Tag: Author

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 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 their were apartment building, 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.

 

Is this really English … American?

Ever since I heard Ray Romano say, in an episode of his TV show when they visited Italy, ‘does anyone here speak American?’ I’ve often wondered if, being an English speaker, there were two very distinct different versions of the language.

Spelling wise, there is.

You say color, I say colour, you know the sort of thing.

But then there are words like ‘heater’.

Yes, like a lot of people I thought the word means a device that warms you up in winter, or when it’s cold.

Apparently not, and this is where it pays to know a little about the American language, though maybe not necessarily that one Ray was talking about.

For instance, a heater – is a gun apparently, and an expression used often during the 1930s through 1950s, particularly in films.

Quite loses all of its magic though when you yell out to your friend, throw me a heater will you, and it’s not the gun!

Give him a heater, no, not because the recipient is cold, but it is an instruction from the catcher to the pitcher – yes, it’s another name for a fastball.

And what do you know, all three definitions turn up in an American dictionary, the one referring to the gun being labeled ‘dated’, and, yet another adds the notation ‘slang’.

I’m betting Humphrey Bogart used the term more than once in a gangster film.

There are other definitions, but none so colorful as that for the gun and the fastball, except perhaps for the short winning streak at the casino.

There’s nothing like finding something that works, and then it disappears

You know the story…

Finally, someone out there gets it right and produces a product that really works.  For years, out of loyalty, you have persevered with all the little niggles because the product is almost there.

Then, finally, they get it right.

I’ve got one of those.  It’s called a Holden Commodore car.  It’s made by General Motors, in Australia.  It’s a car designed for Australia and built to work in Australia.

‘For years their cars have been great, but just miss the mark in a number of aspects, each year being beaten up by the Japanese and Asian imports on quality and extras.

Each successive model got better, and better, until, when I bought mine, it was as good as any import, if not better.  And it was ours, we knew buying one of these, the money was going to stay in the country.

Except…

General Motors decided to stop building Australian made vehicles because it was uneconomical, despite the Government handing over millions in incentives to stay.

Great decision General Motors.

Overnight it went from the number one bestselling car in this country to number twelve.

Apparently, no one is surprised.

Ford already left town years before, and there are no news Fords anywhere, not the Australian build variety anyway, and those in their last few years of life were terrible.  IT was a pity they didn’t work as hard as they do elsewhere to produce a worthy product the public might buy like Holden did.

But, alas…

There are no more homegrown Holdens, mine is one of the last few models made here, and about to, if not already, about to become a part of history.  I refuse to buy an imported version of the Holden Commodore.  They are not made for this country, or by Australians.

Sorry…

Someone has to make a stand, and that’s me!

What happens after an action-packed start – Part 12

It’s still a battle of wits, but our hero knows he’s in serious trouble.

The problem is, there are familiar faces and a question of who is a friend and who is foe made all the more difficult because the enemy if it is the enemy, doesn’t look or sound or act like the enemy.

If at first, you don’t succeed, try a few threats, or leverage

 

He took a deep breath, gave me a look a parent would give a miscreant child, and started again.

“What’s the deal with you and Commander Breeman?”

Yes, he does know about her proclivities, but he was hardly in a position to condemn her.  He, too, had a ‘thing’ for the female trainees under his command, and one in particular.

“She has to eat, I have to eat, in the same mess as it happens.”

He gave me another of his penetrating glares.

“Nothing else?”

“That would be against regulations, as I think you are fully aware.”  I returned his glare but with more intensity.

“What did you discuss over the dinner table?”

Odd question.  Not operational matters, if that was what he wanted to hear.  But what we spoke about had little relevance to work.

“Cars.”

It was true.  She liked restoring old cars from the mid-war period, some of which had been used as props in period movies.  I had an old Cadillac, the sort that would fail any fuel economy test.

I could see it was not the answer he was looking for.  He would have to ask a specific question in order to get a specific answer one way or the other.

“Did she mention the no-fly zone?”

I thought about it for a moment, and then said, “No, there are no cars out there to speak of.”

“Flippancy doesn’t become you, Alan.”

Perhaps not, but it was all he was going to get.

And for added emphasis, I said, “Like I said to your predecessor, I don’t know how or why you would have to ask the pilot.”

He stood abruptly, nearly knocking the chair over.  Angry.

“You know something, Alan, otherwise you would not have been on that helo.  She threw you under the bus, and the quicker you realize that the better.”

Then he walked out, slamming the door behind him.

 

© Charles Heath 2019

What happens after an action-packed start – Part 11

It’s still a battle of wits, but our hero knows he’s in serious trouble.

The problem is, there are familiar faces and a question of who is a friend and who is foe made all the more difficult because the enemy if it is the enemy, doesn’t look or sound or act like the enemy.
Old friends, new tricks.

Genial tone, trying to win my confidence.  I wasn’t going to ask, but wait for an explanation.  Asking would be like leaving the door ajar.

He sat after pulling the chair closer to the table and put his clasped hands on the table.

“This is a secret military operation known only to very few, apart from the team that is in situ.  Commander Breeman has been, against very specific direct orders, trying to find out what we are doing here.”  He stopped.

I think this was the moment I was supposed to ask, what was going on here.

If it was secret, then I didn’t want to know, and he was not going to tell me anyway.

I just looked attentive.

“You have been caught up in a jurisdictional issue.  It’s not hard to assume that you were sent here, with the pilot of that helicopter, to do an off the book search for this camp.  That, in itself, would be impossible, but the flyover coincided with a provedore run.  Just plain bad luck.”

For Joe, the pilot, it was.  Or not, if he had been given specific verbal orders, making it out to be a training run.  And the odds of me being on board at the same time, given my association with Breeman?

One coincidence too many.

And if it was as the man before had said, they knew everything, then Bamfield would know of my connection to her.

“You said you had no idea where you were when you were shot down?”

Time, I guess, to speak.  “No, I didn’t.  The desert looks all the same to me.”

“You will forgive me if I say I find that hard to believe.  I know you are better than that, Alan.  Who sent you out here?”

“I was along for the ride.  Standard operating procedure.  A helo goes up, someone like me has to be on board in case of trouble.  More conventional trouble than rockets.”

“But you specifically?”

“I don’t make the rosters, I just go where they tell me.”

Bamfield frowned.  I think he’d finally noticed I was not addressing him as ‘sir’.  Until I knew what side he was on, I considered myself a prisoner of war.

 

© Charles Heath 2019

What happens after an action-packed start – Part 13

It’s still a battle of wits, but our hero knows he’s in serious trouble.

The problem is, there are familiar faces and a question of who is a friend and who is foe made all the more difficult because the enemy if it is the enemy, doesn’t look or sound or act like the enemy.

If at first, you don’t succeed, try a few threats, or leverage.

Or just get rid of the problem

 

Back in my cell, delivered more forcibly than when they escorted me to the interrogation room, I had time to consider his words.

A tactic, I told myself.  Classic divide and conquer.

It was obvious that he wanted me to corroborate his suspicion that Breeman had sent the helicopter out to find his operation.  Did it sound like something she would do or any other commanding officer whose jurisdiction this operation fell under?

Why hadn’t they told her?  If t was military and being run by our side, why would they keep it secret from their own people, especially when something like what just happened, could happen?

It didn’t make sense.

Unless, of course, it was the CIA.  They seemed to be a law unto themselves, except in this case they needed something to incriminate her with in order to have her removed, and replaced with a more sympathetic commanding officer.

It was all too much for a gunnery sergeant like me to understand.

At least I didn’t know anything so I couldn’t tell them anything.  A little solace perhaps, but the trouble was, they’d never believe me.

I sighed.  Perhaps some sleep before they returned for the next round.

They came in the middle of the night.  Or day, I had no idea what it was outside because there were no windows in my cave cell.

They had no intention of being polite, I was dragged up by the scruff of the next and tossed in the direction of the door.  When I stumbled, still half asleep and unable to see properly, one of the guards kicked me and said he would do it again if I didn’t get up.

He did anyway because I took too long.

My ribs were hurting when I breathed, as I staggered in front of them, one behind me giving me a shove every two or three steps, perhaps hoping I’d stumble again so he could kick me.

At the interrogation room, a different one this time, he shoved me in and shut the door.  I didn’t hear a key in the lock, so perhaps they were hoping I’d try to escape.

There was only one chair in the room, and I sat in it.  I couldn’t sit up straight because it hurt, so I had to slump over.

A half hour later a man and a woman, both with white coats like a doctor would wear, came in.  Nothing was said.  The man took up a position behind me, then held me so I couldn’t move.

The woman then joined him, produced as a syringe, and jabbed it in my neck.

The man let me go, and a few seconds later I fell off the chair onto the floor hitting my head in the process, and a few more after that, it was lights out.

At least there was no more pain.

 

© Charles Heath 2019

Travel is part of the story – Italy, and Greve in Chianti

When we decided we were going to stay in Tuscany for a few days it was necessary to select a central place to stay.

What I researched first before selecting what would be a central location, was tours.  I considered doing a cooking tour but these turned out to be quite expensive so we decided to look at other types of tours.

Bus tours went out of Florence so our initial intention was to stay there.  We’d been there before and stayed at the Hotel Brunelleschi and loved it.  It is perfectly situated in Florence, especially for discovering the city by foot.

Then I found an interesting tour company, Very Tuscany Tours, run by Sara and Andrea, two people who specialize in showing visitors the Tuscany area and I thought; what could be better than tour guides with local knowledge?

So began an exchange of emails, the upshot being that it would cost less if we stayed in Greve.  On that basis, we booked two personalized tours so we could see notable landmarks, scenery, a number of wineries, and sample the real food of Italy.

The tours fulfilled our expectations, and then some.

But back to Greve in Chianti.

We booked an apartment at Antica Pastifico, an old converted pasta factory, a room in fact with a name.  Ours was called ‘Iris’ located on the first floor of the yellow pasta factory.

It was the middle of June and summer so the days were very hot and the evenings were cool and one night it rained.  It was beautiful to watch the raindrops on the terracotta tiles, and take in the aroma of the rain interacting with nature through open windows, and feel the gentle breeze in your face.

It was equally delightful in the morning, to look out over the garden and take in the early morning coolness and scent of the flowers whilst getting ready for the day.

There was a church, The Santa Croce church, at the top of the Piazza Matteotti which we could see from our apartment, and every morning at 8:00 am the bells would sound, making it a much more effective of being woken up than the usual conventional means.  Sadly we never got to visit the church.

Where the apartments were situated it was a five minute walk to the shops and a particular coffee shop where we went every morning for coffee and cake.

A walk on the other side of the square took us past a bakery where every morning the aroma of newly baked bread pulled you in.  There’s something about Italian bread …

Further around was a butcher shop, Antica Marcelleria Falorni, with an incredible collection of meat, small goods and cheese that made selection almost impossible.

Suffice to say our diet mostly consisted of wine, cheese, salami and bread.  It was also served at all the wineries we visited with their wine tastings.  One of the interesting facts is how good the inexpensive wine is and it was not difficult overindulge.

From our visits to several wineries we learned a great deal about the Sangiovese grape and the wine made from these grapes.  Apparently only a small group of wineries can market their wines as Chianti and to prove it is authentic the label has a distinctive cockerel motive on its label.  There is the Chianti Classico and the Chianti Classico Riserva that interested us the most.

There were several restaurants on the piazza and one in particular had my favorite version of pasta, wild boar.  Although the apartment had a full kitchen it was easier to go out and eat rather than cook for ourselves.  We did attempt to cook breakfast several mornings after finding a type of supermarket, Coops, tucked away several streets from the Piazza.

But as for the location of Greve in Chianti, it is very central to all the major tourist spots such as Siena, San Gimignano, and Arezzo.  We visited both Siena and San Gimignano a second time this trip having stayed for three days in San Gimignano as our central base the last time we were in Tuscany.

The only downside to the latest visit was that it was not long enough but isn’t that true of any holiday?

It’s Friday again, another week flies by

But, unlike last Friday when I was lamenting the appalling lack of progress with everything I was trying to achieve, this week is looking better.

Thew treasure hunt is back on with another episode and a plan for the next

I wrote five more episodes for the action-packed start story and published two, so there’s three in the bank for the next week

I’ve been working on another five of my ‘a picture paints a thousand words, or less’ stories and published three, and the other two are nearly completed

At the Castello di Briolio (or the Castello that looks like it) I have been considering the direction for Episode six, and this will be written in the next week

I hope!

I realized there’s another story with five episodes, our man on the spot being caught up in a bank robbery gone wrong.  I need to go over these episodes as a refresher and start on the sixth.

Something, I guess, to look forward to.

And what’s scary is that there;’s another story, inspired by our stay at Lake Louise, the rescue of a countess from the Nazi’s during WW2, from a mothballed hotel in the, well, I’m calling it the alps in Germany.

Problem is, some of this I can find, and other parts have gone missing, along with my structure of the German military ranks.  I don’t want to do this all again,. so the search continues.

Novel wise, nothing got touched.

However, during the week I think I came up with a novel way to promote book sales and get reviews.  Maybe it;’s a newish idea, maybe it’s old and done before, and maybe it will work, or hasn’t and been forgotten.

Need your input, so read about it here: http://bit.ly/2SZzJGk

Of course, I still need to create new posts on the blog, and this takes time and effort, taking me away from writing.

As for the travel blog, that still needs me to complete about half a dozen posts in various stages of completion.

I let you know how that pans out next week!

This is Baldrick on the line, I have a cunning plan

And for those who know nothing of Rowan Atkinson and his endless episodes of Blackadder, the name Baldrick would be equally as puzzling.

But for those who do, you will recognize the significance of the statement.

Baldrick always had a cunning plan, almost inevitably doomed to failure.

I lump my plan, scheme, borrowed or stolen idea into this category, because it needs outside help, support, encouragement, discouragement, whatever input you feel is necessary.

AS well, if you so desire, participation.

A long time ago I realized I was never going to be able to pay for marketing assistance from the ‘experts’.

OIn reading their material on their webpages, and blogs, it quickly came about that all of these used the same premise, dressed up in different words, all of which was to get you to hand over what little money you didn’t have, with the disclaimer that it worked for them, but it might not work for you.

$50 gone, no result and no comeback.  You read the disclaimer.

And, sadly when I tried several ‘products’ I discovered not only were they basically the same (who sold them the get rich quick template?) and offered no advice I hadn’t trawled the internet first for.

I thought, also, for a short time, I might do the same as they, but in the end, I know what it’s like to have a book, the desire to make it available to others, good or bad reviews withstanding, and not have to spend a fortune doing it (with no hope of guaranteed success).

Of course, there was the rub, since I couldn’t afford to market it, there were no good or bad reviews.

Hence the idea, which you can read about here http://bit.ly/2SZzJGk

Perhaps I might call it ‘The Gathering of Eagles’ since we all want to soar!

As always comments are welcome at cwheath555@gmail.com.

 

 

Check out PI Walthenson, a novel created page by page

How thrilled Harry Walthenson, Private Detective, had been to see his name painted on the translucent glass window in the door to his office.  Located in Gramercy Park, in an old building full of atmosphere, he had a space renovated to resemble that of Spade and Archer in a scene right out of the Maltese Falcon.  His desk had an antique phone like those used in the 1930s, and a lamp that cast eerie shadows at night.  Along one wall was a couch, his bed for more nights than he wanted to remember, and on the other a filing cabinet, waiting for the big case files.

Up till now it had been missing cats and dogs.

Then, everything changed…

Starts at episode 1 – The Wrong Place, The Wrong Time

http://bit.ly/2J4aEBP

The latest episode:  Episode 47 – A Real Interrogation

http://bit.ly/2Ucqyip

Enjoy

 

PS  Please leave a comment, make a suggestion, or join in the conversation