This book has been written for some time and the manuscript was sitting in a box with half a dozen others gathering dust and not quite as complete, so this month it is going to get the makeover, a first draft for the editor.
And so it begins…
…
Reworking the synopsis
…
Yes, it’s that time, nearly three weeks in, and writing a story sequentially from start to finish has some perils involved with it.
Like the plotting, and like any good actor given a bit part in a movie, the objective is to make it their own.
I think it’s called, grabbing hold of your fifteen minutes of fame and using it.
Characters do this us, they force themselves out of their restrictive cacoon. One of mine has taken her bit part and is now the frontrunner for the villain.
How do you make such personable people drip with evil?
This book has been written for some time and the manuscript was sitting in a box with half a dozen others gathering dust and not quite as complete, so this month it is going to get the makeover, a first draft for the editor.
And so it begins…
…
Reworking the synopsis
…
Yes, it’s that time, nearly three weeks in, and writing a story sequentially from start to finish has some perils involved with it.
Like the plotting, and like any good actor given a bit part in a movie, the objective is to make it their own.
I think it’s called, grabbing hold of your fifteen minutes of fame and using it.
Characters do this us, they force themselves out of their restrictive cacoon. One of mine has taken her bit part and is now the frontrunner for the villain.
How do you make such personable people drip with evil?
This book has been written for some time and the manuscript was sitting in a box with half a dozen others gathering dust and not quite as complete, so this month it is going to get the makeover, a first draft for the editor.
And so it begins…
…
Finally, we’ve got the internet back
…
After two days in the technological wilderness, we are back, which must say something about the human condition.
I’m sure, one day, the internet will collapse and billions of us will go through the same withdrawal symptoms I just did, and there’ll be a lot of clean rooms around.
Even so, there are those two items that were very prevalent when I went to school, pencils. HB or 2B, or coloured, and lined paper in what was called an exercise book, 48 pages, 64 pages, 96 pages or 128 pages.
I am yet to equate words to an exercise book page, but that’s the least of my problems.
Still working on the new killer, and a perfect match for the hero. Yes, I’m hoping we can have a happy ending for at least two characters.
It is a day of rest although writers are ready and able to work on any given day at any hour of the day or night when an idea or thought comes to them.
I’m trying not to think, but that’s not working.
I’ve been going over the reasons for writing the first draft of the book 30 odd years ago and it had something to do with the fact I was working with personal computers and local area networking when both were in their infancy, and I wanted to blend this knowledge into a story.
Of course, I’d always wanted to write thrillers, and this presented the opportunity to use computers as a basis for a worldwide conspiracy. How easy it is these days to do just that, but back in those days, it was a lot of hard work.
I remember sitting in a meeting when the company I was working for at the time had just implemented a network and personal computer to replace the mainframe and dumb terminals, also looking to leverage the new technologies of spreadsheets and word-processing, effectively making accounts staff more productive, and removing typists and moving into the world of centralized word processing. It was not a new idea with Wangwriter, but using PC’s was.
One of the departmental managers got up to give his take on the new technology, this about six months after implementation, and after a lot of teething troubles caused mainly by people who were vehemently resisting change, and his message was, it should not be called ‘networking’, but ‘not working’, in reference to the number of times the network went down.
But this is a digression. Computers are only a part of the story.
The story also goes back to a time when there was a clear demarcation between the management levels. Management offices were oasis’s whereas the staff worked in a stark desert-like environment. When one came to work for such an organization, it was with the belief that you start at the bottom, and over time, you work your way up the ladder. There was, very definitely, class distinction, and the various management levels never mixed, at work or socially, except within their own level.
There were Managers, Assistant Managers, and Manager’s Assistants, a typing pool, a secretary, that young, or old, lady who did so many jobs for their boss, that these days it would be considered demeaning. They were dedicated to their jobs and irreplaceable. There was no such person as a Personal Assistant.
Nor was such a thing as sexual harassment. One company I worked in where one of the Assistant Managers was sexually abusing an office girl, her complaints didn’t get a prosecution as it would now, it just had him transferred to another branch. Reprehensible, yes, and thankfully no longer a problem, except of course, in Fifty Shades of Grey which apparently condones such behavior.
There were department heads, General Managers, and Board Members. The upper management level and participants were in a world of their own, one few could ever aspire to. This is the world in which Transworld, my fictitious (but based on a very real) company lives.
I have to work on my company structure to make sure it is right.
Now I have two charts. A timeline, for both Bill, and the story, and a hierarchy for the office management and staff.
This is beginning to be more complicated than I thought.
This book has been written for some time and the manuscript was sitting in a box with half a dozen others gathering dust and not quite as complete, so this month it is going to get the makeover, a first draft for the editor.
And so it begins…
…
Finally, we’ve got the internet back
…
After two days in the technological wilderness, we are back, which must say something about the human condition.
I’m sure, one day, the internet will collapse and billions of us will go through the same withdrawal symptoms I just did, and there’ll be a lot of clean rooms around.
Even so, there are those two items that were very prevalent when I went to school, pencils. HB or 2B, or coloured, and lined paper in what was called an exercise book, 48 pages, 64 pages, 96 pages or 128 pages.
I am yet to equate words to an exercise book page, but that’s the least of my problems.
Still working on the new killer, and a perfect match for the hero. Yes, I’m hoping we can have a happy ending for at least two characters.
This book has been written for some time and the manuscript was sitting in a box with half a dozen others gathering dust and not quite as complete, so this month it is going to get the makeover, a first draft for the editor.
And so it begins…
…
Still No Internet
…
More time to stretch out on the newly cleared sofa in my writing room to consider the direction the work in progress is taking.
We’ve reached a point where the guilty now have to make a move. I’m not quite sure how I want to do this, but the questioning of suspects has made it quite clear, the person in charge has covered their tracks carefully.
Will it be the case that like all people who think they have all the bases covered, make one tiny mistake that will lead to their undoing.
Fortunately, I’m not up to that part of the story but it is occupying a large part of my thoughts.
For a story that was conceived during those long boring hours flying in a steel cocoon, striving to keep away the thoughts that the plane and everyone in it could just simply disappear as planes have in the past, it has come a long way.
Whilst I have always had a fascination with what happened during the Second world war, not the battles or fighting, but in the more obscure events that took place, I decided to pen my own little sidebar to what was a long and bitter war.
And, so, it continues…
…
We were not leaving the castle the way we had found it, but we would blame the Germans. Carlo understood because he was the one who had selectively destroyed parts of it, but I knew after we’d gone, he would blame us.
When Carlo discovered the empty cells below in the dungeons, he and the boy went back outside and looked for them. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that Wallace would have ordered them removed and executed because Meyer had been the objective and everything else was a distraction.
Two of Blinky’s soldiers were assigned to bring back Chiara.
Blinky and the rest of his men moved into better quarters and had their first real meal in a week. We posted sentries, but I didn’t think any Germans would be coming to see what happened. The sentries were more to tell us when Meyer and his escort arrived.
Blinky would then be the official escort for Meyer back to England. A plane was on standby waiting for our signal.
Several hours after Carlo left, he returned with Martina and Johanneson, the latter looking very worse for wear.
The last of the traitors.
Carlo shoved him into a chair and bound him very tightly.
“We found the prisoners, all shot. Fernando’s remnants killed them. I will make it my business to find every last one of them. What do you want to do with this traitor?” He nodded in Johannesen’s direction.
Martina had slumped into a chair. She still wore the very recent scars of a severe beating and was out on her feet. Despite that, I got the impression she was glad to be alive.
“Was he responsible for anything that happened while you were in the cells?” I asked her.
“He saved me if that could be called an act of kindness. He did nothing to save the others.”
“If you had a choice?”
“I’d shoot him.”
“Now hang on. Since when did good Samaritans get punished?” Johannesen was outraged.
I shrugged. “You will be judged on past sins.”
Martina looked up. “He was the leader of the group that destroyed the church. It was our original headquarters, down in the basement. We managed to get away, with a few injuries, but it took out our equipment and radio.”
“There,” he said. “My intention was destroying infrastructure not lives.”
“Coincidental.”
I got up and walked over to Martina and gave her my gun. “I’ve done enough killing for today. Perhaps a small token of retribution for those lost.”
“Chiara?”
“She will be here shortly. We found her just in time.”
“Thank God for that.”
I don’t think she had it in her to enjoy themoment she executed Johannesen, I don’t think it was worth celebrating a death, more lamenting the loss of yet another person in a war that seemed to be dragging on.
At least he accepted his fate and didn’t plead for his life.
It was mission accomplished.
Blinky’s radioman finally reconnected with Thompson and told him that we were awaiting the arrival of Meyer and that he could tell those up the pipeline it was safe to bring him to the village. He would then signal when the plane was in the air. Thompson was pleased enough to give me a ticket back to London. All we had to do was collect Meyer.
That was Carlo and my job, and for the last time, I went back down into the village and waited.
I was not sure who was more relieved, Meyer or myself. I’d met him once before the war, at a University in Hamburg where he was working on a top-secret project, and I was studying the archaeology of some old castles nearby.
I’d been tasked to find out what he was doing, my rather bright future in archaeology was never going to take off in those dark months that followed Chamberlain’s peace treaty. Everyone but him seemed to know that war was inevitable.
He’d spent time telling me about the stars and planets, and how wonderful it would be to visit them one day in the not-too-distant future. From that, we inferred that the Germans were working on space travel, though you never really could tell what they were up to.
It simply meant if things went bad, we needed to touch base every now and then with Meyer, which I did, in a friendly manner and never directly asking what he was up to. That contact had paid off, and he had made contact asking me if it was possible to come live in England.
Thompson had been very pleased.
“Herr Atherton,” he said, rather relieved to see me.
“Herr Meyer.”
We shook hands, and then he hugged me like an old friend would. “You came.”
“You asked. I do my best?”
“We leave now?’
“We very definitely leave now.”
I left Carlo with the escorts to explain the new arrangements, far away from the castle, and I took Meyer back to the castle. Along the way we talked, not of rockets and death, but of old times in Berlin, and how Germany used to be before this crazy person called Hitler had sent them down the path to self-destruction.
Perhaps, he said, one day he might be able to return.
I hoped I would not, not until the war ended, but that being a forlorn hope, not until I had a very long, well-earned rest.
But this was Thompson we were talking about, and his favourite saying was ‘There’s no rest for the wicked’.
This book has been written for some time and the manuscript was sitting in a box with half a dozen others gathering dust and not quite as complete, so this month it is going to get the makeover, a first draft for the editor.
And so it begins…
…
Still No Internet
…
More time to stretch out on the newly cleared sofa in my writing room to consider the direction the work in progress is taking.
We’ve reached a point where the guilty now have to make a move. I’m not quite sure how I want to do this, but the questioning of suspects has made it quite clear, the person in charge has covered their tracks carefully.
Will it be the case that like all people who think they have all the bases covered, make one tiny mistake that will lead to their undoing.
Fortunately, I’m not up to that part of the story but it is occupying a large part of my thoughts.
This book has been written for some time and the manuscript was sitting in a box with half a dozen others gathering dust and not quite as complete, so this month it is going to get the makeover, a first draft for the editor.
And so it begins…
…
Coping without technology
…
There are no more surprises at least for today.
We have no internet, the power company came along and removed an old pole and that was the end of it.
It’s amazing what you can’t do when there’s no internet and then all the things you said you would do one day if only you had the time.
This morning’s word count accumulates quickly without the distractions so I had the afternoon to finally clean up my workspace.
50 photographs, 50 stories, of which there is one of the 50 below.
They all start with –
A picture paints … well, as many words as you like. For instance:
And, the story:
Have you ever watched your hopes and dreams simply just fly away?
Everything I thought I wanted and needed had just left in an aeroplane, and although I said I was not going to, i came to the airport to see the plane leave. Not the person on it, that would have been far too difficult and emotional, but perhaps it was symbolic, the end of one life and the start of another.
But no matter what I thought or felt, we had both come to the right decision. She needed the opportunity to spread her wings. It was probably not the best idea for her to apply for the job without telling me, but I understood her reasons.
She was in a rut. Though her job was a very good one, it was not as demanding as she had expected, particularly after the last promotion, but with it came resentment from others on her level, that she, the youngest of the group would get the position.
It was something that had been weighing down of her for the last three months, and if noticed it, the late nights, the moodiness, sometimes a flash of temper. I knew she had one, no one could have such red hair and not, but she had always kept it in check.
And, then there was us, together, and after seven years, it felt like we were going nowhere. Perhaps that was down to my lack of ambition, and though she never said it, lack of sophistication. It hadn’t been an issue, well, not until her last promotion, and the fact she had to entertain more, and frankly I felt like an embarrassment to her.
So, there it was, three days ago, the beginning of the weekend, and we had planned to go away for a few days and take stock. We both acknowledged we needed to talk, but it never seemed the right time.
It was then she said she had quit her job and found a new one. Starting the following Monday.
Ok, that took me by surprise, not so much that it something I sort of guessed might happen, but that she would just blurt it out.
I think that right then, at that moment, I could feel her frustration with everything around her.
What surprised her was my reaction. None.
I simply asked where who, and when.
A world-class newspaper, in New York, and she had to be there in a week.
A week.
It was all the time I had left with her.
I remember I just shrugged and asked if the planned weekend away was off.
She stood on the other side of the kitchen counter, hands around a cup of coffee she had just poured, and that one thing I remembered was the lone tear that ran down her cheek.
Is that all you want to know?
I did, yes, but we had lost that intimacy we used to have when she would have told me what was happening, and we would have brainstormed solutions. I might be a cabinet maker but I still had a brain, was what I overheard her tell a friend once.
There’s not much to ask, I said. You’ve been desperately unhappy and haven’t been able to hide it all that well, you have been under a lot of pressure trying to deal with a group of troglodytes, and you’ve been leaning on Bentley’s shoulder instead of mine, and I get it, he’s got more experience in that place, and the politics that go with it, and is still an ally.
Her immediate superior and instrumental in her getting the position, but unlike some men in his position he had not taken advantage of a situation like some men would. And even if she had made a move, which I doubted, that was not the sort of woman she was, he would have politely declined.
One of the very few happily married men in that organisation, so I heard.
So, she said, you’re not just a pretty face.
Par for the course for a cabinet maker whose university degree is in psychology. It doesn’t take rocket science to see what was happening to you. I just didn’t think it was my place to jump in unless you asked me, and when you didn’t, well, that told me everything I needed to know.
Yes, our relationship had a use by date, and it was in the next few days.
I was thinking, she said, that you might come with me, you can make cabinets anywhere.
I could, but I think the real problem wasn’t just the job. It was everything around her and going with her, that would just be a constant reminder of what had been holding her back. I didn’t want that for her and said so.
Then the only question left was, what do we do now?
Go shopping for suitcases. Bags to pack, and places to go.
Getting on the roller coaster is easy. On the beginning, it’s a slow easy ride, followed by the slow climb to the top. It’s much like some relationships, they start out easy, they require a little work to get to the next level, follows by the adrenaline rush when it all comes together.
What most people forget is that what comes down must go back up, and life is pretty much a roller coaster with highs and lows.
Our roller coaster had just come or of the final turn and we were braking so that it stops at the station.
There was no question of going with her to New York. Yes, I promised I’d come over and visit her, but that was a promise with crossed fingers behind my back. After a few months in t the new job the last thing shed want was a reminder of what she left behind. New friends new life.
We packed her bags, three out everything she didn’t want, a free trips to the op shop with stiff she knew others would like to have, and basically, by the time she was ready to go, there was nothing left of her in the apartment, or anywhere.
Her friends would be seeing her off at the airport, and that’s when I told her I was not coming, that moment the taxi arrived to take her away forever. I remember standing there, watching the taxi go. It was going to be, and was, as hard as it was to watch the plane leave.
So, there I was, finally staring at the blank sky, around me a dozen other plane spotters, a rather motley crew of plane enthusiasts.
Already that morning there’s been 6 different types of plane depart, and I could hear another winding up its engines for take-off.
People coming, people going.
Maybe I would go to New York in a couple of months, not to see her, but just see what the attraction was. Or maybe I would drop in, just to see how she was.
As one of my friends told me when I gave him the news, the future is never written in stone, and it’s about time you broadened your horizons.
Thrills, Spills, and just a dash of Romance 