Tag: #amwriting

Just a state of mind

I can’t say I’m not somewhat fascinated by the conflagration that’s going on around me.

Perhaps that’s because I’m one of the older and more vulnerable of the population. They say older is wiser, but I’m not so sure anymore. Being old, and with an underlying medical condition means you are more susceptible to getting any sort of bug and have a higher percentage of dying from it.

I try not to think about it.

And Chester, my cat, had recently also been getting nervous, being 18 cat years (over a hundred human years) and susceptible too, so he hears.

Perhaps I shouldn’t keep watching the live, continuous updates on the COVID 19 crisis. Well, perhaps it’s more than a crisis, but somehow pandemic doesn’t quite fit the horrendous nature of it.

And that’s something else I’ve noticed.

People seem to be laughing it off as a hoax, or a flu strain, or something that might just go away all by itself. 760,000 infections later, I think President Trump got that slightly wrong, but don’t tell him because he never said that, even if he did, and you have concrete evidence, and then he’ll still deny he said it.

But, as you can see, Chester and I have found a new way to lighten our day, we watch what we call The Trump Show.

It’s two hours, sometimes, of, well, I’m not quite sure what it is, but it doesn’t reassure me one bit.

Good thing, then, I live in another country, one where the people are, by and large, doing as the government health officials ask us to do, and we are seeing results.

And our leaders, Local, State and Federal don’t refer to us losing our rights and privileges as residents in a democracy, they ask us to stay home and stay safe, and above all, look after our elderly and vulnerable people.

It’s a repeated and sustained message universally given to us by everyone. We don’t even have partisan politics. The opposition whinge, but basically agree with everything the government is trying to do.

I’m not sure anywhere else other than New Zealand have that luxury.

So, here I am, happily writing, the same as I’ve been doing for the last five years.

Basically, nothing has changed. I go to the supermarket and get groceries, I go to the doctor, I go to the pharmacy, I get to see my grandchildren, and every now and then have dinner with my children, but one family at a time. It will no doubt be some time before we can all sit down together, but I don’t mind. All of them together is hard work.

What I do miss is the travel.

And, sadly, I don’t think any of us will be doing any travelling, especially overseas, for a long time. Good thing then we had travelled extensively and afar during the previous ten years. We were only saying a few weeks ago, it was time to see our own country.

Maybe that will happen sooner rather than later.

But I’m not sure if Chester is all that happy about us being here more than usual. I suspect our 2, 3, and 4 weeks away suited him, having the run of the house, able to climb up on the seats and furniture, and whatever else cats do when you’re not looking.

I hear more of his grumpy tones, and he’s a bit more feisty than usual.

Maybe I shouldn’t have threatened to get a dog.

Anyway, our curve is flattening, whatever that means, and things are looking good. Nobody wants to take anything for granted so we’re going to stick it out for another few weeks, and then, maybe we can start moving about more.

Hopefully, everyone will get back to work, but I suspect our world will never be quite the same. Some industries will shutter the doors permanently, particularly airlines, and others will spring up, like out manufacturing which we long ago sold out the foreign entities. Wasn’t that a huge mistake?

Children doing schoolwork at home. That would be unheard of in days before the internet.

People buying everything online rather than going to a storefront. Also not widely accepted until now, and I think everyone is going to take advantage of the convenience.

People will be looking at movies at home, on very large tv screens and sound systems that will rival theatres; construction companies say that new houses are being built with media rooms these days.

And everyone will be a lot more careful about personal hygiene and more aware of their surrounds and the people in that sphere. After all, there is currently no cure for this bug, and it has the propensity to spread while no one knows their contagious – and it will kill anyone.

And something else that not many people are saying out loud, is that you don’t fully recover from it, even though you think you have. You will become susceptible to flu, and pneumonia later on, and without a doubt, this bug could mutate into something even nastier even if we do find a vaccine.

I don’t really believe in conspiracy theories, but something I do take away from this; I hope it wasn’t deliberately made for a purpose, possibly to kill the elderly and the sick (and those who didn’t know they were sick) much like the Nazis did in a more crude fashion, and they do say history repeats itself.

It seems to be a weapon, people are saying we are waging a war, and thus it highlights the fact it doesn’t matter how many nuclear weapons you have, how many soldiers, tanks, battlecruisers, guns or anything else military, they are useless against this. All that money wasted in the ideal of protecting ourselves, and a sneaky virus comes in the back door and kills just as many invisibly. And without a cure…

Think about it. Who has the most to gain by creating a worldwide catastrophe?

And who will magically become the saviour?

Questions are going to be asked, governments are going to have to completely rethink their plans of fitting into the global economy at the expense of their own industries, and people will have to rethink how they live their lives, and whether they can sleep at night feeling safe.

I have one vote.

That vote will be going to the people who put their people first and self-interest last. That way I know I’ll be able to sleep at night.

I’m not sure about Chester though.

An excerpt from “Strangers We’ve Become” – Coming Soon

I wandered back to my villa.

It was in darkness.  I was sure I had left several lights on, especially over the door so I could see to unlock it.

I looked up and saw the globe was broken.

Instant alert.

I went to the first hiding spot for the gun, and it wasn’t there.  I went to the backup and it wasn’t there either.  Someone had found my carefully hidden stash of weapons and removed them.

Who?

There were four hiding spots and all were empty.  Someone had removed the weapons.  That could only mean one possibility.

I had a visitor, not necessarily here for a social call.

But, of course, being the well-trained agent I’d once been and not one to be caught unawares, I crossed over to my neighbor and relieved him of a weapon that, if found, would require a lot of explaining.

Suitably armed, it was time to return the surprise.

There were three entrances to the villa, the front door, the back door, and a rather strange escape hatch.  One of the more interesting attractions of the villa I’d rented was its heritage.  It was built in the late 1700s, by a man who was, by all accounts, a thief.  It had a hidden underground room which had been in the past a vault but was now a wine cellar, and it had an escape hatch by which the man could come and go undetected, particularly if there was a mob outside the door baying for his blood.

It now gave me the means to enter the villa without my visitors being alerted, unless, of course, they were near the vicinity of the doorway inside the villa, but that possibility was unlikely.  It was not where anyone could anticipate or expect a doorway to be.

The secret entrance was at the rear of the villa behind a large copse, two camouflaged wooden doors built into the ground.  I move aside some of the branches that covered them and lifted one side.  After I’d discovered the doors and rusty hinges, I’d oiled and cleaned them, and cleared the passageway of cobwebs and fallen rocks.  It had a mildew smell, but nothing would get rid of that.  I’d left torches at either end so I could see.

I closed the door after me, and went quietly down the steps, enveloped in darkness till I switched on the torch.  I traversed the short passage which turned ninety degrees about halfway to the door at the other end.  I carried the key to this door on the keyring, found it and opened the door.  It too had been oiled and swung open soundlessly.

I stepped in the darkness and closed the door.

I was on the lower level under the kitchen, now the wine cellar, the ‘door’ doubling as a set of shelves which had very little on them, less to fall and alert anyone in the villa.

Silence, an eerie silence.

I took the steps up to the kitchen, stopping when my head was level with the floor, checking to see if anyone was waiting.  There wasn’t.  It seemed to me to be an unlikely spot for an ambush.

I’d already considered the possibility of someone coming after me, especially because it had been Bespalov I’d killed, and I was sure he had friends, all equally as mad as he was.  Equally, I’d also considered it nigh on impossible for anyone to find out it was me who killed him because the only people who knew that were Prendergast, Alisha, a few others in the Department, and Susan.

That raised the question of who told them where I was.

If I was the man I used to be, my first suspect would be Susan.  The departure this morning, and now this was too coincidental.  But I was not that man.

Or was I?

I reached the start of the passageway that led from the kitchen to the front door and peered into the semi-darkness.  My eyes had got used to the dark, and it was no longer an inky void.  Fragments of light leaked in around the door from outside and through the edge of the window curtains where they didn’t fit properly.  A bone of contention upstairs in the morning, when first light shone and invariably woke me up hours before I wanted to.

Still nothing.

I took a moment to consider how I would approach the visitor’s job.  I would get a plan of the villa in my head, all entrances, where a target could be led to or attacked where there would be no escape.

Coming in the front door.  If I was not expecting anything, I’d just open the door and walk-in.  One shot would be all that was required.

Contract complete.

I sidled quietly up the passage staying close to the wall, edging closer to the front door.  There was an alcove where the shooter could be waiting.  It was an ideal spot to wait.

Crunch.

I stepped on some nutshells.

Not my nutshells.

I felt it before I heard it.  The bullet with my name on it.

And how the shooter missed, from point-blank range, and hit me in the arm, I had no idea.  I fired off two shots before a second shot from the shooter went wide and hit the door with a loud thwack.

I saw a red dot wavering as it honed in on me and I fell to the floor, stretching out, looking up where the origin of the light was coming and pulled the trigger three times, evenly spaced, and a second later I heard the sound of a body falling down the stairs and stopping at the bottom, not very far from me.

Two assassins.

I’d not expected that.

The assassin by the door was dead, a lucky shot on my part.  The second was still breathing.

I checked the body for any weapons and found a second gun and two knives.  Armed to the teeth!

I pulled off the balaclava; a man, early thirties, definitely Italian.  I was expecting a Russian.

I slapped his face, waking him up.  Blood was leaking from several slashes on his face when his head had hit the stairs on the way down.  The awkward angle of his arms and legs told me there were broken bones, probably a lot worse internally.  He was not long for this earth.

“Who employed you?”

He looked at me with dead eyes, a pursed mouth, perhaps a smile.  “Not today my friend.  You have made a very bad enemy.”  He coughed and blood poured out of his mouth.  “There will be more …”

Friends of Bespalov, no doubt.

I would have to leave.  Two unexplainable bodies, I’d have a hard time explaining my way out of this mess.  I dragged the two bodies into the lounge, clearing the passageway just in case someone had heard anything.

Just in case anyone was outside at the time, I sat in the dark, at the foot of the stairs, and tried to breathe normally.  I was trying not to connect dots that led back to Susan, but the coincidence was worrying me.

 

A half-hour passed and I hadn’t moved.  Deep in thought, I’d forgotten about being shot, unaware that blood was running down my arm and dripping onto the floor.

Until I heard a knock on my front door.

Two thoughts, it was either the police, alerted by the neighbors, or it was the second wave, though why would they be knocking on the door?

I stood, and immediately felt a stabbing pain in my arm.  I took out a handkerchief and turned it into a makeshift tourniquet, then wrapped a kitchen towel around the wound.

If it was the police, this was going to be a difficult situation.  Holding the gun behind my back, I opened the door a fraction and looked out.

No police, just Maria.  I hoped she was not part of the next ‘wave’.

“You left your phone behind on the table.  I thought you might be looking for it.”  She held it out in front of her.

When I didn’t open the door any further, she looked at me quizzically, and then asked, “Is anything wrong?”

I was going to thank her for returning the phone, but I heard her breathe in sharply, and add, breathlessly, “You’re bleeding.”

I looked at my arm and realized it was visible through the door, and not only that, the towel was soaked in blood.

“You need to go away now.”

Should I tell her the truth?  It was probably too late, and if she was any sort of law-abiding citizen she would go straight to the police.

She showed no signs of leaving, just an unnerving curiosity.  “What happened?”

I ran through several explanations, but none seemed plausible.  I went with the truth.  “My past caught up with me.”

“You need someone to fix that before you pass out from blood loss.  It doesn’t look good.”

“I can fix it.  You need to leave.  It is not safe to be here with me.”

The pain in my arm was not getting any better, and the blood was starting to run down my arm again as the tourniquet loosened.  She was right, I needed it fixed sooner rather than later.

I opened the door and let her in.  It was a mistake, a huge mistake, and I would have to deal with the consequences.  Once inside, she turned on the light and saw the pool of blood just inside the door and the trail leading to the lounge.  She followed the trail and turned into the lounge, turned on the light, and no doubt saw the two dead men.

I expected her to scream.  She didn’t.

She gave me a good hard look, perhaps trying to see if I was dangerous.  Killing people wasn’t something you looked the other way about.  She would have to go to the police.

“What happened here?”

“I came home from the cafe and two men were waiting for me.  I used to work for the Government, but no longer.  I suspect these men were here to repay a debt.  I was lucky.”

“Not so much, looking at your arm.”

She came closer and inspected it.

“Sit down.”

She found another towel and wrapped it around the wound, retightening the tourniquet to stem the bleeding.

“Do you have medical supplies?”

I nodded.  “Upstairs.”  I had a medical kit, and on the road, I usually made my own running repairs.  Another old habit I hadn’t quite shaken off yet.

She went upstairs, rummaged, and then came back.  I wondered briefly what she would think of the unmade bed though I was not sure why it might interest her.

She helped me remove my shirt, and then cleaned the wound.  Fortunately, she didn’t have to remove a bullet.  It was a clean wound but it would require stitches.

When she’d finished she said, “Your friend said one day this might happen.”

No prizes for guessing who that friend was, and it didn’t please me that she had involved Maria.

“Alisha?”

“She didn’t tell me her name, but I think she cares a lot about you.  She said trouble has a way of finding you, gave me a phone and said to call her if something like this happened.”

“That was wrong of her to do that.”

“Perhaps, perhaps not.  Will you call her?”

“Yes.  I can’t stay here now.  You should go now.  Hopefully, by the time I leave in the morning, no one will ever know what happened here, especially you.”

She smiled.  “As you say, I was never here.”

 

© Charles Heath 2018-2020

“Sunday in New York”, it’s a bumpy road to love

“Sunday in New York” is ultimately a story about trust, and what happens when a marriage is stretched to its limits.

When Harry Steele attends a lunch with his manager, Barclay, to discuss a promotion that any junior executive would accept in a heartbeat, it is the fact his wife, Alison, who previously professed her reservations about Barclay, also agreed to attend, that casts a small element of doubt in his mind.

From that moment, his life, in the company, in deciding what to do, his marriage, his very life, spirals out of control.

There is no one big factor that can prove Harry’s worst fears, that his marriage is over, just a number of small, interconnecting events, when piled on top of each other, points to a cataclysmic end to everything he had believed in.

Trust is lost firstly in his best friend and mentor, Andy, who only hints of impending disaster, Sasha, a woman whom he saved, and who appears to have motives of her own, and then in his wife, Alison, as he discovered piece by piece damning evidence she is about to leave him for another man.

Can we trust what we see with our eyes or trust what we hear?

Haven’t we all jumped to conclusions at least once in our lives?

Can Alison, a woman whose self-belief and confidence is about to be put to the ultimate test, find a way of proving their relationship is as strong as it has ever been?

As they say in the classics, read on!

Purchase:

http://tinyurl.com/Amazon-SundayInNewYork

The story behind the story: A Case of Working With the Jones Brothers

The write a private detective serial has always been one of the items at the top of my to-do list, though trying to write novels and a serial, as well as a blog, and maintain a social media presence, well, you get the idea.

But I made it happen, from a bunch of episodes I wrote a long, long time ago, used these to start it, and then continue on, then as now, never having much of an idea where it was going to end up, or how long it would take to tell the story.

That, I think is the joy of ad hoc writing, even you, as the author, have as much idea of where it’s going as the reader does.

It’s basically been in the mill since 1990, and although I finished it last year, it looks like the beginning to end will have taken exactly 30 years.  Had you asked me 30 years ago if I’d ever get it finished, the answer would be maybe?

 

My private detective, Harry Walthenson

I’d like to say he’s from that great literary mold of Sam Spade, or Mickey Spillane, or Phillip Marlow, but he’s not.

But, I’ve watched Humphrey Bogart play Sam Spade with much interest, and modeled Harry and his office on it.  Similarly, I’ve watched Robert Micham play Phillip Marlow with great panache, if not detachment, and added a bit of him to the mix.

Other characters come into play, and all of them, no matter what period they’re from, always seem larger than life.  I’m not above stealing a little of Mary Astor, Peter Lorre or Sidney Greenstreet, to breathe life into beguiling women and dangerous men alike.

 

Then there’s the title, like

The Case of the Unintentional Mummy – this has so many meanings in so many contexts, though I image back in Hollywood in the ’30s and ’40s, this would be excellent fodder for Abbott and Costello

The Case of the Three-Legged Dog – Yes, I suspect there may be a few real-life dogs with three legs, but this plot would involve something more sinister.  And if made out of plaster, yes, they’re always something else inside.

But for mine, to begin with, it was “The Case of the …”, because I had no idea what the case was going to be about, well, I did, but not specifically.

Then I liked the idea of calling it “The Case of the Brother’s Revenge” because I began to have a notion there was a brother no one knew about, but that’s stuff for other stories, not mine, so then went the way of the others.

 

Now it’s called ‘A Case of Working With the Jones Brothers’, finished the first three drafts, and at the editor for the last.

I have high hopes of publishing it in May 2020.  It even has a cover.

 

PIWalthJones1

In a word: Prior

Of course, prior means gone before, as in past history, or perhaps only a few moments ago; it happened prior to my arrival on the scene.

But it can also mean, quite confusingly, to something in the future, when trying to get out of a meeting by saying I’ve got a prior appointment.

If you are an aficionado of American police dramas then you will be well acquainted with the prior, meaning a previous criminal conviction.

 

And for something quite different, a prior is a priest of sorts, who to me were named as such in the middle ages.  A prior is below an Abbot and is head of a house of friars.  By the way, the most notable friar I know is Friar Tuck

A prior could also be a magistrate in the medieval republic of Florence.

 

It is not to be doubly confused with Pryer or Prier

Someone who pries into another’s business, the most notable prier, the woman across the road from Samantha, in Bewitched.

 

Camp NaNoWriMo – Day 20

The April version of the November write-a-thon is upon us, well, me actually.  I’m not sure hope many others are trying to resurrect an old piece of writing.

The truth is, I’ve been at this story off and on over the past three years, and every time I get a head of steam, something else comes along.

Now I’ve decided to use the April version of NANOWRIMO to get this thing finished, or at least in a first draft state.

Part 3 is now finished and it is onto the laborious work of getting part 4 right.  There will be about ten chapters in this section, and then a short Part 5 which is yet to be written.

Today’s assignment is Chapter 37, and progress is still slow due to continual interruptions.  Chapter numbers from here might be strange as I work on renumbering.

Today’s word count takes me to the end of Chapter 37 and adds another 2,206 words to a total of 60,113 so far.

 

 

 

 

A to Z Challenge – Q is for: Quick, before I change my mind…

Q2020

There’s a point where you suddenly realized you’ve been tricked into doing something you wouldn’t normally do, and, worse, by someone you thought was your friend.

That thought, along with others, floated around in my mind while considering my fate; in a small room in the basement of a house that belonged to, what I now knew to be a criminal.

Everyone knew of Joe Delaneo as a wealthy philanthropist, not the head of a gang that had barely registered on the crime scale, and definitely not on the police radar.

Their crimes were, but it was a matter of fact the police had no substantial leads, nor any idea who was purporting the crimes.

But I knew. Now.

However, the chances of escaping with this knowledge and passing it on were somewhere between impossible and needing a miracle.
I had time to reflect on how I got here.

Basic human failings. The desire to take people at face value. To accommodate people who seemingly sincerely tell you they care about you, and then spin you a story about how a certain person stole something of theirs, and they wanted it back. The was more to the story, but it was the implied gratitude that reels you in.

I believed it was my one and only chance with Marylou Brenner. I even believed the story of how she had tired of Max Brenden, a gifted quarterback destined for bigger things, because of his wandering eye, and dismissive attitude. I’d seen him with other girls, and seen how he treated them.

A shake of the head, and a realization of how big a fool I’d been. Perhaps they knew Joe Delaneo was a criminal or maybe not, they just got lucky, but the result was always going to be the same. Trouble for me and amusement for them.

Of course, I was not cat burglar, and no experience in breaking and entering, and setting off a silent alarm was inevitable, as was capture.

What, at first surprised me was the fact Delaneo hadn’t called the police to report me. That set off the first alarm bell. Then, another man, one with a scarred face, a man I’d not seen before, came to the room and asked me questions. Who sent me, what was I looking for. I told him the truth, and he didn’t believe me. He didn’t say anything more, just glared at me, then left. It was enough.

I’d seen the movies and TV shows and guessed what happened next. Torture, either waterboarding or electricity. A battle with pain that no normal person could withstand, and for a mere boy just starting university, my threshold would be all of 30 seconds. The anticipation would make that about 15 seconds by the time he arrived with the equipment and equally mean-looking assistants.

There was a bed in the room, and I sat on it. Sleep was the last thing on my mind.
I was woken by the rattle of a key on the lock and the squeaky hinges of the door opening.

It was the best time to come when I was half asleep and disorientated. It took three seconds to realize where I was and five more to remember what had happened. By that time a fist had wrapped itself around the clothing on my shoulder and dragged me to my feet. I Neely collapsed, remembering at the last second that he would probably drag me to where we were going, and finish up in an unceremonious heap in front of whomever he was taking me to see.

Better to arrive on my own two feet. Begging might come later.

We went up a flight of stairs and along a long passage to the back of the house. I’d broken in via the back of the house and made it as far as Delaneo’s study before being caught. We passed a large room with library shelves, a dining room, and an empty room before we arrived back in the study.

In daylight it seemed bigger, but equally as forbidding. More shelves, more books, cabinets, luxurious chairs, a magnificent desk, and an alleged crime lord sitting behind it.

The fist released its grip on my clothes and the man it belonged to stepped back two paces. He had a gun, I saw it just before he grabbed me, as a detective in a shoulder holster. I saw it briefly last night, and it looked big and deadly.

“So, Jim, it is Jim isn’t it?”

Should I agree or pretend to be someone else? Where did he find out my name? I’d stick with the truth. “It is.”

“What were you after?”

“I don’t think it matters now that I’ve had time to think about it. I suspect the people who sent me on this goose chase are probably laughing their heads off about now.”

“So, this is a prank, and you’re the stooge?”

“As much as you probably don’t want to believe me, but if you think about it for one minute, you’ll see the truth of it. Hell, if I was this remarkable cat burglar you seem to think I am, the first thing I’d have done was disable the alarm, and then enter through the rear. The fact there was an unlatched window at the rear comes as no surprise. Everyone forgets something once in a while, and it has been seasonally hot.”

He looked at me with a rather strange expression. Was he horrified, or intrigued that I would talk to him so?

“Who are you, really?”

“Just a stupid fool trying to impress a girl. The wrong sort, but then people like me always seem to try and punch above his weight. I’ve learned my lesson I can tell you.” I took a deep breath, resigning myself to my fate. “Look, whatever you’re going to do, just get on with it.”

Delaneo’s expression changed, it wasn’t quite evil, but somewhere near it. He looked past me at the man standing behind me. “Impatient little bugger, isn’t he? ” I assumed the man behind me nodded because he didn’t speak.

“Take him away. I don’t want to see him again.”

I felt the man behind me move forward, and grab my shoulder again. He twisted me around to face the door, and we left the room, the man closing the door gently behind him. We walked up the passage towards the front door. Another man opened it. He took me as far as the edge of the patio and let go.

“Think yourself lucky this time. You come back, you’re luck will run out. Now go, quick, before I change my mind.”

I sighed inwardly in relief and went down the steps. He could have thrown me down, but he didn’t. I was, as he told me, quick to get to the gate and then, outside, I ran.
“You’ve got to stop throwing fools into the breach, Marylou.” Delaneo glared at her in much the same expression he had for all people under the age of 40. As a miscreant.

“They need to be tested.”

“Well, he didn’t turn to water if that’s what you want to know, not like that footballer chap of yours.”

“Oh, he’s not mine, not anymore. I have someone else in mind to take his place. Someone far more interesting.”

 

© Charles Heath 2020

Conversations with my cat – 95

20160909_062838-2

This is Chester.

He realizes we are now part of a different world driven by the events surrounding the COVID 19 virus.

The grandchildren are here while their parents are working, and they are going to school remotely, that is one is in the kitchen and one is in the dining room, remotely linked to their school, teachers, and classmates.

Chester finds this interesting because they are not trying to find him, so, he’s come out to see what they’re doing.

First, he jumps up on the dining table and sits next to the 13-year-old. She is hard at work. I hear him ask if there is anything he can help with given his vast knowledge of everything.

There’s a universal greeting from 30 others, and he tries to find where all the other people are. No, it’s not hide and seek, they’re all online she tries to tell him.

No, doesn’t get it. They must be in the room somewhere. And he’s suddenly miffed that he can’t find them, and then that his assistance is not required.

All too much to cope with, he comes out to join the 10-year-old sitting at the kitchen table. She had headphones on and doesn’t hear him.

This time he sits on the floor and looks up thinking, if they can’t see him, he’s not there. She ignores him. I don’t think mathematics is his strong point.

So, he wanders into the office, planning to annoy me.

I find some headphones and put them on. He gets the message, no interruptions today, everyone is hard at work.

A sigh, then he goes to his corner and lies down on his bed, yawns and closes his eyes.

I know he’s not asleep. He’s waiting for something to happen, ready to spring into action.

Unless, of course, it’s a mouse.

A twitter biography

Every year I come back to revisit this, and each year it becomes a harder issue to deal with.  All that’s recently changed is the number of characters you can use

I’ve been trawling the endless collection of twitter descriptions provided by their users, noting that there is a restriction of 280 characters.

How do you sum yourself up in 280 characters?

I don’t think I can, so we tend to put down a few catchphrases, something that will draw followers.  I’m thinking the word ‘aspiring’ will be my catchword.

I’m aspiring to be a writer, or is that author?  Is there a difference, like for instance, one publishes ebooks on Amazon, one publishes hard copies in the traditional manner?

Is there a guide to what I can call myself?

Quite simply put, but in more than 140 characters, married happily, two wonderful children, three amazing grandchildren, and a wealth of experience acquired over the years.

Actually, that sounds rather boring, doesn’t it?

Perhaps it would be better if I was a retired policeman, a retired lawyer, a retired sheriff, a retired private investigator, a retired doctor, someone who had an occupation that was a rich mine of information from which to draw upon.

Retired computer programmers, supermarket shelf stackers, night cleaners, accounts clerks and general dogsbody s don’t quite cut the mustard.

I have also become fascinated with the expression ‘killer biography’.  Does it mean that I have to be a ‘killer’?

Better than the self-confession above.  Should we try to embellish our personal history in order to make it more appealing?

It’s much the same as writing about daily life.  No one wants to read about it, people want to be taken out of the humdrum of normalcy and be taken into a world where they can become the character in the book.

And there you have it, in a nutshell, why I write.

 

The story behind the story – Echoes from the Past

The novel ‘Echoes from the past’ started out as a short story I wrote about 30 years ago, titled ‘The birthday’.

My idea was to take a normal person out of their comfort zone and led on a short but very frightening journey to a place where a surprise birthday party had been arranged.

Thus the very large man with a scar and a red tie was created.

So was the friend with the limousine who worked as a pilot.

So were the two women, Wendy and Angelina, who were Flight Attendants that the pilot friend asked to join the conspiracy.

I was going to rework the short story, then about ten pages long, into something a little more.

And like all re-writes, especially those I have anything to do with, it turned into a novel.

There was motivation.  I had told some colleagues at the place where I worked at the time that I liked writing, and they wanted a sample.  I was going to give them the re-worked short story.  Instead, I gave them ‘Echoes from the past’

Originally it was not set anywhere in particular.

But when considering a location, I had, at the time, recently been to New York in December, and visited Brooklyn and Queens, as well as a lot of New York itself.  We were there for New Years, and it was an experience I’ll never forget.

One evening we were out late, and finished up in Brooklyn Heights, near the waterfront, and there was rain and snow, it was cold and wet, and there were apartment buildings shimmering in the street light, and I thought, this is the place where my main character will live.

It had a very spooky atmosphere, the sort where ghosts would not be unexpected.  I felt more than one shiver go up and down my spine in the few minutes I was there.

I had taken notes, as I always do, of everywhere we went so I had a ready supply of locations I could use, changing the names in some cases.

Fifth Avenue near the Rockefeller center is amazing at first light, and late at night with the Seasonal decorations and lights.

The original main character was a shy and man of few friends, hence not expecting the surprise party.  I enhanced that shyness into purposely lonely because of an issue from his past that leaves him always looking over his shoulder and ready to move on at the slightest hint of trouble.  No friends, no relationships, just a very low profile.

Then I thought, what if he breaks the cardinal rule, and begins a relationship?

But it is also as much an exploration of a damaged soul, as it is the search for a normal life, without having any idea what normal was, and how the understanding of one person can sometimes make all the difference in what we may think or feel.

And, of course, I wanted a happy ending.

Except for the bad guys.

 

Get it here:  https://amzn.to/2CYKxu4

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