Oh my ears and whiskers

Grendel decided to spice up our morning breakfast routine by providing us with most of a rabbit this morning. Gone were the waistcoat and pocket watch, leaving everything south of the shoulders. Mmm... it seems that rabbit heads are every bit as crunchy and munchy as mouse ones. Big rabbit too. She Who Must Feast On The Flesh Of Dead Wild Animals now wants to train Little Miss to go hunting on our behalf, so the results can be skinned and eaten. Me? I'm not fond of game, so until the cat brings back a sheep or a cow, I'm not interested.

Friday meant a trip up to the wilds of Huntly and a visit to The Gordon Schools where I did spend an hour babbling nonsense at higher English students. And I even recognised some faces from last week's workshops at Fyvie Castle. Masochists. You’d have think they’d know to stay away after what happened last time. Now when I do these things I usually start with a reading (warning: this product may contain shouting and swearing) and then move on to the old interactive 'let's plan a crime novel using a flipchart, a mind-map, and a naked photo of Gloria Hunniford' thing. And Huntly did me proud, in the bizarre-stakes anyway. We ended up with a tale of an old woman, stabbed in the neck down a darkened alley. By her pimp. Because she hadn't returned a book of his. And the best thing of all? This crime was to be investigated by 'A Man In A Hotdog Suit'. GENIUS!

I could, totally, see myself writing something like that. And maybe I shall, maybe I shall... But not today, as I have the edit of doom to be getting on with.

In other today-shaped things, I believe the lovely people at Deadly Pleasures are announcing the winners of the Barry Awards tonight at that Bouchercon place. *sigh* no convention for poor Stuart. Still, it would have meant flying in to Chicago O'Hare and having done so already this year, I have every intention of avoiding that festering concrete cock-up for as long as possible. Nice city to visit, crap airport.

But I digress. So, yes, the Barry's tonight. Good luck to all the contenders, especially those on the Best First Novel shortlist: Megan Abbott, Brian Freeman, Randall Hicks and David Hosp. Excellent books one and all. How I ended up on the roster with you guys I'll never know. Maybe it had something to do with all those sketchy photos? Took me ages to find a Rubber 'Nurse Nipples' Dress in my size.

And now, if you'll excuse me, I have an appointment with the last eighty pages of BROKEN SKIN and a dirty big blue pen.

An unfortunate attachment to inanimate objects

I had to say goodbye forever to a member of the family today. OK, so it wasn't a biological relative, it was my second car, but it was a strangely emotional experience. Last year I made the stupid mistake of bowing to demands from a source that shall remain nameless, and bought a Jeep Cherokee. It was green. It had a four litre engine. It drank petrol like a crime writer drinks beer -- at a convention -- when someone else is paying. And maybe there are free peanuts, or crisp, or something like that. Who can tell when you've had that much to drink?

Anyway, the upshot is that it was a drain on the finances MacBride, and had to go. So we tried to sell it: put adverts in the local paper (complete with photo to entice those easily aroused by a ton and a half of good, old American engineering) and in ScotAds. Sat back and waited for the calls to come rolling in.

Tumbleweed.

Months and months of tumbleweed. Nobody wanted this bloody car. So we hatched some plans, prevaricated, sodded about, and sort of forgot about it. HOW? HOW THE HELL CAN YOU FORGET ABOUT A HUGE GREEN FOUR-LITRE PAPERWEIGHT SITTING IN YOUR DRIVE WAY? I had to park next to the bloody thing every night. Had to walk past it to hurl abuse at the cows (who can be rowdy if you don't keep an eye on them). But forget about it we did, until it came time to put the sodding thing through its MOT. And when I regained consciousness after seeing the size of the bill to fix the bastarding thing, enough was enough: it was going to the mart.

So into auction it went. And three failed sales later, it came back again. No one bid over £1,500, when we know the trade-in value is £2,800. AND WE PAID £6,000! Thieving sodding, arse-biscuit bastarding garage owning, second-hand-car selling BASTARD! (calm, picture the lilies, picture the sodding lilies and take deep sodding breaths!) So, there was only one recourse left -- no one would by it privately, no one would buy it at auction -- so it was going to have to be traded in.

Now if we just did that we'd still have three cars on the driveway -- the Clio, the 4Trak, and whatever the Jeep transubstantiated itself into. We'd still have to sell something, because I'm sick to the back teeth of insuring and taxing cars we don't sodding drive. And this was the genesis of a cunning plan: we would trade in the Jeep AND the Clio for something else. Thus killing two stones for one bird.

And that's what She Who Must Remain Nameless and I did, traded both cars in for a second-hand Renault Megan with the funny shaped arse.

All well and good. Until it came time to hand over the Clio... I like my Clio. She was a lovely car, bought from new. She had a name -- Roo -- and she was mine. And I really, really liked her. And today I gave her away to a strange man. And for the first time ever, in six years of driving, she refused to start when I tried to take her on her last trip as a MacBride. I turn the key and get nothing but the Panicked Car Owners' Concerto for Starter Motor and Swearing. Twice. On the third go she started -- obviously resigned to her fate -- and off we went to the garage.

Every time I've ever traded in a car in the past, I've been relieved to see them go. Hell, sometimes I've been positively ecstatic, but this time I was genuinely sad to part with her. I wonder if I've made the right decision, if I wouldn't have been happier just taking the financial kick in the crotch and accept a paltry £1,500 for the car I paid £5,000 eighteen months ago (not to mention the grand she cost to get through her MOT). I could have used that cash to fix up the Clio, and she would have given us a couple more years of happy motoring. Instead of which, this Megan with the funny-shaped arse has cost me the Jeep, £3,300 in used fivers and my beloved Clio.

*sigh*

I miss my Roo.

Inflicting Beardiness on Germans everywhere*

From today people should be able to get their mittens on the German edition of COLD GRANITE, or DIE DUNKLEN WASSER VON ABERDEEN (the Dark Waters of Aberdeen) as it's to be known. If my soup-addled mind remembers correctly, Random House in Germany were the first people to pick up foreign rights to all three books, so it's been a long time coming, but they've been determined to wait for the best translator, rather than rush into things. Which is cool. Fingers crossed it does well for them and I get to do some sort of tour with beer, bratwurst and more beer. October would be a good time. There's lots of beer about then.

The edit's going slightly faster than it was, but it's still like pulling pubic hairs with a pair of rusty tweezers. Still, only another one hundred and seventy one pages to go and it'll be done. And I'll curl up in a little ball, like a mouse that's just gorged itself on a whole pile of candles and pooped behind the fridge, and sleep and sleep and sleep. Or not as the case probably will be. I'm off to Gordon Schools in Huntly on Friday to give another talk-type thing. Have to remember to be on my best behaviour. No swearing, or drinking absinthe before going on. That way leads to trauma and lawsuits.

But fingers crossed BROKEN SKIN will be wheeching it's way to the HarperCollins Spoon-Wielding Berber Ninjas before then. And in the meantime I still need to come up with an alternative title for the US market. Any suggestions? Main themes are bondage, murder, rape and curry. But not necessarily in that order. Not that I'm asking you to do my work for me, or anything... *ahem*

Soup du jour: Spicy Texan Kidney Bean topped with grated cheddar and fresh tomato salsa. Mmm, beany, and more than enough for another bowl. Maybe it'll be breakfast tomorrow? That's got to be healthy.

* As long as they're in Germany.

In which our bearded protagonist eats stuff

I'm slowly, but painfully, working my way through the line edit for BROKEN SKIN -- and have been for the last week and a half. I don't know why, but this book is making me think taking a potato peeler to my scrotum might be more fun by comparison. Yes, knell the funeral bell, for I have entered Line Edit Limbo.

This happens with pretty much every book, but for some reason it's more outchy with this one that it was with COLD GRANITE and DYING LIGHT. I know there are those out there who cast scorn upon writers who drop everything to have a whinge about writing: "Wah, wah, look at me -- I just have to make shite up for a living, life's so hard..." and so on and so forth with the sarcasm and the ridicule. You know what? Fuckem. Fuckem inna eye wiv a stick. How come you're not allowed to have a bad day, just because you sit on your bum and tell lies about made-up people all day? Plumbers are allowed to moan if they get a particularly crappy drain to deal with, accountants if they've got to do someone's books who thinks receipts are a good substitute for toilet paper, politicians if they've been caught sticking their private member's bills in the intimate parts of someone else's wife. But writers? Fuck no -- we're livin' the dream. Every day is like a ray of frigging sunshine, with fluffy bunnies and little tweeting birdies.

But you know what? I hate line edit time. It's not that there's any problem from HarperCollins -- far from it, they like the book, they've spotted some wayward commas and naughty typos, that’s all the changes they need -- it's me. I am the pain in my own backside (which makes one sound like an over-endowed, pervert contortionist who hasn't got anyone to play with) -- because this is my last and final chance to make everything perfect. After this it costs my publishers money. So I'm agonizing over each and ever word. Could it be better? Could it be different? Does it make 100% sense? Would this word do more than that one? On and on and bloody on.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAArgh! Leave the bloody book alone! Everyone likes it! Even She Who Must Be Consulted By The Light Of The Waxing Moon, After The Ritual Sacrifice Of A Roasted Chicken And Chocolate Lest She Become Enraged And Destroy The Earth* likes it. Thinks it's better than the first two. So how come I'm hunched over the bloody manuscript with a blue pen scribbling on each and every bloody page?

Well, gentle snowflakes, it's because I'm an idiot.

In other news (not that the fact I'm an idiot is news, let's face it -- if you've been here before you'll have seen plenty of evidence of that already) the soup du jour was a nice homemade Chorizo, courgette and sweet corn chowder. Mmm, all creamy and vegetableness. I love soup. Not literally, that's a sure-fire way to scald your nether regions, but metaphorically. There's something Zen-like about selecting the vegetables from the garden, the chopping, the sautéing, the stock, milk and cream. The alchemy of the simmer... Very relaxing. Just the thing to get one's mind off of changing perfectly good sentences for the sake of it.

But all good things must come to an end, so I'm back to my self-imposed Sisyphian task. Did I mention that I was an idiot?

*Well, she does come from Fife you know.

How the hell do they do it?

Teachers, I mean -- how the hell do they get up and do that teaching stuff all day, every day? Holy crap that's hard work. Yesterday wasn't too bad, I'd never done it before, huge step outside the old comfort zone, but it seemed to go OK. And you want to know the funny thing? I wasn't even vaguely nervous. Not a squit. Nada on les front de nerves.

But today I was worried about the whole thing from the moment we started. Don't know why: maybe because yesterday went so well? Anyway, I was worried today would be a complete and utter, fucking disaster. And you know what they say about self-fulfilling Prophesies... They wear big shoes.

Anyway, all four of the other writers in residence had groovy first sessions. Like petting enthusiastic, fluffy bunnies and feeding them some sort of delicious biscuit. Mine, not so much. I can't tell if I was crap, or if everyone was just playing it ultra cool. Which is a pain in the arse. This shit is hard enough to do, without having to guess if you're going down like a gangrenous nun in a brothel. (Uh, ooh, uuuuuh… Oh GOD! -- pant, pant, pant -- Sister Euphoria, I love it when your toes fall off while we're doin' it!)

But at the lunchtime tea-and-sandwich-fest a couple of people did come up and say that they'd actually enjoyed it. WELL WHY DIDN'T YOU BLOODY LET ME KNOW WHILE WE WERE THERE? AAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH! And other such prima-dona-style thingies.

So I tried even harder in the afternoon. I think it went a little better, but again it's hard to tell. The only thing I do know after all this is that it's a lot harder bloody work than I'd anticipated going in. Hats off to the other four writers there: who seemed to be experienced dab hands at the whole thing. And Kenneth has been at this for four weeks! Four weeks of workshops and visits and not being anywhere near home! WTF? FOUR WEEKS? I'd be running rampant with a whiteboard marker and a fucking big knife by then. Probably screaming something about atmosphere being the sum of all words. Or dancing girls. Haven't decided yet.

In the end, I haven't got the slightest idea if today was OK, or a complete and total clusterfuck.

Who'd be a write-ist, eh?

An serious discussion

Well, sort of. I've been doing these workshop things at Fyvie Castle today -- one in the morning, one in the afternoon, and a reading in-between. I get to do 'plotting' and 'atmosphere', which somehow implies I know what I'm doing. Which, obviously, I don't. Well, maybe a little. But only a little. Smaller than a halved mouse anyway.

The plotting bit is the easiest to do: I just start in on the whole mind-map thing and make everyone join in. Then I make them do one of their own, using it to plan out a protagonist, and lo and behold nearly everyone drifts off and starts sticking down plot details as they go through the process. What starts out as a character description ends up being an idea for a story. Which I think's a good thing: after all, books are always supposed to be character driven, aren't they? So what can be better than a plot that come from the character in the first place? So that bit seems to be working out OK.

What's a bit more difficult to pin down is this whole 'atmosphere' thing. As far as I'm concerned, every single bloody word you write contributes to the atmosphere of your story. The number of words you use, how complicated your images, dialogue, action -- everything. It all changes the way someone reads the story.

So it's kind of a moveable feast. Difficult to pin down, because at the end of the day it's everything. Right now I'm kinda freewheeling and going for the 'shortest is bestest' approach for this stuff. Getting them to summarize their descriptions and put them in the right place so they set the scene early on. But I have to wonder if there isn't a trick out there I'm missing.

Anyone got any thoughts on what makes for effective atmosphere in a book? I've got to do this stuff all over again tomorrow, so any help is much appreciated!

Broadband off the starboard bow!

Finally, the days of dialup are behind me! Bwahahaha... oh God... I have to laugh, else I'll cry. BT have finally decided that my house isn't too far from the exchange after all and have fixed some bits of wire instead. House is too far from the exchange... It's not moved, has it? Baba Yaga never lived here -- bloody place doesn't sprout chicken feet and march about on its own. Not that I've noticed anyway. Well, maybe when we're asleep. And it's not as if I would have noticed us getting any further from town. My daily commute is from the kitchen to the study and it's still the same distance as it always was. Unless I start in the bedroom, in which case it's nearer. I could ask She Who Must Still Drive Into Town Every Morning In Order To Keep The Boy Rat In Carrots, Shoes, And Drugs, but she can get a bit antsy if she thinks I'm rubbing the whole 'working from home' thing in her face. Fifers, go figure.

So technically the house could be farther from the exchange than it used to be, but I seriously doubt it. So, continental drift not withstanding, the Marx Brothers style repair job is at an end and once more I have t'internet! Bwahahaha! Even if I did have to go buy a wireless router to get it to work. Which makes the speakers in the study make little popping, crackly noises. As if the voices in my head have found a way to manipulate the outside world... And as I have no way to empirically prove that they don't I suppose I'll just have to hope that talking back appeases them. Wouldn't want things to get out of hand after all.

All of which leads me in a meandering stagger to the fact that this is International Talk Like A Pirate Day! A fact I forgot as soon as I went in to do my radio interview this morning. Damn and blarst it, ye scurvy dogs! I was all set to do my Captain Pugwash impersonation too. Instead I had to tell people all about these workshop things we're doing at Fyvie Castle on Thursday and Friday. Not so much as an, "Arrrrrr!" crossed my lips. I'm so ashamed.

So to make up for it: ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!

Like Vikings Of The Open Road!

We had a visitation from She Who Must's parents last night. They're also from Fife, which maybe explains their choice of caravan -- it's a Marauder 380.2 in cream and pistachio... 'Marauder'? Hello? It's a bloody caravan! Marauder my arse. Picture the marketing meeting where everyone sits round the table, drinking lattés and playing with their ponytails:

Marketing Guy 1: "OK, you guys, we gotta come up with a name for this new caravan."
Marketing Guy 2: "What kinda something?"
MG1: [shrugs] "I dunno, do I? Something that says: 'Caravan'."
MG3: [having a bit of a think] "Hmmm...."
MG2: [pretending to have a think, but actually having a scratch under the table] "Hmmm...."
MG3: "How 'bout: HAPPY ROAMER?"
MG2: "Nah, that sucks ass. How 'bout: SUNNY WANDERER?"
MG1: [pounds fist on desk and looks disgusted] "Jesus, just poke a stick in my eye, why don't you? Naw, we're gonna call it..." [strikes dramatic pose] "MARAUDER!"
MG2 & MG3: [share a startled look] "Marauder?"
MG1: "Yeah! I like it! It's butch and manly. It says, 'I'm a fuckin' caravan driver, don't fuck with me, asshole! You fuck with me: I kill your whole fuckin' family!' That's what we want!"
MG2: "Cool! Let's go do more cocaine off hooker's boobs!"
MG3: "Yay!"

And so on and so forth. Marauder. Can you imagine the Viking hordes pillaging up and down the coast of Britain, dragging their three berth caravans with chemical toilets behind them? And if you're going to call a caravan the Marauder 380.2 (obviously the numbers are there to make it sound like some sort of weapon: Uzi 9mm, Magnum .45, Marauder 380.2 -- see, much more dangerous) the least you can do is paint the damn thing black. Maybe with red flames. And some skulls and crossbones. Not pastel pistachio with a cream roof!

No self-respecting Visigoth would be seen dead in one of those: all his mates would laugh at him.

Edit, rinse, repeat...

Got my line edits back from the lovely ladies at HC last night, and so far it's looking OK. No running away screaming, "Oh, GOD, what have we done?" at any rate, and that's always nice. Now I have to go through the book with a fine toothed nit comb, combing out all those nits that leech the blood from the scalp of the narrative, making it all itchy and maybe contributing to dry, flaky skin. And no one wants to suffer from literary dandruff.

I could apply some sort of medicated shampoo, but you can never tell if it's worked, and all that washing half the manuscript's head in ordinary shampoo thing is a waste of bloody time. You ever tried to wash half your head in one lot and the rest in another? If you have: GET OUT MORE! Get a girl/boy/sheepfriend and have some sex, for God's sake. There's more to life than pissing about with your hair.

Anyway, I've got the whole thing printed out on the very messy desk next to me as I type, making come-hither eyes. It's not shy, not now it knows it's going to get its hair washed. It's a dirty manuscript and it knows it.*

* Unlike my central heating, which was a dirty boiler, but a nice man came round and stuck a hoover in its intimate feminine regions and now it's nice and clean. Not so much as a love bite, you could even introduce it to your mother and not have to worry about it bringing up blowjobs over tea and cucumber sandwiches.

Happy Birthday!

Yes, today She Who Must Be Spoiled Rotten celebrates surviving another calendar year! Hurrah! The birthday tree is up, with it's little fishie on the top and presents piled underneath, and tonight we'll be having a home cooked organic chicken thing with many trimmings and fizzy wines.

Mmm, birthdaytastic!

And now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go gift-wrap some fish.

Revolting the world, one person at a time...

Elgin -- if it wasn't for the fact that I've been stuck behind some slow-arsed bastard all the way from the town of Keith it would be a lovely day. Somehow pottering along at 40 MPH on the Northeast's most dangerous road while some hairy idiot cleans out his earholes with a biro takes the shine off things. But the sun is splitting the cobbles as She Who Must Be Taken Along To Point Out Interesting Items Of Scenery* and I pull up alongside the pond outside the library. Next to the ugliest duck I've ever seen. This is one fowl the whole 'ugly duckling' tale missed: he started off looking ike the back end of a turkey, and that's how he grew up.

We're a bit early, because I've got no idea when I'm supposed to be doing my thing. All the emails say is 'afternoon', so I've made sure to be there before 12, just in case. There follows a bit of wandering about, cheesy smiles and wondering who the hell I should be talking to.

She Who Must Hang Around, Otherwise She'll Be Off Molesting The Shops and I sit in on one of the lunchtime workshops, then head off into the sunshine so I can 'gather my thoughts for the coming event', AKA saunter about for a while, making fun of the ducks and spotting tiny fishies in the river. And if we hadn't done that I'd've never discovered Elgin's hidden gem: The Biblical Gardens. These are situated just opposite the ruins of the cathedral (£4.00 for a shooftie from those privateering bastards at Historic Scotland) and seem to consist of slightly dodgy sculptures clarted in bronze Hammerite paint.

There's a tableau just inside the gate, featuring three 'young people' -- two boys and a girl -- demonstrating something about unity and the love of God... allegedly. It looks to me like the bloke on the end in the Buddy Holly glasses is trying to nick the wallet out of the back pocket of the boy next to him. That or he's trying to cop a feel. Either way I think it's contraindicated in the bible.

Further in there's a well, where Jesus (the only white statue in the whole place -- by which I don't mean he's the only Caucasian, I mean he's painted in Dulux Brilliant White, rather than shiny Hammerite bronze) is making what can only be described as 'Fonze-like' gestures at a woman opposite. From the wonderbra perkiness of her front we can only assume this is meant to be Mary Magdalene. Plus she has a very pert arse, a fact the sculptor (because it's got to be a bloke) has drawn attention to by making her rear end look like it's eating her robe. Maybe she's been having a deep and personal scratch at her fundament when all of a sudden the Lord's only son has appeared and she's decided it's a bit unladylike to be caught having a rectal rummage in polite company. That's the sort of thing we want to see in civic sculpture.

And then it's back to the library for me: keynote speaker, believe it or not, where 'Stuart will be talking about how he researches his police procedural novels, featuring: "scenes from a post mortem", "never trust British TV police shows", "stuff I've got wrong", "real life can get you sued", and "why the people who produce CSI should be taken outside and shot".' Talk about jumping stark naked outside your comfort zone. All I've ever done before is rambling anecdotes joined together with babbling nonsense. This is, like, proper work!

Just to be on the safe side I grab some volunteers from the audience and cast them in the roles of victim: Angela, and murderess: Jill. Then we act out the murder and I use it as a framework for the whole police procedural thing, hoping no one in the audience knows what I'm talking about, or they'll be able to point out the HUGE holes in my knowledge.

Everything's going well as I ramble into the Post Mortem segment, demonstrating on my volunteer cadaver what the APT and Pathologist do to you after death. Then I look up and see a couple of green faces in the audience of 50(ish). And that's with me trying to keep it informative and entertaining. I hurry to the end -- skipping some of the more gory bits -- but even so, one lady has to hurry from the hall, looking decidedly the worse for wear. Oops...

In the end I run over by about 20 minutes before someone in charge gets up and politely hints that it's time for me to shut the hell up. After all, we still have coffee, tea, and the results of the short story competition to go. The winner turns out to be a nice lady from 200 miles south, who She Who Must and I shared a lunch table with. She reads her entry at the end and it's wonderfully poignant and very well written. (OK, I had nothing to do with judging the competition, but I got her a cup of brown coffee, so I'm justified in taking some of the credit)

Afterwards it was another hour and a half battle through traffic back to Casa MacBride and a huge bout of exhaustion. Hard work this 'sounding like you know what you're talking about' lark.

* NEVER, EVER is She Who Must put in charge of directions after an unfortunate trip to Huntly ended up in Fettercairn.

Elgin Ho!

By which I don't mean a prostitute from Elgin. That would be silly. Not that Elgin doesn't have its fair share of ladies of the mid-afternoon, I'm sure it does and... er... Time to stop digging.

Tomorrow She Who Must Accompany Me To Ensure I'm Not Mobbed By Nymphomaniac Groupies* and I will be making the arduous trip from Casa MacBride to the Elgin Public Library, where the Elgin Writers Group are hosting a two day festival of fun and frolics. Right up until the time I get there, then it'll all turn into a disaster. "Why?" You ask, in that winsome way of yours, well, I'll tell you (otherwise this would be a very short blog post with even less narrative cohesion than usual) they've asked me to talk to them about police procedure.

Honestly, just because I write police procedurals, people think I know what I'm on about. Which is worrying. I'm hastily rereading all my notes and trying to cram as much as I can betwixt my little ears, in order to pass on my dubious knowledge.

Bizarre.

In other, non Elgin-related news: this weekend marks the end of voting for the Barry Awards, as run by those lovely people at Deadly Pleasures and announced at Bouchercon. I'm up for one, but don't let that sway you, we're not into ballot stuffing here (unless we're sure we can get away with it), you go off and vote for your favourite book. I see Misters Kernick and Billingham are up for Best British Novel. I wonder if they'll make them fight in a cage match, in their pants**, while people pelt them with half-sooked jelly babies? It's a thought anyway.

And now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go out and squish some caterpillars. The freeloading buggers are munching my kohlrabi, but if you pinch them hard, you can get their innards to squirt quite a distance. Sqoooooooooosh!

Maybe I need to get out more?

* Well, we've all got to have a hobby, don't we?
** And in the UK pants are pants, not trousers. If the word 'pants' was meant to mean 'trousers' it wouldn't be spelt P-A-N-T-S, would it? Stands to reason.

Flapping about

Just when I thought it was safe to go back in the water, the double bass notes from a sinister cello sound and it's time to sort out the cover copy for Book 3. This is the bit that gives me the biggest headache, OK, maybe not as big as the book itself, but it's still... And maybe not as big as the whole title debackle -- bloody, sodding, bleeding titles* -- but it's on a par with the cover thing... well, slightly less than the cover, but it's still up there in the Top 4 Things That Cause Stuart Grief When It Comes To Books.

I know I'm a bit obsessive about getting stuff like this right, but darn and twizzle, it's important. What's the first thing a new reader sees -- the cover. Has to be good enough to make them pick it up (this is assuming that they've not already heard great things about you / your book from their friend / lover / goat) and read the title. And if that sucks, the book goes back on the shelf. Next up is the cover copy and the reviews. And only after you've passed all those tests will they venture into the depths of the actual book.

Which is kinda odd: the most important thing should be the quality of the writing on the inside of a book, but most of the burning hoops have to be jumped through by what's on the outside. And those are the bits that your average writer has the least control over.

Take the US cover for Dying Light -- it was going to be red to start with, then they showed it to booksellers and a certain huge chain that begins with the letter B said they'd take 'X' amount with the red cover. But if St. Martin's made it blue instead they'd take 'Y'. Where 'Y' is a number a hell of a lot bigger than 'X'. So St. Martin's said, "Can do!" And quite bloody right too -- the cover is there to sell copies, and if they'd changed it to neon pink in order to do that, I'd have no problem with it.

This is why I become such a pain in my publishers' backsides when it comes to packaging the book. I want the thing to sell as many copies as possible, because it means more people are reading the stuff (which is incredibly cool), and the publishers get a good return on their investment, and maybe I get to play at being a write-ists for a little bit longer.

There are those who say that writers should be above all that, that your job should be to make sure the book is as good as possible and that's it. Well, by the time the packaging is going on, the books already done. Bar the odd tiny tweak -- which I'll keep making right up until the wire, because I'm a nuisance -- that sucker's done and dusted and come away in, you'll have had your tea. And if you're not prepared to stick your finger in the pie you can't complain about what comes out the other end. Let's face it, we've all seen books that look like the other end they've come out of belongs to a dog.**

So, today I shall be mostly wracking what little brain I have and trying to come up with the kind of cover copy that will make the angels themselves weep, like the big, sissy, girls' blouses that they are. That and wait for the boiler man to come round and give it a good service. Ooh, you like that, don't you, you're a dirty central heating system! Spank me, spank me!

*ahem*

* I've recently met authors who are so fed up of fighting with their publishers' marketing departments that they now just call their books, "Book 8" and let the Marketing Monsters come up with a title if they're so damn clever. That'll teach them.
** Much like that sentence.

Competitionarama

Well, the competition to end all competitions has come to an end and I've been inundated with entries: all 5 of them. And everyone seems to have underestimated the ruthlessness of the MacBridian edit! BROKEN SKIN comes in at a racing-snake figure of 119,122 words, 54 of which are 'Arse'

Paul Crilley got closest to the pin with the wordcount (27,110 over, but it's still the nearest), so he wins!

The Northeast Policeman takes the arse prize with a guess of 74, so he wins too!

You know what, everyone wins. So Betty, Carol and Fiona all get a prize too.

We now return you to our regular programming.

Now 0.007% swearier!

When little brown envelopes land on my doormat I usually regard them with suspicion. LBEs usually come from some greedyarsewit arm of the government wanting to help themselves to the contents of my pockets, leaving behind nothing but lint and a strange smell. But this time it was from HarperCollins: hurrah! Containing not one, but two bits of mail sent via my publishers.

One was a lovely postcard from Brian Rust, telling me how much he'd enjoyed DYING LIGHT (available from all good bookstores), even if it did make people look at him funny on the train as he laughed inappropriately.

The other was from a Mrs J Usher of Australia and goes like this:

Dear Sirs,

I have recently attempted to read your publication 'Dying Light' by Stuart MacBride*. I'm sure it's a good story**, however, I abandoned it one third of the way through***. The constant stream of obscenities and offensive bodily references**** made the police appear the lowest of the low, and greatly detracted from the story.

I will not read this author again and neither will many others*****. Some bad language is found in most books today******, but this was excessive and totally unnecessary.

Yours faithfully,

Etc.

She actually included her email address, just in case anyone from the publishers wanted to get back to her and apologise in person for the bad language.

But to be fair, she did buy a book about prostitutes getting battered to death. One might reasonably expect there to be a minimum of bad language involved. After all, there are standards that need to be maintained. Look, I'm maintaining one now: can you see me? Mmm, standardy... On the other hand, she should have known what she was getting into from the start, it does say on the back cover -- "Warning: contains graphic violence, scenes of an adult nature, and sexual swearwords!" -- OK, it doesn't, I just made that up. But it'd be cool if it did.

So, in the interests of avoiding doing any actual work, I decided to go take a look. And maybe do some sort of groovy graph thing.

As you can see, there were 5 farts in Cold Granite, 4 in Dying Light, but only two in Broken Skin! I'm getting better! Only trouble is the naughty 'F' word -- nearly 200 instances, that's 0.162%! Or one word in every 621! The HORROR!!!

Actually, the second only trouble is the word that can only be politely referred to as 'Ladies Front Bottom' my use of which has gone up by 100% to a staggering 2 instances in the new book! Hang thy head in shame, bearded nasty man! Oh once more the HORROR!!!

Actually, when I did my book launch chat thing at the United Nations earlier this year, the Manageress of Aberdeen's Ottakar's told my dad I was "the sweariest author they'd ever had, except for Irvine Welsh." That went down well. And given the fact last time I was down at her shop they taught me the term, 'Fuck Weasel', I think that's a bit unfair. Mind you, 3D line graphs don't lie, do they?

Anyone want to share their book's rude word count with the class? That way I can do more graphs!*******

* Oh-ho don't like the look of that 'attempted' in there... this does not bode well on the ego-stroking front.
** Hurrah! Maybe I was wrong, maybe the old ego's in for a bit of a foot massage after all!
*** Nope, I was right the first time.
**** One too many fart jokes eh? That's what I get for pandering to the low-browed, like She Who Must Giggle Uncontrollably At A Well-Formed Reference To Bottom-Burping.
***** Quite right too!
****** That's why the world is going to ratshit in a handbasket! Oh damn, I said "shit"... I meant, 'Ratpoop'. Yes, that's much better.
******* Methinks I need to go back to work sooooon!

Manly things

Ah yes, I have broadband, but alas it's not mine and I have to give it back at the end of the day. I'm joinersitting at the moment -- by which I don't mean I'm sat on some hairy joiner's knee, no matter how much they beg -- for the parents while they're off getting a Queen's Award For Industry from that Princess Royal woman. So, here's me surrounded by the sounds of hammering and drilling and "To you, Fred!" and "Up your end, Charlie!"*

And what am I doing while all this manly workmanning is going on? I'm trying to think up another rhyme for 'dead'. Yup, here I am, all grown up, spending my day coming up with the next instalment of a fictional skeleton who wears a pink knitted suit. Very butch. I used to want to be an astronaut -- that's pretty manly. Never fancied the whole fireman thing, and by the time I was born engine drivers had to sod about with big diesel things, so no chuff-chuff, woo-wooooo! For me either. But still…

Worse, I actually have the cheek to think that doing Skeleton Bobington actually qualifies as work. My mum and dad must be so proud.

* Which sounds rude, and is. That's why there's no knee-sitting going on.

Music while you work

Like lots of people I like to have music to write to. I always used to say that it helps drown out the background noise, but I now live in the middle of nowhere and it's pretty damn quiet here. Or it would be if not for the noisy bastard cows. But even noisy bastard cows need to take a break every now and then, and silence reigns supreme once more.

Then I finally figured it out -- the music does drowns out background noise, but it's the background noise inside my bearded noggin that needs the out-drowning. Plus it flavours the way and kind of thing I write. Most of Book One was written to a soundtrack of Radiohead, Barenaked Ladies, and Pink Floyd. Book Two had more of a Stereophonics, Feeder, and Staind -- with the odd bit of Dame Janet Baker thrown in -- kinda feel to it. But Book Three has been much more eclectic: dozens and dozens of different albums helping to drown out the noises inside my skull.

And you know what? I'm getting a bit tired of the music I have. I need to know it well enough for it not to be distracting as I write, but that means by the end of a book I've listened to the same songs thousands of times. That gets a bit wearing after a bit.

So now I'm casting my eye over the unexplored jungle that is to be Book Four I look at my record collection and sag a bit. I don't really want to go over the same old tunes yet again, but I don't want to go out and pick up a lot of new stuff that I'm not used to hearing either, as it'll be all distracty. Game, set, and Catch 22.

I suppose I could go through some of the old and creaky vinyl I bought back when I was wee and you couldn't fit an entire album in your mouth without smashing the damn thing to bits with a hammer first. Not that I make a habit of stuffing CDs in my mouth, you understand... It's just a... OK: some of them look a lot tastier than they actually are. You remember when CDs were just coming out and those lying bastards on Tomorrow's World told us all how durable they were? How tough? How you could spread them with jam and they'd still play? LIES! If you slather them with strawberry compote they make the inside of your stereo system all sticky. And when you bite into them they're all brittle and jaggy. Even with marmalade.

And who the hell decided it would be a good idea to clart Compact Discs with breakfast preserves anyway? What made the connection? Some twit in a labcoat with a pocketful of pens took one look at that perfectly round, mirror-shimmer surface and thought: "You know what, that'd go really well with seedless raspberry!"

I mean, they don't do that with other products, do they? You don't see some footballist appearing on your telly midway through When Armpits Attack! (or whatever it is you freaks watch) to demonstrate how spanky some new brand of trainers are by spreading them with blackcurrant jam, do you? Would BMW sell more cars by coating them with lime jelly? Would Playtex sell more bras by drizzling their models sensuously with maple syrup... Well, they might not sell more bras, but sure as hell, a lot of men would watch the advert.

Mmm...

I can't remember what I was talking about now.