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.
I’m always on the lookout for inspiration for stories, especially the short stories I attach to photographs in my Being Inspired series, and one of the topis that has been suggested is along the lines of the following.
There is certainly a lot of scope with these.
Home is where the heart is
One’s home is the preferred place to all others, the one you are most emotionally attached, i.e. you have the deepest affection for. It may not necessarily be a physical place though.
I must say I tend to agree with this because every time I go away, I’m always looking forward to coming home.
Even when I’ve had to stay away for a few months, it’s not possible to call that home, it’s just another place to stay.
On the other hand…
It’s the name of a song by Elvis Presley.
And it has been the title of several films.
The Hallmark channel presses this point home time and time again.
Pliny the Elder is credited with coming up with the saying.
Home is what you make it
This is a similar saying, but, to me, it means something completely different
Though many will say this means that it’s where family and friends can come to, a place where memories can be made, I don’t believe it’s the same as the first saying.
What you make of it depends on your circumstances, you can hate it because it might be because you’re stuck with one parent with perhaps a step-parent. Or you might love it because you’ve escaped a bad situation.
But it’s not necessarily where your heart is.
Wherever I hang my hat I call home
Barbra Streisand made this song famous, and probably means that no matter where you are, it is home to you. It would be more fitting for someone who doesn’t necessarily see their true home very often, ie you work in the diplomatic service or in the military and you move around a lot.
Home away from home
This is a place that is as good as your real home.
To 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 early 2021. It even has a cover.
To 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 early 2021. It even has a cover.
There’s more writing to be done, but to get through nearly 70,000 words in 30 days is quite an achievement.
It’s been a battle, and time management has been shot to hell more than once.
There were days I honestly believed I’d get nothing done. I don’t know how people who have a day job could ever get much writing done at night.
I’m looking forward to a few days rest, and not have to face the word processor ready to input words.
As for how it will finish, the end is in sight, it may change but not substantially, and I will add a post in the next week to tell everyone what happened.
As for now, that’s it!
…
Today’s effort amounts to 3,676 words, for a total, so far, of 72,594.
A single event driven by fate, after Ben told his wife Charlotte he would be late home one night, he left early, and by chance discovers his wife having dinner in their favourite restaurant with another man.
A single event where it could be said Ben was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Who was this man? Why was she having dinner with him?
A simple truth to explain the single event was all Ben required. Instead, Charlotte told him a lie.
A single event that forces Ben to question everything he thought he knew about his wife, and the people who are around her.
After a near-death experience and forced retirement into a world he is unfamiliar with, Ben finds himself once again drawn back into that life of lies, violence, and intrigue.
From London to a small village in Tuscany, little by little Ben discovers who the woman he married is, and the real reason why fate had brought them together.
When it came to holidays, I preferred to get as far away from everyone as possible.
I saw my parents, and sister who lived with them, every week on Sunday, for lunch and cross-examination of why I was not married with children yet.
Explaining I was only 27 was not a reason because, “your brother married at 21 and he’s got three children, a great job, his own house..” and in and on it went.
And I saw my brother every other Saturday just to tell him that I was Ok. He was considerate in one sense, it was just the matchmaking wife always inviting what she considered suitable women for me.
That fortnight off work was an oasis in a desert full of well-meaning people.
I’d tried dating several girls at work, but they never got past the family inquisition. If I had been in their shoes I’d just say it was all too much too. The lesson I learned there was to never take a girlfriend home.
But, for now, I was footloose and fancy-free. The most recent girl I’d met had decided to return home, no it was nothing I’d done wrong, but I guess it was. Perhaps asking to go with me to Hawaii was a bit too forward too soon. Another lesson learned.
I think I’d probably get it right by the time I was fifty.
So here I was, a history buff, looking to further my knowledge of the events surrounding Pearl Harbour. I’d read a great many history books on the subject, and now, it was a matter of going there, and getting a feel for the place.
More than once I had lamented the fact I could not go back in time and live through the event. I had mentioned this once to a friend, and he asked if I was stark staring mad.
Of course, he was right. Who would want to be in the middle of such a violent attack, especially when it came largely by surprise?
Since my work required mt to fly a lot I had sufficient frequent flyer points to upgrade to first class. I was hoping after flying coach for so long, I’d notice the difference.
Certainly, the initial service after being shown my seat, and the champagne soon after as a welcome onboard, set the tone.
When the door closed, and everyone was on board, only half the seats in first class were taken. A glance at those who were fellow travelers showed an interesting cross-section. A husband and wife who definitely upgraded from coach like me, but were a little m less refined. An executive and his personal assistant, who, judging by the way she looked after him, there was more to that relationship, a woman in her sixties, definitely born to money, and casting somewhat distasteful stares at the upgrade couple, and a woman about my age, who looked very unhappy.
I managed to fit in another glass of champagne before the plane reached the runway.
Then, with a roar of the engines, we were off.
Halfway through the 13-hour flight, I found it impossible to sleep, even with the luxury first-class provided me. I just couldn’t sleep on planes. Instead, I sat up, found a book of crosswords, one of three or four I always had with me and usually got to solve one or two puzzles.
It was quiet and still except for the noise of the air rushing past outside the plane. In that almost soundless atmosphere, I thought I could detect any changes in engine speed or the gentle movement of a change of course. The ride was quite smooth, except for some turbulence and the pilot took us up another 2,000 feet to escape it. We’d been slowly coming back down over the last hour. I’d been monitoring it on the flight path screen. It might be a larger screen, but watching movies was, to me, boring, except in a cinema.
“Can’t sleep either?”
It was the soft voice of the girl from two seats across. She had several revolutions of the plane, exercising I heard her explain to the cabin crew because she couldn’t sit down for long periods.
“Not on planes, no. Trains, yes, ships yes.”
“Crossword fanatic?”
I saw her glance down towards the book. “Not really. This has been floating around for about 10 years, and I drag it out as a last resort.”
“I try reading. It doesn’t help. Where are you going, if you don’t mind me asking?”
“Oahu. Doing the whole Pearl Harbor history experience. And just laze around for a few days before going back to work.”
“New York?”
“Yonkers, upstate. Are you from New York?”
“My family is. I work in San Francisco, come over once a year, but this year I got sick of them early, so I just jumped on the first plane out that had a first-class berth. It was this one. I’ll let you get back to your crossword.”
I was going to say it wasn’t a problem, but she had gone back to her seat. A moment later our cabin attendant, Lucy, came over to deliver a glass of champagne, then came over to me. I hadn’t seen the second glass on the tray. “Miranda thought you might like a glass too.”
I looked over to nod a thankyou, but she was looking out the window. There wasn’t much to see as it was dark and most of the passengers had the shades down.
Then, just as Lucy turned to leave, the plane hit more turbulence. A second, maybe two, later the seatbelt sign went on, just as the co-pilot came on the speaker system to advise all cabin crew to sit down and belt up.
A minute later what sounded like a large bang, one I would have said was an engine exploding, made everyone jump in their seats, to be quickly followed by a sudden jerk to the right that was almost instantly corrected, but that was not the worst of it, equally suddenly the plane started to descend. Very quickly.
At the same moment, the masks dropped down from overhead, I grabbed it and fumbled putting it on, realizing that panic was setting in. It took a minute, but then it didn’t seem like there was any air flowing through it.
Not that any of that mattered. Starved of oxygen, I could feel myself losing consciousness. A minute or so later, I think the plane had started to level off, and a look at the flight path showed we were down to 10,000 feet, in the middle of the ocean. My last thought, how long we would survive if we ditched.
I felt a hand on my shoulder shaking me.
“Sir, sir, are you alright?”
I opened my eyes and blinked several times. I had to be in the middle of a nightmare.
The first thing I noticed was the engine noise, it was very loud, the loudness that came from propeller engines. The second, I was no longer on an Airbus A330. This was more like a Boeing 314, a flying boat. The third, the man shaking me awake was a steward in a white coat, with PanAm on it.
Where the hell was I. No, when the hell was I. What the hell had happened?
“Sir, there’s a message for you.” He handed me a folded sheet of paper. “The captain asked me to tell you we’ll be landing in an hour, and that you, we all, should be prepared. It’s a mess.”
“What is?”
“Pearl Harbour. It was attacked yesterday morning by the Japs. Bastards came in and practically blew everything up.”
All of a sudden there was a roaring sound outside the plane, followed by what had to be the chatter of a machine gun, followed by the sound of bullets hitting the fuselage. One minute the steward was standing next to me, the next he was a bloody heap on the floor. Above my head was a line of bullet holes. More machine gun chatter, then an explosion, followed by a cry behind me of, “got the zero.”
I got out of the seat and went to the steward, staring at me with lifeless eyes. A quick check for a pulse told me he was dead. When I looked behind me there were a dozen or so military men, army, and navy. Two sailors came up and gently maneuvered the steward towards the rear of the aircraft. He had been the only casualty. Turning back towards my seat I caught a reflection of myself in the window, that of a Lieutenant in the Navy. How, and why was I here, now?
I remembered the note the steward had given me, sat down, and unfolded it.
The receipt date was 3:00 pm on 8th December 1941. It was addressed to me, that is, a man with my exact name. Orders to report to an Admiral who would reassign me, the ship I was being sent to had been sunk, and likely not to see service again.
We’d been in the air at the time of the attack, and I guessed news would have been sent to the plane, just in case it was not safe to land. Perhaps they hadn’t counted on try Japanese Zero fighters hanging around for just such a flight as ours.
Whatever the reason I was here, however it had happened, I would have to make the most of it.
Only then did I remember what I had once said, ‘if only I could go back’.
Once again I felt a hand on my shoulder, and a voice, this time of a woman, gently shaking me awake.
“We’re arriving in Honolulu in about 40 minutes. You need to prepare for landing.”
At the same time, I heard a change in the engines as we began to descend. I looked around. More familiar surroundings, back on the A330, the quiet hum of jet engines, and the sight of familiar faces.
“Did something happen to the plane or was I imagining it?”
“Just a lightning strike. We had to go down for a bit, but these planes are designed to handle just about anything. You slept through it, the best thing to do in situations like that.”
OK. It had to be a dream. That’s all I could put it down to. Except for one small detail. My grandfather’s name was the same as mine, he was in the Navy during World War 2, and he had been sent out to Pearl Harbour and was en-route when it happened. But there was only one slight difference. He had been killed when the lone zero had struck, not the steward.
This case has everything, red herrings, jealous brothers, femme fatales, and at the heart of it all, greed.
See below for an excerpt from the book…
Coming soon!
An excerpt from the book:
When Harry took the time to consider his position, a rather uncomfortable position at that, he concluded that he was somehow involved in another case that meant very little to him.
Not that it wasn’t important in some way he was yet to determine, it was just that his curiosity had got the better of him, and it had led to this: sitting in a chair, securely bound, waiting for someone one of his captors had called Doug.
It was not the name that worried him so much, it was the evil laugh that had come after the name was spoken.
Doug what? Doug the ‘destroyer’, Doug the ‘dangerous’, Doug the ‘deadly’; there was any number of sinister connotations, and perhaps that was the point of the laugh, to make it more frightening than it was.
But there was no doubt about one thing in his mind right then: he’d made a mistake. A very big. and costly, mistake. Just how big the cost, no doubt he would soon find out.
His mother, and his grandmother, the wisest person he had ever known, had once told him never to eavesdrop.
At the time he couldn’t help himself and instead of minding his own business, listening to a one-sided conversation which ended with a time and a place. The very nature of the person receiving the call was, at the very least, sinister, and, because of the cryptic conversation, there appeared to be, or at least to Harry, criminal activity involved.
For several days he had wrestled with the thought of whether he should go. Stay on the fringe, keep out of sight, observe and report to the police if it was a crime. Instead, he had willingly gone down the rabbit hole.
Now, sitting in an uncomfortable chair, several heat lamps hanging over his head, he was perspiring, and if perspiration could be used as a measure of fear, then Harry’s fear was at the highest level.
Another runnel of sweat rolled into his left eye, and, having his hands tied, literally, it made it impossible to clear it. The burning sensation momentarily took his mind off his predicament. He cursed and then shook his head trying to prevent a re-occurrence. It was to no avail.
Let the stinging sensation be a reminder of what was right and what was wrong.
It was obvious that it was the right place and the right time, but in considering his current perilous situation, it definitely was the wrong place to be, at the worst possible time.
It was meant to be his escape, an escape from the generations of lawyers, what were to Harry, dry, dusty men who had been in business since George Washington said to the first Walthenson to step foot on American soil, ‘Why don’t you become a lawyer?” when asked what he could do for the great man.
Or so it was handed down as lore, though Harry didn’t think Washington meant it literally, the Walthenson’s, then as now, were not shy of taking advice.
Except, of course, when it came to Harry.
He was, Harry’s father was prone to saying, the exception to every rule. Harry guessed his father was referring to the fact his son wanted to be a Private Detective rather than a dry, dusty lawyer. Just the clothes were enough to turn Harry off the profession.
So, with a little of the money Harry inherited from one of his aunts, he leased an office in Gramercy Park and had it renovated to look like the Sam Spade detective agency, you know the one, Spade and Archer, and The Maltese Falcon.
There’s a movie and a book by Dashiell Hammett if you’re interested.
So, there it was, painted on the opaque glass inset of the front door, ‘Harold Walthenson, Private Detective’.
There was enough money to hire an assistant, and it took a week before the right person came along, or, more to the point, didn’t just see his business plan as something sinister. Ellen, a tall cool woman in a long black dress, or so the words of a song in his head told him, fitted in perfectly.
She’d seen the movie, but she said with a grin, Harry was no Humphrey Bogart.
Of course not, he said, he didn’t smoke.
Three months on the job, and it had been a few calls, no ‘real’ cases, nothing but missing animals, and other miscellaneous items. What he really wanted was a missing person. Or perhaps a beguiling, sophisticated woman who was as deadly as she was charming, looking for an errant husband, perhaps one that she had already ‘dispatched’.
Or for a tall, dark and handsome foreigner who spoke in riddles and in heavily accented English, a spy, or perhaps an assassin, in town to take out the mayor. The man was such an imbecile Harry had considered doing it himself.
Now, in a back room of a disused warehouse, that wishful thinking might be just about to come to a very abrupt end, with none of the romanticized trappings of the business befalling him. No beguiling women, no sinister criminals, no stupid policemen.
Just a nasty little man whose only concern was how quickly or how slowly Harry’s end was going to be.
Stranger’s We’ve Become, a sequel to What Sets Us Apart.
The blurb:
Is she or isn’t she, that is the question!
Susan has returned to David, but he is having difficulty dealing with the changes. Her time in captivity has changed her markedly, so much so that David decides to give her some time and space to re-adjust back into normal life.
But doubts about whether he chose the real Susan remain.
In the meantime, David has to deal with Susan’s new security chief, the discovery of her rebuilding a palace in Russia, evidence of an affair, and several attempts on his life. And, once again, David is drawn into another of Predergast’s games, one that could ultimately prove fatal.
From being reunited with the enigmatic Alisha, a strange visit to Susan’s country estate, to Russia and back, to a rescue mission in Nigeria, David soon discovers those whom he thought he could trust each has their own agenda, one that apparently doesn’t include him.
What happens when your past finally catches up with you?
Christmas is just around the corner, a time to be with family. For Will Mason, an orphan since he was fourteen, it is a time for reflection on what his life could have been, and what it could be.
Until a chance encounter brings back to life the reasons for his twenty years of self-imposed exile from a life only normal people could have. From that moment Will’s life slowly starts to unravel and it’s obvious to him it’s time to move on.
This time, however, there is more at stake.
Will has broken his number one rule, don’t get involved.
With his nemesis, Eddie Jamieson, suddenly within reach, and a blossoming relationship with an office colleague, Maria, about to change everything, Will has to make a choice. Quietly leave, or finally, make a stand.
But as Will soon discovers, when other people are involved there is going to be terrible consequences no matter what choice he makes.
Thrills, Spills, and just a dash of Romance 