thirty-somethings plus due to the era of the novel. 

Maybe Kate's "unhipness" has abated because she penned a punk novel titled Fall  Of  The Flamingo Circus which was published by Allison and Busby and by Villard. It was reviewed in The Times and The Face. Since then she has seen Seaview Terrace and Sucka! published by Skrev Press and Break Point, and shorter works have appeared in Skrev's avant garde magazine Texts' Bones including a version of a satirical novella Lost The Plot. 

A poignant novel, Thalidomide Kid, was published by Bewrite Books which brings back the era of the 60s and 70s wonderfully, so if you're looking nostalgia as well as a tearjerker maybe that's the one to try.

Kate has many short stories published, and received a Southern Arts bursary for Where A Shadow Played (now renamed Œ Did You Whisper Back?), and Dancing In The Dark is an erotic anthology by Pfoxmoor Publishing.

Her novels tend to be character-driven and a bit quirky or gritty ­whether contemporary or retro ­and deal with issues of today: drugs abuse, homosexuality, neighbourhood conflicts, and a common theme is about the experience of being an outsider in society.

Titles now available on Kindle:

Little Guide to Unhip

Thalidomide Kid

Seaview Terrace

Break Point

Suckers n Scallies (formerly Sucka!)

Down The Tubes

Smashwords:

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/16648 - Little Guide to Unhip

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/45068 - Down The Tubes

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/43721 - Break Point

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/42991 - Seaview Terrace

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/50635 ­ Suckers n Scallies

 Kindle:

 http://www.amazon.co.uk/Down-The-Tubes-ebook/dp/B004UC51NK - Down The Tubes

 https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B004TNGRBU - Break Point

 https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B004SV2DBG - Seaview Terrace

 http://www.amazon.co.uk/Little-Guide-Unhip-Kj-Rigby/dp/1452876983 -  Little Guide to Unhip

 https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B004WTARYY ­ Suckers n Scallies

 http://www.amazon.com/Thalidomide-Kid-ebook/dp/B0046W6TDA -  Thalidomide Kid

Paperbacks:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Thalidomide-Kid-Kate-Rigby/dp/tags-on-product

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Little-Guide-Unhip-Kj-Rigby/dp/1452876983

http://www.skrevpress.com/index.php?p=2_12_Kate-Rigby

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0749000910/ref=cm_cd_asin_lnk - Flamingo Circus  Anthology

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/39905 - Dancing In The Dark, where I have two stories

Website:

http://kjrbooks.yolasite.com/

http://bubbitybooks.blogspot.com/

Gary Moore introduces us to: Churchmouse Tales - for "big" kids.

At last, a cynical bedtime reading for kids aged 11 to 100 about all the important things that you never thought you needed to know, such as:

Why you should never buy a penguin at auction.

How to make best use of 127 colour-blind hamsters.

How your banjo keeps going missing.

The ideal way to push frogs out of trees.

What really happened during Castro's Cuban Missile Crisis.

How the Internet started -  and more!

The is a selection of twenty-four short stories and due to be published by Charging Ram Books of Canada to be out Feb/March this year. The book is described as: 24 amusing short stories, in 148 pages of whimsical rubbish lovingly crafted into one slim overpriced book.

Gary Moore says of himself:  I've never been afraid of doing things and taking chances. At age 25 I employed 20 people and had a rapidly expanding business. By the time I was 30, I had lost the lot. I'm someone who sees an opportunity, exploits it, and then manages to shoot myself in the foot by trying to be too clever. This has happened a number of times, and hopefully I've learnt a few lessons from it. Currently I'm languishing in a trough rather than riding a peak, but you have to keep trying. Most of the millionaires that I've known in business (Although not all) have been as dull as ditch-water and have spent their lives accumulating money rather than living. I don't expect the book to be a best seller, I'm an unknown after all, and I have neither contacts in the publishing trade nor money to promote the book. I also know that not only do you have to write the right material at the right time in the right market, but you also need a decent slice of luck to make it. But if people like the first took, then they will buy the second and the third. Overnight success is something that happens very rarely. The J K Rowling story is well known simply because it is so unusual. I figure that I have to keep plugging away building up a readership. If I get lucky that's great, but right now I'm not phoning the local Bentley dealership to discuss the colour of the carpets.

 

Gary Moore is an Englishman living and working in France. Has been many things in the past: Army officer,

factory owner, market trader, heating engineer and now writer of satirical nonsense. Has been both rich and poor and has dined with millionaires and paupers. Currently closer to the pauper end of the scale.

Links: gary.moore@orange.fr

What inspired you to write your book?
Lack of money originally. I live in a poor part of rural France where there are not many jobs,and those that are available are poorly paid. Despite working full time as a self employed heating engineer, a long period of constant bad luck meant that I was always left with nothing in my pocket at the end of the month. The only thing that I could think of that wouldn't cost me anything and might bring in a few pennies was to write. I had always entertained kids at family parties by telling them stories that I had made up, and people used to say that I should write them down and send them off – They didn't tell we where to send them though!

Click below for more!

(Re) Making Love: A Sex After Sixty Story

By

Mary L. Tabor

     Fresh, quirky and delightful, (Re)Making Love: A Sex After Sixty Story, is brutally honest while giving hope that passion doesn’t need to end after a certain age. Tabor takes the reader from Washington, DC to Missouri to Australia and eventually to Paris, a visit that offers a stunning surprise—one that changed the author’s life.

Mary L. Tabor had been married for twenty-one years when her husband announced to her, “I need to live alone.” Already grief stricken by the deaths of her mother, sister and then father, the news threw Tabor into a tailspin of impetuous acts, the good, the bad and the foolish.

In this deeply personal memoir, Tabor wholeheartedly shares her journey, all after age sixty, proving it’s never too late to find love—and oneself.

Readers will find hope in a story that gives new meaning to romantic comedy.

The American adult woman is featured in this debut collection of stories about love, adultery, marriage, passion, death, and family. There is a subtle humor here, and an innate wisdom about everyday life as women find solace in cooking, work, and chores. Tabor reveals the thoughts of her working professional women who stream into Washington, D.C., from the outer suburbs, the men they date or marry, and the attractive if harried commuters they meet. One woman fantasizes about the burglar who escaped with her deceased mother's jewelry.

In another story, the protagonist uncovers her husband's secret: his pocket mirror and concealer do not belong, as she had feared, to a mistress but rather are items he uses to hide his growing bald spot. Revealed here are the hidden layers of lives that seem predictable but never are. Reading Tabor's wry tales, one has the sense of entering the private lives of the women you see everyday on your way to work.

Mary L. Tabor’s short story collection The Woman Who Never Cooked won Mid-List Press’s First Series Award. An excerpt of her new memoir (Re)Making Love: a sex after sixty story is forthcoming in the poet Ravi Shankar’s eZine Drunken Boat: http://www.drunkenboat.com/

Her memoir can be found here: http://sexaftersixtybook.com/. Her fiction and essays have appeared recently in the anthology Electric Grace, Paycock Press, The Missouri Review, Chautauqua Literary Journal, Image, the Mid-American Review, River City, Chelsea, Hayden’s Ferry Review, American Literary Review. She has taught at The Smithsonian’s Campus-on-the-Mall, George Washington University and is a Woodrow Wilson Visiting Fellow.

Click for the interview:

Grammar Police

I've always hated bad grammar: it's sloppy, unprofessional and RUDE. Yes, I am offended by poor grammar.

I'm not perfect, I make silly mistakes (don't we all?) but what I'm talking about here is sloppiness, and people who just don't seem to care about the differences in there, their or they're etc. And don't get me started on the apostrophe!

This is a funny clip from Youtube. Are they for hire, do you think?




Disclaimer: Please don't write in telling me my mistakes. I shall completely deny them!

Meredith Cagen - Chicklit Author.

Guilty As Charged

by

Meredith Cagen

When I was younger, I had a relationship that broke my heart. Adverbs, adjectives and accolades did not do him justice. He was the perfect man. No matter how many times he showed his true colors, I was steadfast in my belief that he was perfect. I languished in my illusion (actually delusion) of his perfection. I was in love.

I didn’t know what to do. There was no expert who could guide me. No published Q and A pertinent for my situation. I searched for a plan, a guidebook, and a path to success: how I can get the storybook ending with Mr. Perfect.

Every “what not to do while dating” offense a girl can make, I embarrassingly did. I was available to him. I telephoned him. I was the one who initiated contact, demonstrating my interest as if he had doubts. Running to see him when he beckoned, accepting his last minute dates and last minute cancellations. Worse, I accepted his lies, I had no self respect. I threw myself at him. I was insane! Where were my friends when I obviously needed them? An intervention was needed but no one restrained me.

Unwilling to consider the possibility of his rejection, I changed myself to meet his requirements.

Yes, Mr. Perfect had criteria. His personal preference was models, blonde skinny models. His office walls were covered with photographs of Mr. Perfect with his choice of arm candy. It was a shrine to his ability to attract these trophy girlfriends. A medium height, curvy size eight brunette (me) didn’t seem to be a worthy enough prize for a man of with his considerable talents.

I tried my best to meet his standards. I dieted, exercised, groomed, and ingratiated myself into his social universe. I attempted to succeed with this game plan. But I committed the biggest sin a girl can. A don’t so whopping that I am banned from giving advice forever. A mistake so huge, there is no known recovery. This dating felony pains me even now, years later. I told him, I was in love with him.

What was wrong with me? The girl police should have come and thrown me directly into jail or a padded cell on the spot. No trial or psych evaluation was necessary.

Crimes Charged: Extreme Stupidity and whatever else is beyond.

Verdict: Guilty.

Sentence: Rejection by Mr. Perfect.

My idiocy haunted me for years. If only I had a second chance. What could (coulda, woulda, shoulda) I have done differently while staying true to myself. In my fantasies, I would still be me, but smarter. What was I thinking during this dark period of being in love? How did I permit myself to act like a fool?

One day, I looked back at my past actions, those silly schemes, attempts at change, and idealistic belief that if I loved him with a pure heart, he would love me back. I started to laugh. It was funny, very funny. Telling this story would be my second chance and shot at redemption

Reality hit me as I lay pen to paper, Mr. Perfection was my upstairs neighbor, he was The Man Upstairs. That was the original title for my book, ‘The Man Upstairs,’ but people thought it was a book about religion.

To this day, I am uncertain what was going through my pathetic naive head during that time. Maybe I wasn’t thinking properly? There are theories that love affects (and obviously impairs) your cognitive thought processes. Next title was ‘What Was I Thinking?’ but people thought that was a self-help book.

My healthy curvy body, thin not emaciated, did not fit into his model sized world. I wasn’t who he wanted, whatever my size. Paroled from my romantic stupidity I realized that the intellectual/emotional connection didn’t exist between us. It is what is on your insides that counts. It’s a cliché but true. The older I get, it’s my sense of humor that gets me through the days and the nights. I love when someone makes me laugh, even if it’s me! I am a Size Eight in a Size Zero World.

Ashley Stokes on TOUCHING THE STARFISH

Ashley Stokes

Cult writer and cultural refusenik

Ashley Stokes

Ashley Stokes’s comic masterpiece, TOUCHING THE STARFISH stars Nathan Flack, a writer exiled in a backwater teaching creative writing to a group of high-maintenance cranksand fantasists. When a very literary ghost by the name of James O'Mailer starts to haunt Flack, he has to ask himself: is he sinking into a netherworld of delusion, or is he actually O'Mailer'sinstrument? TOUCHING THE STARFISH has already been compared to Lucky Jim, TristramShandy and the novels of Tom Sharpe.

The Author: Ashley Stokes’s fiction has appeared in over twenty anthologies and journals,including London Magazine and Staple and he won a 2002 Bridport Short Story prize.

You say Starfish is hard to define as a genre, is that like all your work?
Touching the Starfish was definitely a departure for me and I certainly felt let off the leash when I was writing it. My other work was, or can be, a bit more straightforward. This was the first time I’d tried to write a comic novel and the first time I’d mucked about with the form quite so much.


Was it hard to hook an agent/publisher for Starfish because of the difficulty of knowing the genre?
Actually no, but I was lucky to be in the right place at the right time when Unthank Books was founded. LINK TO UNTHANK


You worked as a copywriter, what is that exactly?
For a short while I worked for the Enid Blyton Company, just after the 'brand’ was relaunched in the mid-nineties and all the licenses were up for grabs. I basically wrote promotional brochures for series, like The Secret Seven and The Famous Five. We also had to ‘update’ the characters as well, which once involved a whole morning deliberating what to call the imp in the Folk of the Faraway Tree because Enid had called him Chinky.


Oh, that's so funny! Dear old Enid Blyton wasn't very politically correct, was she?
What was even funnier about the Chinky business was that everyone was so blocked about the name that we dragged up from the stack another Enid book called The Christmas Imp, thinking we could nick that imp's name and retitle Chinky but his name turned out to be Prick-Ears.


I bet you had some giggles! Have you always worked in the "writing field"? Is this because you've always held a long-time belief that you would eventually become published, or has your work made you want to become a writer?
I did always want to be a writer when I was a child but then again I probably wanted to be a Warlord of Atlantis as well. I wrote a lot in my teens, then forgot about it. It nagged, though. Things didn't seem settled without it. It wasn't until my mid-twenties that I had the confidence to start. But I suppose I have always worked in related fields. I'd wanted to work with books and worked in bookshops for about two years after I left university. Then I worked in publishing trade sales and international rights. This was before I started to write fiction, something that really got going when I had a year off on the dole. After the subsequent Enid Period I took an MA, mainly to buy some time, and it was after that that I started teaching and editing as a way to support myself and work on my writing. The writing for me is the priority though the teaching and editing do feed into it: write better, teach better, write better, teach better. I wouldn't teach creative writing if I wasn't getting my hands dirty myself and I'd  be suspicious of any teacher who wasn't a writer, too.


You have studied creative writing at university and obviously this will help, but do you think others who haven't studied/been to university have less chance of being published?
It shouldn’t be that way, should it? Being a writer shouldn’t need a professional qualification like becoming a doctor or a loss adjuster. The best writers write because they need to and what they write is so distinct no one could teach it them how to do it. I suppose it depends on what type of market we’re talking about, too. A glace at the hardback fiction chart suggests that the writers who really shift copies probably didn’t study creative writing at university level, nor produce the sort of writing encouraged by such courses. If the work is strong, then not having an MA can be a positive advantage, I think. Publishers often want to sell an idea of an author before the novel, so “Jack Bratt has an MA in Creative Writing from UEA” may have less allure than “Jackie Bratby used to herd goats on Mount Ararat”. Then again, schooled writers often gain by osmosis a better idea of how the industry works and may make more professional approaches to publishers. They may also have better editing skills, too. Creative Writing course, if they’re any good, only really teach you how to edit.

As an editor, how frustrating is it to see authors' potential yet know they will be turned down with a standard rejection letter? Have you not wanted to contact them and say, look if only you'd do this, this and this you would have a greater potential?
It can be frustrating, yes, and it has become harder and harder for a first book to find a publisher unless it’s obvious that it will sell very quickly in great quantity at discounted prices. In my work as a creative writing tutor and as an editor for the Literary Consultancy (I’ve appraised over eight hundred novels and only three of the authors have been published) I am always making suggestions about how a book can be materially and stylistically enhanced. I’m doing some editing for Unthank at the moment and have annotated some pieces and asked for them to be resubmitted. Editors in publishing houses used to do this. It’s because they don’t anymore that we have so many creative writing courses and literary consultancies.

Let's talk about your current novel: Touching the Starfish is a fictional account about a writer, Nathan Flack who thinks he is haunted by a ghost called James O'Mailer. Is your character bonkers, or is he really haunted?
To answer that candidly would give away the end of the story! All I should say is confirm that, yes, that’s the premise. You need to read the last two parts of Starfish for a proper answer.
　
Starfish opens like a non-fiction how-to-write-a-novel book. Can you talk us through this process?
My basic idea for Touching the Starfish was for it to be a sort of Book Group style light comedy in which Nathan is forced to teach a group of eccentric students. It was easy then to structure the story around a course and give each part the name of the study topic, like Plot or Point of View. In each of these parts, Nathan would give some sort of (hapless) lecture on the topic at hand and in some places more emphasis would be given to the device, i.e. lots of talking in the Dialogue chapter. It’s really an organizing tool but it does mean you get a free textbook with your novel. If I could have wedged in a travel guide or car manual as well it could have been the perfect 3-for-2-table book. Why didn’t I think of that earlier? I’d be rolling in it.

The book is funny. Did you mean it to be, or did it change its direction half way through?
It was intended to be funny. I’ve always found it hard to relax when I write or when I give readings unless I get a laugh. Here, I did want there to be four or five funny lines or phrases per page. What did change the novel during the process was the more or less spontaneous inclusion of footnotes and a ghost character. These just occurred when I was writing the opening chapter and I ran with them. I didn’t really want to write a novel about teaching creative writing to start with and did it to amuse some friends initially. I suppose I was subverting the whole idea of a Book Group-style light comedy and I started to think of it as the least commercial novel imaginable. I didn’t quite anticipate that people were going to find it quite so funny, though I’m relieved that they do.
　
How many drafts?
There were two. It took quite a while to write the first draft, three years, but I write very methodically, going over and over each page until it reads like publishable prose. It then took me about three months to do the second. draft I diidn’t cut too many scenes and found myself only really making the first chapter better ground what happens later. This hasn’t always been my experience with drafting.

Did you self edit/self proof read considering your baskground, or did you get it professionally checked over?
Actually, we did it ourselves. It's quite a steep learning curve because when it's your own work and you know that you can spell the easy words correctly you forget that you can still mistype. The first edition of Starfish has a 'shorts' car where there should be a 'sports' car. Given that, if it's your own work I would suggest getting a fresh pair of eyes to proof it.

This is your debut novel, but do you have other unpublished books tucked away somewhere?
Oh yes, there are four earlier novels. I wrote two in my twenties that received very enthusiastic rejection letters from editors.: “Potentially prize-winning author, writes like Donna Tartt but less good, show me what the does next bla bla bla”. My third novel got through this obstacle with a couple of big publishers but if the editors liked the book the sales people said it wasn’t ‘big’ enough to launch a season. My next book was by far the most mature, commercial and likeable, I think (it made some girls cry but in a good way, if you know what I mean), but I couldn’t even get anyone to read it. If this hadn’t happened, I probably wouldn’t have written Touching the Starfish. It was a strange fifteen years getting here but I think I pulled something out of the fire towards the end.
　
How many "real life" incidents did you put into Starfish?
None really. The incidents are gross exaggerations of things that might have happened. What is drawn from real life is the atmosphere that Nathan lives in. His flat, for example, is pretty much the semi-uninhabitable frost bucket I was living in when I started to write the book. The spine of the book concerns Nathan's attempts not to be the Chosen One in a supernatural conspiracy story that he doesn’t approve of. That’s not autobiographical, I’m afraid. I did make that bit up.

Do you write straight onto the computer, or do you research first, get the idea perfect in your head and then type away?
I do write directly into the computer, though strangely once I finished Starfish I started writing longhand in pencil again (though this was in winter and it was too cold to stay in the house so I wrote in cafes, something I’d never done before). Usually, when the sun is shining, I spend quite a long time making notes and busking ideas before I turn the computer on. I usually describe to myself what I am going to write, then type it up. The next day I’ll edit this passage before I write anything new. It builds up slowly. I do plan a lot. Even my paragraphs have plans
　
What are you working on now?
I’m working on a series of twelve stories called The Syllabus of Errors. They’re loosely connected or overlap but not in a Cloud Atlas way. I am also writing a sequel to Starfish called SubGrubStreet as a blog. Nathan can’t ignore the internet forever.

Is it in the same vein as Starfish?
SubGrubStreet obviously is in the same vein but the short stories are mixed. There are some historical stories set before World War Two and some contemporary ones that are more hard-edged than Starfish. Then again, the sort of too-well-read, windmill-tilting male character that I used in Starfish does crop up a lot. There’s also one story that uses footnotes to tell itself which is pretty much in the same vein as the novel. If I concentrated on only one form or tone I’d get bored. Some days I’m happy to gaze out of the window. Some days I want to put a brick through it.
　
Will you use Unthank Books again? How did you find them?
I certainly will. I was very lucky, really. I knew Robin Jones, Unthank’s founder, because he had been my agent in the past. It was very serendipitous.
　
When will the next novel be finished?
Well, The Syllabus will be finished this year. I’ve just written the penultimate story so there’s only one to go. Next year I’m intending to start another novel. I’ve got some plans. I am likely to muck about again and follow in the same vein as Starfish.

Any last words/anything else you want to share?

Writing fiction is a state of mind rather than a career. I think this is what a lot of beginners forget and it

Is there a link for your Literary Consultancy?
Yes, there is. TLC, the original and the best: http://www.literaryconsultancy.co.uk/




　

Read the Eastern Daily Press review: http://bit.ly/ddcTgo of Touching the Starfish.
　

Touching the Starfish is mostly described as a comic novel and metafiction. Check out Amazon for reviews and others on Stokes' website. There is also a blogged sort-of-sequel, SubGrubStreet to promote Starfish. 

Touching the Starfish on Amazon