I hadn’t seen Rufus in years, not since high school in fact. He was marginally taller but otherwise had changed little from the picture I had of him in my mind – freckles and dimples, a divot in his chin, nervous smile.

“How are you doing?” I asked him then launched into the usual recital of my own life after high school. Started studying law but dropped out and ended up in music production, worked with some big, big names in the music biz. Married Jen, you remember Jen, maybe you don’t actually. Had two daughters, our little angels, good as gold. Finally I asked him: “So what about you? What have you been doing?”

“Oh you know,” he shrugged. “Still the same.”

“The same what?”

He hesitated for a moment. “Still at school.”

“Ha ha – another one of you nutters who went and became teachers! You’re braver than I am, I can tell you! I think Martin Telford went into teaching as well.”

“No, you don’t understand,” Rufus continued. “I’m still at school. I never left.”

I continued to grin, trying to work out the joke. Of course he’d left school – he had been at the graduation ceremony and the leavers’ party afterwards. Or had he? Now that I thought about, I couldn’t picture him having been there; perhaps he’d never turned up.

“I don’t get it Rufus, we left high school over ten years ago.”

“Yeah, not me.” He undid his jacket at this point so that I could see that he was indeed wearing our old school’s blazer and blue and white striped tie. I laughed but only because I couldn’t think of any other way to react. Inside I was starting to feel a little off-balance, that sensation in a dream when things just stop adding up.

“What the hell are you talking about Rufus,” I said, harsher than I had intended. “I don’t see or hear from you in years and now you spin this nonsense on me? I mean what the hell?”

Some passers-by had turned to look at what the commotion might be. Blushing, Rufus steered me towards a nearby bench, took a deep breath and started back at the beginning.

All through our time at Canderwell High, the head teacher had been a Mr Brookes. Brookes had dressed and acted like some hotshot investment banker, all braces and pinstripes, and personality-wise was simply a horrendous human being. Whilst you could begin to sympathise that most other teachers were just acting towards their pupils’ own good or were stressed or misread situations, not Brookes. He was genuinely evil. He would pick out kids and berate them for the most ludicrous of reasons, a slight twinkle in his eye all the while. There was always a nervous queue outside his office, trembling at the yelling from within. Even the other staff seemed uneasy in Mr Brookes’ slithery presence.

Myths had been built up around the infamous head teacher by us kids – apparently he had shouted so much at one kid, the boy had wet himself and insisted his parents move him to another school the following day. Or there was the rumour that Brookes still kept a cane in his office and would sometimes bring it out to practice long, arcing swishes against imaginary school children. One myth that had completely slipped from my mind though was the “Price of Escape” – a tale that each year a few unlucky kids would be unable to graduate from their final year because they had supposedly damaged school property at one point or taken too many suspicious sick days. The guilty would have to complete a day of laborious cleaning around the school as well as supply Mr Brookes himself with a hand-written apology as penance before being allowed to officially leave the school. I had never actually known anyone who had lived through this ritual first, or even second, hand and had just dismissed the whole thing. But for Rufus, it seemed, the Price of Escape had become a reality.

Aged 13, he had broken a window in the art department – entirely by accident albeit whilst mucking around. He had taken a berating at the time and his father had ended up footing the bill. The crime had not been forgotten by Mr Brookes though and on our final day of high school, he had called Rufus into his office. Mr Brookes quietly reminded Rufus of the situation and how a full, written apology would be required before Rufus could graduate. Rufus had politely replied that he would be doing no such thing and walked out, heading home early. The next day however there was a phone call for him from Brookes and the next day as well and then letters started to arrive – all highly aggressive and demanding the necessary apology. This campaign lasted all summer, methodical and unrelenting. The situation started to grate, not just against Rufus, but his parents as well who found it to be the latest in a string of topics to fight about. By the end of the summer, Brookes had not relented, Rufus’ parents were in the early stages of an ugly divorce and Rufus had had enough. Instead of looking for a job or applying for university, he waited till the first day of term, put on his tie and blazer and went back to school.

The teachers were initially bemused at his arrival, sitting cross-armed and awaiting to be told what classes to attend but soon Brookes arrived to witness Rufus’ defiance first hand. The head quickly concluded that if Rufus would still not apologise then he would simply have no option other than to repeat his final year. Unwilling to back down, Rufus accepted. That day he went to all the necessary classes, taking notes and answering questions. He came back the following day and did the same, and the next day, and the next. It was a laugh – he knew a few people in the lower year so fitted in quickly. But a year later and the situation had remained unchanged, Rufus was still at school whilst his classmates were once again preparing to graduate.

“See you next year?” Brookes had asked Rufus with a slight grin, laying down a renewed challenge.

Rufus went and travelled during the summer but came back in time for the new term. This time, members of staff started to complain but Brookes quickly suppressed such undercurrents. Rufus decided to take a few new subjects, seeing that he might as well take the opportunity to broaden his horizons. The routine began again.

The situation had gone on for so long now that every passing day, week and year made it harder for Rufus or Brookes to back down. After a few years Rufus had to be withdrawn from sitting with the main classes, studying himself from textbooks and receive the odd private lesson. He was however, gradually becoming adept in every subject the school ran. He had developed a friendly relationship with the teachers, even helping some with marking or preparing new course material. In the evenings and weekends he worked stacking shelves or in a local meat-packing plant. Along with the money he got from two embittered parents, he managed to rent a small flat and live a fairly comfortable, if lonely, life.

“So that’s that,” he said finally and shrugged.

“So you’re really telling me,” I said, struggling to put the words together. “That you’ve wasted the past thirteen, fourteen years of your life just to make a point to that twisted, old git?”

“I can’t let him win now,” replied Rufus.

I did something then that may have seemed cruel but I honestly did it for the best of intentions. I slapped him. Hard. The sound carried on the still air and when Rufus turned back, a crimson handprint was clearly visible against his pale skin. I’d forgotten what it was like to hit somebody – the experience was both nauseating and strangely intimate.

“Nobody’s going to win, you bloody idiot,” I said. “You’ve both lost – you and Brookes. The only thing you can do now is walk away and live your life. He’ll still be there, miserable and despised but with no control over us anymore. Just forget about him!”

Rufus just stared back at me.

“You were my friend once, so I’m doing you this kindness now,” I continued. “Don’t you go back to that school tomorrow, don’t you dare. I’m going to phone them up tomorrow and if you’re there then I swear I’ll phone up every newspaper I know and tell them this story. Do you understand?”

He got up at that point and without another word, just walked away. I tried to call him back but he didn’t respond.

I didn’t call up Canderwell High the following day as I had threatened to do. I’d lost my nerve and didn’t want to face the reality that Rufus might indeed have still been there. So I just left it at that. I’d done enough damage I reckoned.

* * *

It wasn’t until a couple of years later that I answered my door one Sunday afternoon to find Rufus standing there, grinning. He looked a world away from last time – hair cut short, trendy shirt with a tee underneath. No school uniform.

I invited him in and as we waited for the kettle to boil, Rufus thanked me. Although he’d been furious with me at the time, it turned out I had provided him with just the push he needed. He hadn’t gone back to Canderwell the following day after all or the day after. He’d gone and done a few courses at college whilst he figured out what he wanted to do with his new found life. He’d actually considered teaching but couldn’t face the thought of stepping foot in another school. Instead he’d leveraged his unique understanding of the education system to become an editor, and occasional author, of educational textbooks, a career he was thoroughly enjoying.

I told him I was happy for him, relieved even. He said he was too. He looked happy, back on kilter. It had taken him a few years longer than the rest of us, but Rufus had finally made it out of Canderwell High.

As some sort of conclusion, I should tell you what became of Mr Brookes at this point but the fact of the matter is, I don’t know. I never bothered to find out.

Title image courtesy hellosputnik

Now this is the point in the year where I should really be setting myself some writing objectives for the year ahead. I did this last year and got on quite well. I’m going to sort of do the same thing this year but these will be more like vague targets rather than hard objectives. If I don’t manage these ones then I’m not going to cry too hard. Why? Because I’m lazy. No, just kidding. Because my wife is pregnant. She has been for some time but I’ve trying to pretend it wasn’t really happening. The bump is hard to ignore now though, especially when it kicks you. In less than four months, if all goes well, I’ll be a father and there will a small, living, breathing human in this world that I’ll have to look and try not to ruin. Already our house and my head is filling with items and words I never thought I would need to know. These are strange times for me. The writing will have no choice but to take a back seat.

So now excuses have been made, I shall go ahead and list what I am hoping to achieve:

Find an agent for my novel The Mechanician’s Apprentice
The novel is nearing a point where I feel confident showing it to agents or publishers, the sort of people who might sneer at it or might (if all the planets are aligned) actually decide to do something with it. I now know what sort of book this is and how it should be marketed (it’s a two-part, young adult, steampunk adventure where understanding science is the key to survival). I’m also working on a shortlist of agents and have already invested in some professional tutoring on how to submit a query letter.

Write a novella
You know how (if you’re a writer) you have a list of ideas that you want to write and it just keeps getting longer and longer? Well I’ve got one idea that’s being sitting permanently at the top of that list for well over a year now. I’ve been holding it back to concentrate on the novel but feel the time is right to have a crack at it. It’s dark, it’s modern and is built atop one hell of a twist. It’s also based on one of the short stories you’ll have seen on this site. I’m not going to tell you which one though.

Writer another novella
Yes that’s right, it’s same objective twice. I’ve got a few other burning ideas lingering in my mind that are longer than short stories but probably not as long as novels. I’m not actually sure which one will work out yet but my current favourite is a supernatural drama set during WW2. Also, should I somehow manage to write these two novellas, I’m going to self-publish one as I did with The Thief of Sleep and the other I’ll try marketing around and seeing what sort of avenues there are for publishing that length of work.

So there we go. It’s going to be a tough year. A tough, tough year. Expect to see a lot less of me on Twitter and the blogs but know that somewhere, somehow I will still be writing. Even if it’s only my dazed and confused mind.

But wait – there’s other stuff happening this year!

I’ve signed up for an online writing course! This was one of my objectives for last year but I managed to miss the start of the few courses I liked the sound of. So this year I was hot of the marks and got myself signed for 10-week Creative Writing course organised by the University of Strathclyde. This kicks off on Monday and I’m pretty looking forward to.

I’m going to a new writer’s group! I moved house just before Christmas (more bedrooms, you can guess for yourself whether or not this was motivated by the bump). This sadly meant that I moved away from my old writing group that I had been going to for a year and loving. It does however mean that there is a brand new writing group that meets just down the road from me to try out now! They seem to be a lot more organised, have workshops and social events and even a resident Writing Fellow. Wow! So that starts next week as well on Wednesday so there is yet more writing experience coming down the pipeline for me.

So what about the rest of you? What writing objectives are you hoping to achieve and what potential hurdles stand in your way?

Title image courtesy sarchi

Clay sat bolt upright and coughed a handful of worms into his hand. He could feel more wriggling half way down his throat. He tried to reach down and retrieve but found them to be just a little too far. He swallowed the little buggers down for the tummy juices to deal with instead.

The moon was a spoon, silvery and scratched. It drew outlines of his surroundings — low brick walls, marble statues chipped by age. He was still somewhere in the Great Garden. This was no use to him.

Clay pondered getting up and having a wander, give his eyes some practice, but already he could smell the men hunting for him. Soon enough they’d be here with their torches and looking glasses. And he caught a damp, hairy smell as well — they’d brought dogs this time as well. Clay cared not for dogs.

Clay turned and pushed his fingers, the nails long ripped away to nothing, down in the cold soil. They sunk quickly; he continued to push till he was buried to the wrists. He made handholds in the earth and pulled himself further in. It was like swimming through the worst water ever; each stroke exhausting. With one final gulp, his head slipped under.

* * *

Clay felt chill air against his fingertips and pushed till he was free of the earth once more. He had dug without deviation and so should now be on the opposite side of the sphere. Here the sky was waxy, yellowy, full of promise. The grass under his knees was still moist. He was near a gravel path, neatly lined with sandy coloured pebbles.

Somebody was humming and that somebody now strolled into sight. It was a girl. A woman. A woman girl. She looked somehow different from the others, her face broken in a permanent grin.

Clay crossed over to her. “I like your teeth.”

“Hello there! I’m Sophie, how are you?”

“They say I’m called Clay,” said Clay, chewing on a baby slug.

“You’re all mucky — what a mess!” laughed the girl.

“Been digging. Digging is what I’m good at.” Clay decided that he liked Sophie. She smelt like warm camomile and was interesting to look at.

There was a rumbling and both Clay and the girl looked up to see the shadow of another sphere approaching theirs. It’s surface was covered in water and as it neared, it began to rain gently down upon them.

Clay, accustomed to such events, kneeled and sunk his hands into the earth to hold on but already Sophie was being lifted upwards by the other sphere’s pull.

“Oh I’m not sure I like this!” she called, flapping her legs back and forth. “Help me Clay! Help me please!”

Clay did try, stretching up and to grab at her nearest foot but the red sneaker just slipped off in his hand and then the girl was out of reach. The rain began to ease up as the other sphere retreated once more.

Clay felt sad to see his new friend slipping away and felt scared for what she might encounter alone on the other sphere. He had to go with her.

Up on his feet, Clay tried jumping as high he could but to no effect. There was a cherry tree nearby so he ran to that and began climbing. The rain had stopped completely now but he could still feel some suction from above. He reached the highest branch, squeezed his eyes shut and leapt upwards.

He felt that old sensation in his stomach and knew that he was falling. It hadn’t worked. He waited for the impact of the ground against him. He waited and continued to wait. Odd — the tree hadn’t been that high had it? He opened his eyes just in time to see grey waves racing forwards to embrace him.

“Cway, Cwlawy!” Clay’s head resurfaced above the water and he saw Sophie treading water nearby. “Clay!”

The water tasted like poo and smelled even worse.
“Clay I can’t swim,” called Sophie and Clay did his best to reposition himself closer to her.

“Neither can I!”

“What are we going to do Clay? My legs are getting achy!”

Clay looked around them, there was no sign of land or anything to hold on to. Perhaps this entire sphere was covered with water. There was nothing else for it, Clay decided to do what he did best.

“Pretend to be a stone,” he told Sophie.

They both took deep breaths then tucked their knees under their arms, allowing themselves to sink. Beneath the water was a murky void. Occasionally shapes twitched in the grey.

The moment Clay felt himself touch the bottom he made Sophie grab hold of his ankle and started burrowing. The seabed was made of soft sand that they slipped quickly under. Once they were deep enough, with aching lungs, Clay slithered back around above them, using his back to plug the hole and form an air pocket. They gasped with relief and sucked hungrily on the dusty air.

Clay dozed for a while. When he awoke, Sophie was sobbing.

“Why are you sobbing Sophie?”

“Oh Clay! I want to go back home. I want to see my little kitty again. But instead we’re stuck here in the dark and we can’t go back up or we’ll drown!”

Clay didn’t know what to say so licked he away her tears. They tasted like buttercups.

“You two tickle.”

“Why did you say that Clay?”

“I didn’t say that Sophie. I thought maybe you had said it.”

“It wasn’t me. I didn’t say it either Clay. That’s a bit odd isn’t it?”

“I think that it is” said Clay.

“Why is it odd?” asked the sphere. “I think you two are odd.”

“I’m not odd” said Sophie uncertainly into the gloom.

“I am” said Clay.

“I might spit you out now if that’s okay?”

Before either could reply, the earth around them start to vibrate and streams of sand began sliding around them. Then, flung forwards by a force unknown, Clay and Sophie were hurtling through sand then water and then air.

They struck ground again with a thump.

Looking up they found that they had landed before a row of gravestones, weathered by time and uneven in the ground. The nearest read: “Here lies Carson the Fibber. Eat dirt.” The sky was still dark here, only a few stars twinkled.

“Oh no,” said Clay, rubbing his sore bits.

“What?” Sophie asked. “Are we still on the wrong sphere?”

Clay shook his head. “No. We are back where we came from. Only we’re in the Great Garden, which isn’t a good place for me to be.”

Somewhere beyond the hedgerows and gatherings of mausoleums, hounds began to bray and howl. They knew he was here.

“We should go away from here.” Clay grabbed Sophie’s hand and started off down one of the avenues. There were too many bodies buried in the ground to risk burrowing here. Clay had once, unintentionally, dug up into a grave and had had to fight himself free as the cold bones tried to snatch and grab hungrily at him.

As they ran, the paths and hedgerows shifted around them, making it impossible to judge if they were making progress or not.

“There it is! There’s the Clay!” called an angry voice and they turned to see Clay’s pursuers had caught them up at last. The men wore dusty trench coats, their bodies beneath, bound with yellowing bandages. Two dogs had been unleashed and were sprinting forwards, showing off their glistening fangs.

When Sophie and Clay turned to run once more, they found a brick wall, riddled with ivy, had sprung up. They were trapped.

“Catch it! Bind it with rope. Burn it with fire!” called the men. The hounds had come to a halt before their prey, taking turns at snapping at the terrified pair. “The Clay must not be allowed to continue existing!”

“Clay — what did you do to make them so angry?” Sophie asked.

“Do you know the Book of Broken Promises?”

Sophie shook her head.

“Well I read from it. No one’s supposed to even look at that book, let alone open it and read what’s inside!”

“And what is inside?”

“Broken promises.”

The men were almost upon them, the spaces where their eyes hid piercing into the fugitive and his young friend. Two of the men were rolling an iron wheel forward, chains at set points around the rim as if designed for binding a man to.

“I don’t know what to do Sophie,” said Clay. “I’m sorry that I brought you here. We might be going to die now which is unfortunate.”

“I’m sorry too,” said Sophie and started to cry but the tears that ran from her eyes did not look like normal tears. Each was a different, bold colour from the last and they sparkled a little. Then Sophie began to clutch at her stomach and winced her face. “Oh no, no, no.”

“What is it? What’s happening to you?” asked Clay and when his woman girl friend looked at up him, her eyes were filled with stars. She was a Dazzler.

Sophie looked at the approaching men then opened her mouth, vomiting forth a stream of rainbows, small fizzing comets and dancing little bolts of lightning. The wave of Dazzle spread out and struck the men full on, the light and colour and sound tore at their clothing and their bandages began to unravel about them. Whatever had been lurking beneath, quickly evaporated away. They tried to scream but all that came out was “la, la, lahelala.”

Soon Clay had to look away and when he finally dared turn back, some hats and flickering torches on the ground were the only evidence the men had ever been there. The dogs had become transformed into Shar Pei puppies, happily play-fighting with one another. A few stars still sizzled on the ground and some of the nearby bushes glittered a little.

“I’m… sorry about that,” said Sophie, tenderly getting back to her feet and wiping the glitter and spittle from her lips.

“Don’t be,” said Clay. He’d never seen Dazzle happen first hand before, had only ever heard stories. “That’s quite a trick.”

“I can’t always control it. We were lucky today but not always. I’m on my seventh kitten now.”

“Maybe you need some around to help you control it,” said Clay, taking her hand. Where her tender, still fizzing skin met with his, hardened and mud-streaked, they almost seemed to even other out.

“Maybe you’re right,” said Sophie. “Maybe what we’ve been needing all along is each other.”

Overhead, the rising sun and setting moon bled into one another, painting the sky with streaks of vivid pink and purple. Nearby, birds were beginning to chirp.

Clay grinned broadly. From behind one of his broken teeth, a worm squiggled out.

Title image courtesy aaronescobar

So wayyyyy back at the beginning of this year I set myself three writing-related goals that I intended to achieve by the end of the year. Some were more ambitious than others and I will now summarise how I got on.

1. Complete my novel So yeah, this didn’t happen. I got a lot done in the first half of the year and ground through the first half of the novel, even managing to send that out for some beta reading. And then I got distracted. Fortunately one of my distractions was The Thief of Sleep but it did mean The Mechanician’s Apprentice has gone another entire year still evolving on my hard drive and in my head. I still feel optimistic though, initial feedback has been good and/or very useful, I have a much better feeling for what sort of a novel this actually is now (it’s actually two). Next year I feel I’ll be ready to start sending queries out to agents and seeing what happens from there!

2. Take some formal writing training This did and didn’t happen. I had originally envisaged this as either going on some sort of classroom course or doing distance learning over a number of months. I didn’t do either, mostly because I couldn’t find anything that I thought would definitely be right for me. A few things seemed like they might work but the cost involved was a bit too high to take the chance. Instead I joined a local writer’s group. You could argue that this wasn’t “formal” training but it was really the first time I’d allowed other people to sit and openly critique my work (as in going through it with pen and providing line by line suggestions of improvements). This year my writing as come leaps and bounds and I really do merit most of it to those wonderful people in my writer’s group! I’m marking this one down as: success.

3. Become a published author This was the one I thought would be most difficult to achieve and it was. I’ve spent the year firing short stories off to various publications and having very little success. But success did come! Towards the end of the year I received word that one of my stories, Chemicals had been selected for an anthology of Scottish writing titled The McCollection and also another short called The Way of the World has been made available for sale by Ether Books, an exciting projects that sells short stories via the iPhone. And of course I published my own collection of short stories called The Thief of Sleep. Self-publication has been a lot tougher going than I was expecting but has been an exciting project from which I’ve learned a lot. Again: boom – success!

So I managed 2/3 which personally I’m thrilled with. Would I have made such good progress without having set myself these targets? Probably not. So I guess the most important thing to do now is start thinking about my targets for next year!

Title image courtesy bensutherland

“And a happpeee newww yearrr!”

Finally. They were finished. Dalton exhaled and turned the volume on the TV back down to its normal level.

“I saw three ships come sailing in, come sailing in, I saw three ships come sailing in.”

“Oh you’ve got to be joking me!” cried Dalton, chucking the TV remote across the room in frustration.

“Just go and give them some money,” said Sue sitting next to them. “Then I’m sure they’ll move on to the next house.”

“No. They’re not getting anything, not a penny,” Dalton replied. “I never asked them to come here, I never asked them to sing. They’re not getting anything. They’re like those toe-rags that come and wipe your car windscreen then expect you to just give them money. That’s not how the world works Sue.”

Sue snorted in amusement and carried on watching the TV. Dalton was always like this at Christmas time and you either just to had to laugh at him or go slowly insane at his constant anti-merriment.

Finally the carol singers finished their song. A few moments passed in silence, just long enough for Dalton to relax then they started again. “Away in a Manger” this time.

“Right that’s it,” snapped Dalton, getting to his feet and storming out of the room before Sue could try and stop him. From the hall she could hear him swinging the door open and then unleashing a torrent of rage upon the well-wishing carol singers.

“Be near me Lorrrd Jesus! I ask thee to stay!” The carol singers just kept on singing.

The door slammed shut again.

“Don’t you think that was a bit rude?” asked Sue when her husband finally returned to the sofa, rosy faced.

“No less than they deserve. I ask you this – what if that was kids playing music from one of these ghetto-thingies? Or someone beeping their horn repeatedly? You’d call the police wouldn’t you? Because it’s noise pollution. Causing a nuisance. Just because they’re singing ruddy hymns doesn’t change any of that.”

Abruptly the singing and musical accompaniment died away mid verse. Dalton’s outburst had obviously had some sort of effect, either that or the singers’ toes were starting to freeze and they were going to retreat to the pub. Then the music started again – “Deck the Halls”, only it wasn’t “Deck the Halls” that was being sung.

“You’re a miser-able old bug-ger! Tra li la la, la la la! We hope San-ta brings you co-al! Tra li la la, la la la!”

Sue did all she could to stop from sniggering. Dalton’s face fell.

“All we wanted was a few penn-ies! Tra li la la, la la la! But now you’re going to pay like hell!”

“Hell? Did they just say hell?” asked Sue, now looking less amused.

“Mis-er-able shite, greeeedy old shite!” They had slipped into Silent Night now. “You bouuught this house, for less than you should! You tolddd the previous owners it was riddden with rot. When cleeeaaarrllllyyy it’s not.”

Dalton went to the window. Lights across the street were starting to come on now, neighbours were looking out from their windows.

“Howww’s your bad leg? And your baddd back? We hear you’ve been on beneeefits for quite so-me time. Did that help pay, for your skiiiing holi-day?”

“How do they know all this?” asked Sue, coming to the window as well and looking at the group of figures huddled in the street light. It was hard to make out their faces. “Aren’t they just carol singers?”

Dalton didn’t reply. His throat was feeling very dry all of a sudden.

The music changed again. White Christmas.

“Yooou’ve been workinggg late a lot in the – offff-ice! But does your wife knowww why?”

Dalton bolted for the door.

“That you’ve been banging! Your, sec-ret-ary! And… the girl from market-ing?”

Oblivious that he was just in just in socks out on the frosty pavement, Dalton stood before the carol singers. “What do you want?!” he shouted. “However much you want, I’ll pay it alright? Just leave me alone!”

The carol singers fell silent at last. A series of judging eyes boring into the man before them. He had pulled out his wallet and was now waving a handful of creased notes at the singers.

“Come on, just take it and then leave!” he called. “Please!”

None of the group moved.

“We wish you a merry christmas! We wish you a merry christmas! We wish you a merry christmas and a happppy new year!”

Dalton gave a sigh of relief. Maybe just the willingness to pay up had saved him from further revelations.

“Your wife gets a lot of male of callers! Your wife gets a lot of male callers! Your wife gets a lot of male callers, when you’re not here!”

Dalton turned slowly to look back at the house but his wife had vanished from the window. He felt chills worse than the frost below him or the bitter night air. He started to shake and all the while the carol singers continued to sing.

Title image courtesy clairity

For a while I have been making contributions to McStorytellers – a community of Scottish-based (or connected) writers. It’s a great wee site and I’ve even interviewed head honcho Brendan Gisby here recently. Well McStorytellers has now released their first anthology – a selection of exciting, new Scottish writing talent from across the site. Its appropriately entitled The McCollection and available as an eBook and paperback. Oh and yes – I’m on there! Hurrah! Which means, yes, I am now officially a Printed Author.

I haven’t read the anthology yet, I’m still waiting on my paperback to arrive, but based on same of the names listed and other work I’ve read on the site, I’m certain this will be a great read. Go on, go and buy yourself the eBook. You know you want to.

Title image courtesy egfocus

I’ve been doing a bit of guest posting on other blogs and my latest effort was a short story for Chuck Allen. The story is called The Passing, set in the Scottish Highlands and is all about childhood, family legacies and one slightly wicked grandfather. It’s a departure from usual style (no fantastical elements) but I’m very proud of this one and think you’ll enjoy it a lot, so why not pop over and give it a read?

Title image courtesy oliverthompsonphotography

So there’s not been much new content on the blog recently – I’ve been crazy busy with moving house, amongst other things so there’s no been a lot of time for writing (or internet access!).

But I’m back now! Fresh stories and interviews are in bound but in meantime, here’s a guest article I recently did for Tessa Bazelli over on her blog, its all about Finding Inspiration for you writing.

Title image courtesy oliverthompsonphotography

My latest interview is with the ever talented Cathryn Grant. Cathryn writes flash fiction, short stories, novellas and novels so has a range of experiences, is self-published and even created her own genre: suburban noir.

Hey Cathryn, thanks for taking the time out to answer these questions.
Thanks for inviting me to your blog. I love “talking” about my writing.

So your self-published novel “The Demise of the Soccer Moms” has been out for almost a year now, would you rate it as being a success? What sort of response have you had from readers?
It’s amazing to have people read your work and respond to your characters and story. Responses have been more varied than I expected, but mostly positive. There were two or three “I didn’t like this book at all” reactions. I had told myself, when I get poor reviews it means that people who aren’t friends and family are buying my book! The reality was a little more difficult, but it really is true.

Okay, that’s the down side out of the way. What’s been a thrill that I can’t begin to describe is reading the reactions of people who loved the book. Quite a few said they couldn’t put it down, or stayed up late reading because they had to find out what happened. My two favorite responses were a comparison of the ending to Rod Serling, and another from a fan of dystopian fiction. The second review noted that I’d done something similar to dystopian authors who create a beautiful and terrible world and run you through it. I’d never thought of my novel in that way, but it does fit.

In terms of sales success, it depends how you define that. Since I obviously can’t control sales, I focus my goals on how much I’m writing and completing in a given timeframe, and how I’m improving my craft. I do have milestones for sales. My first was to sell more than the average self published novel. I passed that fairly early on, so I’m satisfied for now. My next milestones are dependent on having more books out, so right now 99% of my focus is on writing.

I believe you made the conscious decision to self-publish rather than pursue the “traditional” route of finding a publisher. What was the thinking behind this?
I was writing seriously for eight or nine years, pursuing traditional publication. I started by submitting to short story markets. I’d been told short story credits would help attract agent interest. When I finally had a novel I thought was ready for prime time (late 2009), I realized the publishing landscape had changed dramatically – can we say dystopian?

Two key factors made me decide to self publish. One was realizing that even with a traditional publishing contract, I would have to market my books myself. Marketing is the one thing I don’t enjoy about being a writer, and if traditional publishing could no longer offer that to new authors, what was the point? The other was an a-ha moment when I realized the goal is to reach readers(!), not agents/publishers/bookstore buyers, and with the internet and eBooks, writers can go directly to readers. I had an experience that really drove that home and it’s included in a longer answer to that question on my blog.

As well as the novel, you have two novellas and some short story collections on sale – are you noticing any difference in sales or reception between the three different types?
My novel has sold the most, but I promoted it the most (although I’ll argue against that being the cause in response to your next question! – I must be clairvoyant.) I haven’t promoted my novellas much beyond my website.

The one thing that fascinates me no end, and gives me a lot of optimism for the potential of self publishing over time, is the track record of the first book I published. Flash Fiction for the Cocktail Hour – Volume 1 was my experiment in self publishing: formatting, cover concept, uploading, etc. I put it up on Amazon and Smashwords. I never told anyone I published it. Until a few months ago, I didn’t even have the cover on my website. It just sat there in cyberspace. And it sold. It’s sold almost as much as Demise. It was reviewed on a book review blog that I didn’t know existed until someone told me my book was there. It’s sold on and off in the UK. I have no idea why or how this has happened.

When I published Flash Fiction for the Cocktail Hour – Volume 2 this fall, I started seeing sales of both at the same time.

I’ve concluded several things from this:
1. I need to be patient, and give it time. Cocktail Fiction v 1 has been out for 15 months now. It was available for about 5 months before I started seeing sales come out of nowhere.
2. There’s something to “series” because volume 2 is riding the coattails of volume 1.
3. There’s probably something to the US$ 99 cent price point. I don’t think that’s the right price for novels, but I’m okay with it for shorts. (I have a collection of two 5000-word short stories coming out later this month that will also be 99 cents)

Because of point #2, I’m doing very little to publicize my novellas until I have six or seven books in the series. If you read Kristine Kathryn Rusch’s blog, she talks about making sure you have books out there for people to find before you do tons of promotion, in order to get the best results from your efforts.

How have you gone about promoting your work and which have been the most successful approaches?
Promotion has been hit and miss. I’m a fairly reserved person, I don’t like shouting “look at me”, and I’ve found book review blogs have quite a backlog. Not to mention the fact that the day job takes a lot of time, and given a choice between marketing and writing fiction, I know you know which one wins! So, I’ve settled into what feels comfortable, because when I was doing a lot of promoting I was not very happy, and worse, I wasn’t writing as much.

Here’s what I’ve done that did not work well enough to make it worth the effort: a blog tour, a Kindle giveaway, forum advertising, and tweeting. I gave away 11 paper copies of my novel on Goodreads and got 3-4 reviews from that, so that was worth the effort, and I’ll do it again for my next novel. I had a few blog reviews, and I think those worked well to build awareness.

After watching the changes over the past year, reading a lot of blogs about how publishing is evolving, thinking about traditional publishing, I’ve become firmly convinced that the best thing I can do to market my work is to write more books. At the end of the day, my fiction sells my fiction. Yes, I need to get that jumpstart, but maybe that can happen over time with a smallish effort. If you think about it, that’s exactly how it is in traditional publishing. How many times do you hear of a book that’s a hit and then discover it’s the author’s third or fifth or tenth novel? It takes time to build an audience.

The other thing I’m doing is submitting short pieces to eZines and traditional print markets. I’d stopped that in favor of “marketing” activities, but then realized it will get my name out there, and it’s doing what I love – writing fiction. If a piece is rejected, I can always self-publish it in a collection. Again, this approach was heavily influenced by Kristine Kathryn Rusch and others.

The Madison Keith novellas have a supernatural element whilst your other work tends to be fairly grounded in reality – why the change?
I write first drafts with just a brief character sketch or two and a few markers for where I’m headed because it’s so much fun to see what develops. Sometimes, that can be startling. In the middle of the first draft of the first novella, a pair of ghosts showed up. When I looked back at what I’d written so far, I saw that I had a good setup for the supernatural and hadn’t even been aware of it (consciously).

I struggled with it for a month or two, worried about confusing my “brand”. However, I’m very interested in philosophy, religion, attitudes about death and other things that lend themselves to the supernatural. In fact six or seven years ago, one of my short stories was rejected by Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine specifically because their readers weren’t interested in the supernatural. (You can listen to the podcast on my website – The Healer).

Since my fiction deals with the disconnect between characters’ internal worlds and what they reveal to others, taking that concept to an entity being seen/unseen seems to fit (at least in my mind). Like my novels and short stories, my novellas focus on the “why” behind the crime and are set in suburbia. There’s also a touch of dark humor, so I think Suburban Noir fits.

You coined your own subgenre! Suburban noir – how did you come up with that? Are there other writers working in this genre (even if they don’t know it)?
About two years ago, I attended a Mystery Writers conference where I read the opening of my novel to the group, and was also given a chance to practice my agent pitch. People were confused because my book clearly wasn’t a “mystery”. One person said, in a bit of a snarky tone, you do know this is a mystery conference!? One of the authors who was giving pitch advice “got” what I was doing, and suggested Suburban Noir to make it clear my work isn’t traditional mystery/suspense.

I do think other writers are working in this “genre”. Anyone focused more on the “why dunnit” aspect of crime rather than the “who dunnit”, in a suburban setting, is in a similar vein. In some ways, Suburban Noir is my term for psychological suspense. From what I can tell, readers in the UK seem to understand psychological suspense the way I do (think of Ruth Rendell’s standalone novels as well as her Barabara Vine books), but in the US, most people tend to think of psychological suspense as a high-stakes thriller, with a PI or law enforcement protagonist.

So how long have you been writing and what got you started?
I wrote my first novel (a novella, really) when I was ten years old. I have no idea why I started. I was a bookworm, so I suppose one thing led to another. I’ve been writing seriously (meaning ~360 days/year, producing finished work on a regular basis) for about 12 years.

And what other writers do you enjoy reading yourself?
Joyce Carol Oates, Ruth Rendell, Ian McEwan, Lauara Kasischke, John Updike, Patricia Highsmith, Tom Perrotta, and Philip Roth are a few of my favorites.

Is print going to die out completely or do you think eBooks and traditional publishing can happily co-exist?
I really don’t know. I adore my paper books. I love the texture of matte-finished covers and nice paper and I’m a font freak. I read eBooks quite often, but find myself gravitating toward paper for my favorite authors. I have shelves full of books in every room and can’t imagine living without them. But I love the opportunity that eBooks have given to writers to create their own audiences, and to have control over what they write and what their books look like.

Maybe it’s wishful thinking, but I believe we’ll eventually have a somewhat even split between eBooks and print on demand paper books.

Your next novel is going to be “Buried by Debt” which sounds very topical. Can you give us a taste of what to expect?
Buried By Debt is about a young, upwardly mobile couple trying to hide their huge debt from their friends. One bad choice after another eventually leads to violence.

You can read the blurb here.

That’s it – we’ve reached the end of the interview! Thanks again Cathryn and good luck with the next novel.
Thank you, David. You asked great questions. And thanks for your good wishes. I wish you the best in your writing. You know I love your flash fiction and I can’t wait to read The Thief of Sleep.

You can find out more about Cathryn and read her work over at: http://suburbannoir.com

Title image courtesy n0seblunt

A the end of my recent story “Bag ah Chips” I’d wanted to point out that it felt bit like a slightly-more-vulgar version of The Broons but then realised that might be a cultural reference too far and most readers wouldn’t get it. So instead I’m going to share with the world, who exactly The Broons are because, to be honest, you’re all missing out.

The Broons is a comic strip following the Broons family in Glasgow. It was started in the 1930s and has run ever since – despite a few updates to fashion and the two sons going off to fight in WW2, the series remains fairly caught in the past which gives it a lot of its charm. The strip appears weekly in the Sunday Post but there most people will read in the annual (which I believe now actually comes out every 2nd year, alternating with Oor Wullie), a stalwart of Scottish stockings at Christmas time with its unmissably garish tartan cover.

The dialect is all is very, broad Scots and each strip is always one, long joke, usually based on a misunderstanding but ends with everyone laughing (well, nearly everyone).

The family consists of:

Paw – The grumbling head of the household, Paw is a very traditional, working man (not sure you ever find out his profession) stuck in his ways. He boasts a distinctive walrus moustache and usually wears a flat cap.

Maw – The matriarch and the one really running the show, Maw is a huge, stocky woman with hair tied into a tight bun. Nearly everyone who reads the Broons regularly will know a Maw Broon.

Granpaw – The grandad of the family and basically just Paw but with a longer moustache and more wrinkles.

Hen – The eldest son, lanky and bookish.

Daphne – The eldest daughter, similar build to Maw. Running jokes included the annual, failed diet and having to go on double dates with the far more glamorous Maggie.

Joe – The square-jawed everyman, popular with the ladies and a bit of a boxer.

Maggie – The blonde-bombshell daughter with a long line of suitors.

Horace – The nerdy, bookworm son who usually feels somewhat left out from the rest of the family.
The Twins – The two identical twins, always getting up to mischief. I’m not even sure if they actually have separate names or are just always referred to as “The Twins”.

The Bairn – The youngster of the family and Maw’s favourite, quite of the root cause of most situations (although never intentionally). Like the twins, not sure you ever hear her actual name (“bairn” is an Scots phrase for a young child).

Sadly there’s not a lot of places to read The Broons online but here’s a link a strip on the Wikipedia.

Title image courtesy DC Thomson