The story so far: I'm a writer based in Canterbury, UK. My first novel, a technothriller called Déjà Vu, was published to critical acclaim in 2005. This blog shoots the writerly breeze on upcoming projects, marketing, and anything else writing-related that springs to mind.
[Photo copyright (c) Mimika Cooney 2004.] I'm a British writer who recently published his first book to critical acclaim. As well as being a writer, I'm an Associate Lecturer in psychological research methods at the Open University, an Associate Tutor at Canterbury Christ Church University and Psychology Section Editor for Intute, a UK higher education information and research service. Say howdy via ian_hocking (at) uk2.net.
The ever-industrious Debra Hamel has come up with a dynamite use for Twitter (the crack-cocaine of Web 2.0 technologies). Twice daily, TwitterLit will tweet the first line of various, diverse and random books; to find out which book the line comes from, you need to follow the hyperlink to Amazon. Trust me, it's addictive. Debra has more info here.
Hot on the heels of Marie Philips's anguished review of a rather wonky Doctor Who episode (I agree, it was awful), the twentieth anniversary edition of Concatenation is out, and includes my article The science in science fiction, in which I sound off on making the story central to any fiction (and, en passant, drop a major spoiler about my next novel, Flashback). Here's a brief excpert:
I guess I've come to this conclusion through the editing process. I've learned that what makes a scene good isn't the tech; it's the meaning conjured by the characters, their struggles, the conflict, and the wider narrative. When working to improve a work of fiction, you can fiddle with the meaning (I'm using this word in a broad sense that encompasses 'emotion', 'affect', 'interest' and so on) or you can fiddle with the technical stuff. At the end of the day, it's the sharpening of meaning that improves the work by any real margin.
You can read the full article here. Thanks to Jonathan, the editor, for commissioning the piece.
Incidentally, I've taken the opportunity to upload a book trailer to the Flashback page. Mmm, moody.
Way back - oh so way back - I thought about writing a book based on a short story. What a muppet. Anyway. I only had one character, a scientist called David Proctor. I wanted another character to chase him...a woman who worked for the government. Browsing a bookshop, I came across a book called Jennifer Government. The cover: One eye, green, with a barcode beneath it. Yes, I thought, tapping my fingertips evilly, a beautiful agent who is literally owned by the government, like that bird out of Nikita. Well, I put the book down in case reading it destroyed the nascent character - plus, I didn't want to plagiarise or, worse, play the 'Am I plagiarising?' game throughout the writing of the book. Now, some years later, I've finally got round to buying Max Barry's Jennifer Government.
It's the future, people. Corporations have finally wrested power from the continental United States government and, from there, insinuated their imperially sticky fingers into the pies of Australia, South America and Russia. There is a MacDonald's 'restaraunt' on every street, in every city. And, within each 'eating establishment', you'll find employees whose surname reflect their employment: Mary MacDonald's, John MacDonald's, und so weiter. Identity and corporate America have become one. The government is a corporation, and one employee happens to be called Jennifer.
Max Barry is not backward in coming forward with instant shenanigans (don't read that phrase twice; it isn't worth it; just crash on) and soon we're embroiled in a crypto-comedic caper of capitalist proportions. We're introduced to the snivelling Hack Nike, who is soon contracted to carry out the dark orders of up-and-coming guerilla marketing men John and John. The Johns intend to release the latest brand of Nike trainers to so few outlets that demand will vastly outstrip supply. As a creative flourish, they will murder several customers in order to drum up street cred.
Quite how Mr Barry has avoided legal attention from the many companies he maligns, I'm not sure. (Though he does have some thoughts on the blog.)
So why is this book so good?
One, it has a freaking great cover. I'm not joking. Put that book on a 3-for-2 table and it will jump out, slap you a couple of times about the face, then frisk your pockets for the RRP. It just looks great at a distance. Crucially - and this is where things often go pair-shaped - it also looks great close up. The icing on the cake is that the single eye, combined with the bar code, makes an impactful statement about the identity of the book. Check out the evolution of the cover on Barry's site.
Two, this guy is funny. I laughed out loud three or four times in the first few pages. The humour is of the well-observed, stand-up variety. Clever but character-based.
Three, this book has been edited to within an inch of its life. I didn't count a single word in the first third that could be removed from a sentence without breaking it. As a writer, I already give him a lot of kudos for that. It isn't easy to edit. But this is more than the chummy glow of admiration. The story is ratcheted so tight the pages squeak: there is no stalling dialogue; descriptions serve dramatic purpose; adverbs have been exterminated; every time there is a change of perspective, the reader perks up because the thread was left as a cliffhanger. (Barry describes the editing process.) Now, plenty of books do this, but few can pull it off without artifice. It's one thing to note that a writer is ticking the checkboxes, but to note that and still be carried away by the story is quite rare, and I can't remember the last time my critical faculties were so switched off by a book because I was desperate to read on.
It's not all perfection. The first third is perhaps the best because it is heavily character-driven. Later, as the plot gains complexity through coincidence, it's harder to engage with the story. But the ending ties up the loose ends nicely. I advise you to buy this book because it is a masterclass in how to put together a piece of fiction; its editing works like the thousand folds of a katana; it's funny; and its politics suit a Guardian-reading wishy washy like me. All wishy washies should read this now! (But I respect and would defend your opinion should you choose not to.)
Plus, there's an online game! What's not to like?
On the web, there are fewer things more amusing than the sport of watching mainstream journalists write pseudo psychological/sociological bullshit on emerging technologies. (As an experimental psychological, I've read a enough of this to be reasonably expert.) Blogs, for example, are dismissed as mostly crap, irrelevant and, on occasion, vomit-inducing. As a criticism, you could apply this to vocal conversation, and it would be equally idiotic.
The latest chap to make a moderate tit of himself is the author of this article from AdvertisingAge. The blog is not his target, but Twitter. 'What Twitter?' I hear you Tweet. Well, this is an online service that allows users to post extremely short descriptions of what they're doing at a given moment. It's nothing more or less than that. For me, it's entirely a piece of art; I love the idea of people from all over the world just answering a simple question over and over. I first heard of it via Leo Laporte. For a visual demo, check out this Twitter map.
I'm sorry, but if you don't think this is simply awesome as a piece of global, human expression, then I can't help you.
Anyway, the author of the AdvertisingAge article wanted to illustrate the pointlessness of Twitter (damn it, so what if it's pointless; why use utility as a marker to justify the existence of art?), and he sampled some Tweets at random. Guess what? One of them was mine:
Having a nap in the hope my feverish symptoms will abate.
Fame at last! But one of my Twitter friends, Debra Hamel, took exception, and posted a response on her blog. An excerpt:
Twitter is not thousands of people tweeting their every move to the world at large. It's thousands of interconnected, opt-in communities in which people are tweeting their whereabouts and current reading and lunch plans and health updates to the members of their virtual communities--which may include people in their real-life communities too, like family members and work mates.
Well said, Debra. Twitter is a conversation. It's a communicative technology, and attacking it is as pointless as attacking two cups and piece of string.
What a muppet.
My agent, redoubtable John Jarrold, just linked to a YouTube video of the 'book trailer' that HarperCollins UK have cooked up for Stephen Hunt's The Court of the Air. Here's the embedded video, below. I love the idea of a book trailer. Indeed I've got one for my unpublished novel, Flashback, which I might post up tomorrow. Meantime, enjoy this far more professional effort. I'm really impressed with it; though a little long, and with subtitles that aren't so easy to read, it's a good demonstration of a marketing vehicle that can really impart the feeling of a book.
One good thing about being ill (only slightly, just a virus I picked up at Eastercon) is that you sit around fussing about all the things you could do were you not ill, notwithstanding that this is nonsense for a person like me, who is lazy day-in day-out. But I did remember a movie that I had watched on my laptop while holidaying in France. I wanted to blog about it, so, now that I am slightly recovered, here goes.
Strings is a film from 2004 that features marionettes - you know, puppets with strings. It's a somewhat epic fantasy with overtones of Star Wars and The Lion King that concerns a young prince and his battle to recapture the usurped kingdom of his father. If this story had been presented in the form of a cartoon, or a novel, the reaction would probably be, "OK; a fairly well-structured fantasy story, nowt special." But the writer/director Anders Rønnow Klarlund chose marionettes. These marionettes are - wait for it - aware of their strings.
Let's just think about that. The marionettes are real characters in a harsh world, striving for family and honour...and yet they see strings flowing from their wrists, shoulders, legs, and head. The strings continue up until they disappear into the clouds.
For me - whose fiction thus-far has tried to wrestle with free will a little bit - this seems the most perfect metaphor for the confusion of identity that results from even superficial thinking about the possibility/impossibility of volition. The marionettes reach for a cup because their strings direct them to. They look into the sky because their cheek strings have been tugged. What operates the strings? God? Their soul? An inanimate something? Like humans, the marionettes only consider these problems briefly, perhaps at moments of distress, and they end their days with the mystery unsolved.
This beautiful film waxes quite lyrical on the implications of these strings. A father creates his son from the best wood he can afford - different woods have different properties, of course. The mother's strings split in two and feel for the inanimate child; they insinuate into the holes throughout the body and, with a tug, the child awakes. And how can a marionette be injured? Simple: you cut one of her strings. This is the basis of unarmed combat in the world of Strings. Lose a string on your wrist and the hand will never move again; cut the head string and you're dead.
Almost as astounding as the film is the documentary that accompanied it on the DVD. The movie took years to make, and involved an army of puppeteers who were worked to the point of exhaustion.
It's a great, quirky, original film (those crazy Danes!), and highly recommended.
Don't get tangled.
Hocking out.
Ting-a-ling.
And now I'm going to catch up on my sleep. Happy Easter!
Hey, I know it's fun everywhere else too. Ah, Eastercon. I'm just printing out some directions to the hotel (it's up in Chester, four hours away by car; and even that might be optimistic given the holiday traffic).
Battle plan:
Will report back on Monday. Hocking out.
Labels: Eastercon
That's right, reader, it's Buy a Friend a Book week. Hemi/demi/semi annually, and at random points within that time period, Debra Hamel (blblio-mavette) runs a BAFAB. Lots of blogs take part, and some, like mine, just like to pass on the meme. So what have you bought for a friend recently? (Alas, I can't shamelessly plug my own book at this point because it's out of print - but I'm working on it).
Labels: BAFAB, Debra Hamel
