Count Homogenised - Laura Solomon

by Laura Solomon

As a child, my favourite television programme was A Haunting We Will Go. A Haunting We Will Go was written and screened during the 1970s and ‘80s. The main character was a vampire called Count Homogenised. Normal vampires drink blood; Count Homogenised drank milk. Whenever he got thirsty, the Count would break into the fridge, steal all the milk and cackle to himself as he drank. The Count was invisible to adults, only children could see him. The Count always got away with his crimes and was never punished for his transgressions.

My older sister Margie and I used to play our own version of A Haunting We Will Go. Neither of us wanted to be the-kid-who-can-see-the-Count-but-isn’t-believed; we always wanted to be the Count.

“I bags being the Count.”

“No, I bags.”

“I’m older than you,” my sister would say. “I’m the one that gets to choose.”

“You were the Count last time, it’s my turn now.”

And on it went. Truth be told, my sister was a better Count Homogenised than I was. The fake fangs we used sat in her mouth more comfortably, the cape fitted more neatly about her shoulders. My mouth was too small for the fangs, my shoulders too slender for the cape. She would steal milk from the fridge and tip it down her T-shirt. I was a petite blonde; Marge was brunette and more solidly built. Marge’s Homogenised had a sinister edge; you got the feeling that any day soon he would tire of drinking milk and take to draining the blood of little girls. My Homogenised drank the milk and then apologized to the children who could see him for having done so. He felt guilty for his sins. My sister’s Homogenised felt no remorse; the deed done, he was off to the next fridge.

I was a better victim though. I did bewildered well.

Read More at The Front View

A Tale of Two Halves (in two halves)

by Jane




by Gary Davison

publisher: PaperBooks 2009







From: Jane Turley
To: Gary Davison
Subject: A Tale of Two Halves

Dear Gary

I’ve been reading your novel A Tale of Two Halves. I’ve found it fascinating to read about Jay and his teenage gang. It is such a gritty story line. Of course there weren’t any children like that at my school but I often saw them from the Bentley.

Anyway, I was totally gripped and wondering what D’s vicious dad does next and then I reached page 72 and it was blank. In fact, the rest of the entire book was blank!

I suggest you contact your publisher and tell them there is a major printing error. Also, I’d like a replacement copy.

Kindest Regards

Jane

Ps: Unless you want my copy back, I’ll use the blank pages for my recipes.

____________________________________________________________

From: Gary Davison
To: Jane Turley
Subject: RE: A Tale of Two Halves

Hi Jane

I know this may difficult for you to comprehend but A Tale of Two Halves is meant to have empty pages. It’s a competition. Work it out.

Regards

Gary

Ps: I’m surprised you cook anything remotely edible that needs recording.

___________________________________________________________

From: Jane Turley
To: Gary Davison
Subject: RE: RE: A Tale of Two Halves

Dear Gary

How does the competition work then? Am I supposed to guess the ending or purchase numerous copies and hope one has the elusive second half? Or maybe if I find a complete copy I win a prize?

If so, what’s the prize? A night out in Newcastle?

Affectionately Yours

Jane

Ps: I really enjoyed your novel, Streakers. I couldn’t stop laughing. Then I woke up.

______________________________________________________________

From: Gary Davison
To: Jane Turley
Subject: RE: RE: RE: A Tale of Two Halves

Hi Jane

The prize is not a night out in Newcastle. The prize is a contract with PaperBooks.

Of course, an intelligent person might have deduced that the empty pages are where the story is to be continued.

Up Yours

Gary

Ps: I really enjoyed your blog. I couldn’t stop crying. Eventually I slept.

_______________________________________________________________

From: Jane Turley
To: Gary Davison
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: A Tale of Two Halves

Dear Gary

That’s an amazing prize! PaperBooks are very innovative and original, I’m impressed.

So how come they choose you to write the first half?

Sincerely

Jane

Ps: Can anyone enter this competition?

___________________________________________________________________

From: Gary Davison
To: Jane Turley
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE A Tale of Two Halves.

Hi Jane

Yes, it's a fantastic prize. PaperBooks are indeed very innovative and original.

That’s why they chose me to write the first half.

I’m also handsome, intelligent and, fortunately, very good humoured.

Insincerely

Gary

Ps: Anyone can enter the competition. Unless their first name is Jane. Otherwise the author, whose first name is Gary, will take a gun to his head.

___________________________________________________________________

From: Jane Turley
To: Gary Davison
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE A Tale of Two Halves

What type of gun?

__________________________________________________________________

From Gary Davison
To: Jane Turley
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE A Tale of Two Halves

You always have to have the last word don’t you?

__________________________________________________________________

From: Jane Turley
To: Gary Davison
Subject: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE A Tale of Two Halves

Yes.
_____________________________________________________________

Gary Davison lives in Newcastle and is the author of Fat Tuesday and Streakers. As well as writing part time he runs his own business and plays golf with a poor handicap. He doesn’t own a gun.

To read our interview with Gary click here.

To read our review of Fat Tuesday click here.

For full details of The Tale of Two Halves competition visit the PaperBooks website here. To visit Gary's blog click here.

The Transformational Power of Literature

by Sharon Blackie

When I decided, three years ago in a dreary Sunday-afternoon Edinburgh café, that I wanted to set up a small publishing company, I had one idea in my head: to publish the kind of books that once upon a time had changed my whole way of thinking about who I was, about the world and my place in it. The kind of books I couldn't seem to find in bookshops any more - and certainly not on the High Street book chain '3 for 2' tables. Books of the kind that I kept being told weren't even being published now, because big publishers were abolishing the literary 'midlist' and were focusing almost exclusively on potential bestsellers instead. On books that weren't too risky; books of the kind that people might like to buy because they'd already bought that kind of book, and several others just like it, in quite large quantities. Books that were, above all, safe.

But those books weren't what I wanted to read. I wanted to read more of the kind of books that I began to discover in my late teens and early twenties: books that had something important to say about the way we live - or maybe about the way we die. What kind of books am I talking about? Well, let's start at the beginning. I grew up on a typical all-girls-grammar-school diet of Jane Austen and John Milton. With a hefty dose of Shakespeare, of course - but only the historical plays or the comedies. All that changed when I was studying both English and French Literature for 'A' level. In one fell swoop I went from Pride and Prejudice (I'm sorry, but I'm one of those irritating people who consider Jane Austen books as historical curiosities, no more taxing intellectually than the average light romance) to Hamlet and DH Lawrence's The Rainbow. From Molière's Le Misanthrope to Albert Camus' L'Etranger. In that heady summer when I was just turned sixteen, my whole view of the world shifted and tilted and has never stood still since.

This wonderful process of discovery continued throughout my twenties and well into my thirties. It included contemporary writers: Doris Lessing, Janette Turner Hospital, John Fowles. Every book I read by these authors and others like them showed me a new way of looking at the world; every one of them changed me in some way. Change and growth are essential; it's how we know we're still alive. Many of the books I bought during those years have travelled all around the world with me as I've moved from place to place. They're treasures.

And now? In these early years of a whole new century? Well, now I hardly know what to read any more. Instead, I wait avidly for a new novel by one of those old favourites - by Michael Ondaatje or Margaret Atwood - and while I'm waiting I read and re-read those old familiar books that once upon a time had the power of transformation. A power that I'm never going to find in the books on contemporary publishing lists, or by scouring today's book review pages, looking vainly for something that's going to even surprise me.

Two Ravens Press was born to try to fill that gap. To publish work that takes risks, whether with language or structure or - heaven forbid - idea. Work that steps out of the same old clichés we've now come to associate with North London suburbs or country houses or inner-city slums. Work that goes beyond the small and repetitive up-close-and-personal account of individual or family or work relationships and gives us a wider angle on the world. Work that tells new stories, presents new mythologies, new ways of living. As Two Ravens Press' fiction editor, when I look at the submissions that land in my email inbox I actively don't want 'the next Jodi Picoult', no matter how many books she might sell. So what do you want? is the frequently plaintive reply, from author and agent alike. And to me, it's very simple: as the photographer Diane Arbus said, 'It is what I have never seen before that I recognise.' I want to be surprised. I want to know that, even though I'm now in my late forties, I can still be shown a new way of approaching the world. That a book can still change my life.

Because a book can. It happened recently, while reading the entire collected works of Cormac McCarthy. A writer I'd never really thought of reading until now; a writer that, if I'd read him ten years ago, I would have responded to differently - maybe not at all. But a writer whose books have already had an enormous impact on my life and on the way to go next. On the way to be next.

That's what I want from literature. As my new hero McCarthy once said, if a book doesn't in some way deal with the bigger issues of life and death, I don't want to read it. I'm not even sure it's literature. I believe that the aridity of much modern writing springs from living in a world where most of us have so many options, where we are so comfortable, where there is so little at stake, so little that can impact on whether we live or die - for most of us who live in the western world, that is. And increasingly we find that we have to step outside that western world to find something new. Challenging fiction has gone east, has gone into war zones, or has vanished into the past - a phenomenon which may explain the increasing demand for intelligent historical fiction. But every time I open another email enquiring whether I'd like to publish a novel, I find it in me to hope that I'll find something unique. Something that is going to change me, or change others. And the greatest satisfaction of all comes from holding in my hands a Two Ravens Press book that I've picked out and published, that I believe has done just that.

Sharon Blackie’s roots are in the north-east of England and in Edinburgh, though she has travelled all over the world and lived in France, Ireland and America. She now lives on a lochside croft in the north-west Highlands of Scotland with her husband and a growing collection of livestock. Originally trained as a neuroscientist, Sharon has worked in a variety of corporate consultancy roles, practiced as a psychologist, and is now a publisher, having established Two Ravens Press in November 2006. Once upon a time in the great American south-west she struggled to obtain a pilot’s licence to overcome a fear of flying. This experience became the foundation for her first novel, The Long Delirious Burning Blue. Sharon is currently the recipient of a Writer's Bursary from the Scottish Arts Council to work on her second novel, The Bee Dancer.

Photo credit top: alicepopkorn

Visit Two Raven Press here.

Home - Jennifer Dworschack-Kinter

by Jennifer Dworschack-Kinter

“The Little Mermaid,” written by Hans Christian Anderson and first published in 1837, is a fairy tale about a young mermaid who longs for a human soul, and the love of a handsome prince. In pursuit of her love, she gives up her home under the sea, her identity as a mermaid, and her voice. When the prince breaks her heart, the mermaid has a chance to reclaim her life, but must kill the prince in order to do so. She can not bring herself to kill him, even though he has broken her heart, and so she dies instead.

Beth uses both hands to twist the wire in front of her away and up, so that the pale blue glass hanging from it catches the sun and reflects itself subtly onto the wood below. She steps back to look at the sculpture. It’s by far the largest she’s ever begun. The driftwood she gathered for its base is huge and gracefully gnarled, stretching itself upward like petals on a wooden tulip; she has built it up with smaller pieces, drizzled it with sand, and attached bits of smoothed beach glass to it with curls of wire. She loves it already. Beth closes her eyes for a moment, and the sounds of the lake outside, quieted all morning by her preoccupation with work, rush into the room. Beth takes one deep breath, lets it out slowly, then another, listening to the softly splashing waves, the aching cries of the gulls. She does this until she feels herself dissolve, until there is no difference between her and the lake outside. It’s been a long morning, and it’s time for her to stop working. She looks out the window at the lake, quiet today, a gentle expanse of blue. Time for a swim.

Read More at The Front View

Soundproof

by Kathleen

Without explanation, Niles moved out. The next morning Alison arrived at her cubicle early and Jill the secretary listened sympathetically. “Just don’t tell the boss.”

Their squat, jowly boss trod the office in constant anxiety that his all-female staff might detonate into mass hysteria at any moment.

Alison swiveled away from her computer when he said good morning, blotting her silent tears.

“Are you—” he cringed, “crying?”

“Not audibly.” Alison’s voice sounded calm despite the tears, remedied by many tissues.

Later, her boss tsk-tsked. “Still weeping, Alison.”

“My eyes water before the computer screen, which doesn’t seem to mind.”

“I mind!” he said. “How can I work surrounded by caterwauling women? Jill thinks you’ve suffered a romantic setback.”

“She shouldn’t think that,” Alison said.

“Our healthcare policy provides for trauma suffered off-site. Jill has arranged appointments for you after lunch with a therapist on the tenth floor. Emphasis on therapist, Alison—nobody here thinks you’re psychotic.”

That afternoon Alison waited opposite a table bearing a small bronze sculpture trickling water. Vivaldi resounded from above.

A door opened: A plump man in a green turtleneck, and huge brown hangdog eyes. Sitting behind his large desk, he leaned forward, full of concern. Through her tears, Alison said that after she and Niles had lived together for eight years, he had dumped her without preliminaries.

Watkins the therapist pushed a box of tissues toward her. “Coping with unexpected loss, many people spend their first few sessions weeping. The walls are soundproof.”

During the next session, Alison wept but managed to explain that Niles had always been unfaithful, relied on her for money, and had poor hygiene. “A keyboard player.”

Watkins nodded. “A keyboard player.”

Alison’s boss kept asking, “Cured yet?” This only opened Alison’s tear ducts, which sent him scurrying inside his office.

Soon, however, she no longer cried when telling Watkins she still missed Niles; her sadness being followed  quickly by relief.

Her next visit, the waiting-room Vivaldi as baroque as ever, Alison heard Watkins through the supposedly soundproof walls.  “Why so hostile, Lenore? I work hard; our life is comfortable. I love you; I love the children.”

After awhile, he welcomed her inside—trick of light?—it looked as if his huge brown eyes were brimming. He listened to the ongoing litany of Niles’ idiocies and suggested she take up something fun. He hadn’t tried it himself but by all reports salsa dancing was very enjoyable.

It was fun, Alison discovered, and the men tended to be in good shape. 

Weeks later, planning to thank him, Alison distinctly heard him weeping through the closed door. “That’s unfair, Lenore. I love you. I love the children. And I’m begging you: do not do this.”

When he welcomed her in, mopping his eyes, his voice choked. “Please, excuse the delay.”

Collapsing behind his desk, he dropped his head and sobbed. Alison circled behind him and patted his heaving back. “Don’t hold back. These walls are soundproof.”

Issue 21 of The View From Here on sale now

 Gorgeous, Eye Catching, Coffee Table Worthy! The View From Here - The Best of the Best in the new and emerging literary scene!

Issue 21 on sale with our interview with Stona Fitch only available in the printed edition. Stona Fitch is the author of original, powerful, and disturbing novels that have attracted an international following. He is also the founder of the renegade Concord Free Press, the world's first generosity-based publisher. He talks about both his writing and Concord Press in a candid interview with TVFH's Senior Editor, Mike French.



Order here  for $5.49 plus P&P for USA & Canada.

and £4.99 inc P&P for UK delivery directly on site here ...

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Interviews with ...
Stona Fitch,
John Dickinson,
Megan Taylor.

Original Fiction by:
William Falo,
Rebecca Stonehill,
Steven Harris,
HJ Hampson. 

Original Poetry by:
Sergio A. Ortiz,
Bruce McRae,
Puma Perl,
Matthew Friday,
Lark Beltrans,

Guest Writers:
Helen Miles & Sharon Blackie.

Flash Fiction by Kathleen Maher

Rabbit Writer monthly cartoon from Naomi Gill.

Book Reviews of
WE by John Dickinson,
Little Hands Clapping by Dan Rhodes.

with original art by Fossfor.
ISSN 1758-2903


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Novels in Conflict

by Assaf Gavron


The success in recent years of the Israeli cinema, notably Academy Award nominations for "Beaufort", "Waltz with Bashir", "Ajami" and "Paradise Now" (a Palestinian movie produced and filmed in Israel,) together with the Grand Prix Award at the Venice Film Festival for "Lebanon," a Golden Globe for "Bashir" – and more – has reopened the debate among Israeli writers and film-makers, concerning what we should be writing about.

All the films listed above deal with war, or with Israeli-Arab relations. Add to them a string of novels that have had success overseas, such As Ron Leshem "Beaufort," David Grossman's "Until the End of the Land," and my own "CrocAttack!" And we have what can be seen as a trend of works relating to the Middle East conflict that do well outside Israel.

After the celebrations died down, there has been a sort of backlash. The question the critics are asking: is this all we can write about? Is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict our only claim to fame? Aren't we in danger of becoming a one-trick-pony? Can't we write other stories? Aren't we in fact educating the world to expect this one-dimensional voice?

Then, when it was noticed that some of these films and books did not do as well in their homeland as they did outside of it, a whiff of opportunism tickled the nostrils: is it possible that young Israeli artists are choosing this subject consciously in order to achieve international success? One very respected and successful writer said in an interview recently that he suspects some writers are choosing to write about the conflict as a way of breaking through abroad. Moreover, say the critics, it is too obvious and too painful: digging into pain and blood, shooting and then crying.

Of course, if the writer writes to please his potential publishers and readers, or to fulfill what he thinks is expected of him, that is wrong. But I feel the critics of Israeli conflict-writing miss a very important point: it is interesting. It is fascinating. Our fucked-up reality is heaven for story-tellers. Sure, families and adoptions and relationships and friendships, and all the things that make up life, can - and should be - the stuff of novels, but how can you be satisfied with those subjects when you have such a treasure trove of material on your doorstep?

A good writer can write about drying paint, shoe laces, or anything he wants, and make you drink in every word, but he must be interested in his subject, and even passionate about it. For some writers in Israel, the conflict is too close, too immediate, too frightening, too hard - and too real - to use for fiction, but for others, there is no more fascinating subject-matter than the conflict, with all its complexities, absurdities, passion, and emotions. By grouping all these works as "conflict stories," the critics are doing a great injustice to the impressive and original aspects that these works reveal, for example the breathtaking visual and sound design of "Bashir", or the clean, disturbing minimalism of "Beaufort".

It took me some time to get around to realizing this. My first three works of fiction took place outside Israel. The characters were Israelis, but they traveled to distant places. But then came the surreal period of daily suicide bombings and I felt I simply couldn't evade writing about it. I couldn't turn my back on it anymore. So I started writing what became "CrocAttack," a tale of two young men, an Israeli and a Palestinian, caught-up between 21st-century hitech and biblical hatred, between the modern and the ancient, between the slowness of life and its unbelievable speed. I had to write – if not for any other reason – for myself, as a postcard to my future, which will remind me how we lived at the beginning of this century.

A few years later I read an interview with Jay MacInerney, in which he said he felt the same way about 9/11. Norman Mailer had advised him, he said, to wait ten years before writing about such an event, to let the dust settle, to get the right perspective. But he couldn't wait. And nor could I. And I feel the same way about the novel I'm working on now, which is set in an illegal Jewish settlement on the Palestinian West Bank. Yes, at times it's stressful, it's heavy, it's sad. Maybe after I finish my current book I will need a break – possibly a romantic comedy in which violence doesn't exist. But for now, this is what I need to write. If I sound apologetic, I don't mean to. I think I am lucky to be in a position to write about the lives of people as history is forming and burning around them: some wounds are made for scratching. And some of those scratches turn out the most powerful sensation.



Born in 1968, Assaf Gavron is the author of four novels, a collection of short stories, and a nonfiction collection of Jerusalem falafel-joint reviews. His fiction has been translated into German, Russian, Italian, French, English, and more, and has won prizes, been adapted for the stage, and optioned for movie development.

He is also a translator of fiction. Among his highly regarded English-to-Hebrew translations are J. D. Salinger's Nine Stories, Philip Roth's Portnoy's Complaint, and Jonathan Safran Foer's novels. Gavron is also the co-translator of his own book Almost Dead from Hebrew to English.

Assaf Gavron was the chief writer of the prize-winning computer game Peacemaker, and he has also contributed to numerous newspapers and magazines, writing on subjects ranging from sports to politics, and from music to food.

CrocAttack! by Assaf Gavron is out now, published by Fourth Estate. 

To visit Assaf's site click here.


Photo credit Assaf: Moti Kikayon 
Photo credit top: Noyes