It’s The Story Stoopid! Or Is It?

There are three writers I particularly admire and who have influenced my own writing.

The first is James Patterson. I really like his take. The way he presents his material. The catchy titles with their promise of excitement. The artwork on the covers. I like the no-nonsense way his novels cut to the chase too. I love the leanness of it all. Pure story-telling. That (in the words of Jeffery Archer) is a God-given talent. Not that this talent will win him many awards. If there is one thing the right-on literary set dislike more than wild success, its seat-of-the-pants page-turners.

Same with Lee Child. I love this bloke! An Englishman abroad. The Reacher character is just perfect. I love the narrative. It beats like a drum. I’m hypnotized by the rythmn of it. Have you listened to him on audio-books? Dick Hill’s interpretation is genius.

There’s awards given in the UK at this time of year. OBE’s, CBE’s and the like. An author received one today. A lady. A very nice lady I’m sure. A great author too no doubt, but I’d not heard of her. I’ve heard of Lee Child though. He’s sold 60 million books. He keeps on with Reacher. One a year. Relentless discipline. Always striving for outstanding. Why don’t they give him a gong? If I were in charge, I surely would.

The last one is Dan Brown. He came out of nowhere with TDC. A lottery win. I was aware of him before then I should add. Not long before – I read Angels and Demons a year or two before TDC broke. But it was the story that got me. The speed of it. The cleverness of it and all against a Roman background. I was caught up in the possibility of it all. It was Dan Brown in general and Angels and Demons in particular that inspired me to start writing again.

 

So those are the three. I’ve tried to find similarities between them. A thread that connects them together. Its difficult. Is it the story that I love the most? Is it the characters that populate the stories or is it the place? Which is most important?

 

What about you? Who are your three?

 

Do you go for the story first-and-foremost, or are you into the characters? What about setting?

 

Tell me. I’d love to know.

 

The City Of London, The East End and My Nan

For the first five years of my life I lived opposite my Nan and Granddad in Bethnal Green, East London. We – my mum, dad and sister – left to live on a council estate in Essex but they remained behind. So I would go back a lot. Back to Bethnal Green. Back to Roman Road and to Holman House.

That period of my life is seared into my memory. The feelings, the images, and the sounds are all stored deep in my brain. I had a great childhood on Harold Hill, but the times spent with my Nan were special. She created a world that I loved to be in. A world of impossible stories, of tales from the war years, of trips ‘up the other end’ (the west-end of London) of endless cups of tea, of cakes and sweets and good times.

My Nan’s world had that other precious quality that (I realise now) most adults don’t have in theirs.

Time.

And she’d spend it willingly with me. It wasn’t hard for her. She didn’t have to force it. It was what she loved to do.

I can’t remember how old I was when my Granddad died but she never recovered from that. Not fully. Our world was changed too. She tried to recreate it like it was but something was off. It was broken somehow.

When I got older I worked in the city of London. On the edge of the east-end. A few hundred yards from the old Spitalfields market where my Grandad worked for fifty years. By then the market had moved to Leyton and the site was abandoned. It had not yet become the new Covent Garden it is today, so it was grey and empty and cold. I would go there in my lunchtimes. Just to walk around, to look at buildings, to imagine what went on for all those years. Then I’d return to the office feeling deflated and empty. Like I’d lost something.

And I had. I’d lost a chunk of the past.

That’s why place is important to me. I was aware after finishing Kill&Cure and certain after writing Dead Innocent that the city/east-end setting was an attempt to recreate my Nan’s world. Visiting those streets in my head, remembering the bustle of it, the smells of it and the feel of it is a way of connecting with her.

I desperately want to find her again.

I hope I succeed.

I hope too that you take a chance on Dead Innocent. Kill&Cure became a ♯1 bestseller both here and in the USA. As a thank-you to the thousands of you who downloaded it, we’ve kept Dead Innocent to under a dollar. You can get it here:

Dead Innocent (Kindle USA)  Dead Innocent (Kindle UK)

Kill&Cure (Kindle USA)  Kill&Cure (Kindle UK) 

 

I sincerely hope you enjoy reading my novels. Let me know how you get on.

 

 

Another Bleedin’ Mystery

This election is a mess. Lib/lab government?  Give me a break…

 

Its A Bleedin Mystery..

Just a quick post to say a big thanks to all those who’ve taken a chance on an unknown author – me. K&C is now at #27 on the mystery chart over at amazon.com. I’m ahead of heros of mine like JP, Harlan and the great Lee Child. I’m as happy as a man with a very special reason to be happy.

If you want to contribute to the thread please do so – it ‘bumps’ it and gets more eyes to look at this British upstart. Here’s the link: http://tinyurl.com/3acs434
Have a great day!

 

Someone’s got to..

I’m aboard the P&O cruise ship Ventura. It’s got everything a man (or woman) could possibly need. Decadent, self indulgent and luxurious. Oh, it also has a lot of old people. Loads of them in fact. Masses of elderly, blue rinsed people. Herds of them, prides of them…I’m trying to think of an old people collective term.

What about a fracture?

A fracture of old folk.

Still I’m not complaining. I’m lovin’ it. An utter scandal really. But I’ve had a hard life and I deserve it.

Now leave me alone. I’ve another grape to force down my saintly gullet and another old person to elbow in the lunch line.

 

The Stifle

I don’t read newspapers much. When I do, I’m not too fussed what I read. I’ll pick up anything from The Times to The Daily Star. As far as newspaper reading is concerned I ain’t proud.

However, there is one columnist whom, when I do delve into his paper, almost always makes me smile and (more often than not) has me nodding in agreement at his random musings. He’s name is Richard Littlejohn and he writes for The Daily Mail. He is obsessed (I think its fair to say) with what he sees as the ultra PC, lack of common sense, beaurocratic, socially engineered type of society we have become. Its the sort of thing you hear down the pub all the time but put more eloquently.

Turns out Rich has turned his musings into a book. Good luck to him, you might say.

Apparently not.

A trawl through the book’s Amazon profile and one is met by a slew of (early) snide and sarcatic reviews from people who seem to be outraged by his material. Is this the same bloke that makes me smile in The Daily Mail I ask? 

Closer inspection reveals a more sinister agenda. It seems the right-on Liberal brigade that Littlejohn is so suspicious of have been at work. Have a gander yourself if you’ve a mind to. Here’s the link: http://www.amazon.co.uk/product-reviews/0091931681/ref=cm_cr_pr_link_2?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&pageNumber=2

 

SmashWords

K&C is now on smashwords in all formats. Here’s he link: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/12127

Type in the following coupon number PP98E to get it for free until 24th April.

Enjoy

 

Kill&Cure ‘Freed Up’

I’ve posted the fact that Kill&Cure is now free to download on both mobile-reads and the kindle boards. If you are from either of these forums: thank-you for stopping by. If you are not, thank-you for finding your own way here!

The novel is my debut. It was published in the UK last summer and has been well recieved (see the right hand column of this blog for the relevant links). Harry Bingham, author of Sweet Talking Money and The Sons of Adam called it: ‘A fast paced, complex plot…a thriller that delivers.’  

If that sounds like your cup of tea, I’m offering it as a free download here on this blog. The link to download it is the book cover below. It is available in both PDF and .PRC format. The PDF will be fine. We’re not so sure about the .PRC (it was converted – I’m told – from the PDF master). Goodness knows what difference that makes! Anyway, please pass it on if you enjoy it and maybe leave a comment here or one of the above forums.

 

Chiropractic Dissenter

Is dissenter a word? I’ll look it up…no I won’t, I cant be arsed. Thought I’d share my response to Professor Ernst’s possible demise (scientifically speaking that is). The professor has a lot to say on chiropractic and has not been shy to do so for the last ten years at least.

The link to the article is:  http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/science/medicine/article7047382.ece 

I get really angry whenever I see this ego maniac in the papers, so here is my penny’s worth which can you can read in the ‘comments’ part of the same link.

Stephen Davison wrote:

I’m a Chiropractor. I wasn’t always – I used to be a research scientist at Cambridge University.
I first became aware of Professor Ernst when I was a Chiropractic student and was struck by his profligate approach to research. At Cambridge, arguments both written and oral were always couched in conservative terms, using the ‘passive voice’ to give a balanced view on whatever was under investigation. The Professor it seemed was untroubled by such restraint.
As I dug deeper into Professor Ernst’s ‘research’ it became clear that his department does very little original research of its own, instead it gathers papers together (often from obscure sources) to support a point of view that the Professor holds, often ignoring compelling research that might give the opposite view.
And here’s the problem for the Professor: balanced, well argued viewpoints, in which research findings are weighted equally and fairly is not sexy. Sexy gets you into the papers, and this in my opinion, is what the Professor craves more than anything else. His ‘journalist’ opinions get him into the papers time and time again (usually The Mail or Express) where he ‘outs’ another profession that threatens to put a small dent in the profits of the pharmaceutical industry. He’s managed to get himself into The Times for goodness sake by effectively blaming Prince Charles for the demise of his depatment!
It’s not royalty that’s done it, I’m afraid. He’s done it to himself. I sincerely hope he is ‘let go’ and money is found for another scientist who wants to get to the truth of an issue rather than get into the papers.

 

More freebies

Author Mark T Sullivan has recently ‘freed-up’ an early novel called ‘The Purification Ceremony’ It won the W H Smith fresh talent award and is well worth hecking out.

www.marktsullivan.com