Down the end of lonely street....

I was seventeen and had just started work for Charlotte City Trucks as a driver when I first heard Heartbreak Hotel. As it came over the radio, I was instantly mesmerised by its haunting lyrics and sombre tones and had to pull my truck over to the side of the road to listen to it properly. I was hooked.

I later found out, that the song had been inspired by a suicide note, which simply read:

'I walk a lonely street'

But it was the line in the song 'Do cry away their gloom' that sent a shiver down my spine the most,  and to this day, twenty years later, it still does the same to me.  I have an image in my mind of a lone man sitting on the hotel bed, head held in his hands and his shoulders riding up to his ears. The weeping is a quite an affair. One which is given through a throat that has long had its mouth quenched and is barely fuelled by the blood pumping from the heart. There is no energy, or want to move from that position.It's a solemn moment captured in a lonely time.  All that is missing from the scene is a gun on the sideboard, a sure sign of its impending end.

I guess it has always curios-ed me as I have been rather fortunate in life. Three weeks after starting at the Charlotte City Trucks company, the foremen had a freak accident and as I had my high school diploma, I was put in the office in his place. Three years later, the owner of the company wanted to spend more time with his family. So I took over the day to day running of the firm and in ten years went on to becoming a partner. The fleet in this time expanded from six trucks to twenty six and when the owner retired, I was able to buy out his share and I turned it into one of the largest trucking firms in North Carolina. I also met my wife Julianna and we had two beautiful daughters: Bessie who is sixteen years old and Anna-Marie who is twelve.

As I neared my forties, I became a respected citizen of Charlotte city standing for mayor and though I did not win, I won the respect of my peers and a whole new world  of opportunity was opened up to me.

You could say I was living the American Dream, but one thing always niggled in the back of my mind. That line "Do cry away their gloom". On August 16th 1977 Elvis Presley died and the string of Presley hits filled the airways in tribute.  On my way home that day, driving my Lincoln continental, sure enough Heartbreak hotel came on and I pulled over, feeling the same mesmerising haunting that I heard, the first time I heard it all those years ago.

The very next morning I went into work and sacked our entire accounts department. I then pulled in a favour from the Senator of NC and pulled a major contract which would double our workload. In the afternoon, I went down to our main depot and laid off a third of the truckers and spent the rest of the day at the car dealership where I purchased several Cadillacs with petty cash. I didn't go home that night, instead taking a ride to one of our regional depots where we based some of the drivers, who we wanted out of sight - the kind that not even the post office would employ,  and I purchased a cocktail of drugs.

The next morning, I slipped a small amount of LSD into my daughter Bessie's morning milk and crushed up a small amount of cocaine for my other daughter into the juice bottle she took to school. Over the coming weeks I would slowly increase these dosages. For my wife, I played around with a mix of barbiturates and cocaine depending on how I was feeling.

I continued to spend the petty cash of my company on whims, such as a yacht which I have no idea to where it actually is, a dune buggy which I left at the side of the road , plane tickets for destinations such as Rome which I never used - I was disappointed that it took the IRS so long to cotton on.

The teamsters on the other hand, were straight in on the case with the increased workload and longer hours,the strikes started pretty much straight away. Good old teamsters , though you should have seen the look on their representative's face, when he came into my office and suggested extra security would need to be paid for, to prevent any trouble with the truckers. Naturally, I paid his request there and then - from petty cash.

It was one of those worst kept secrets in that the District Attorney's seventeen year old daughter was something of a whore, but I made sure it became secret no more as, I splashed her with gifts and paraded her around town. I even gave her the use of my American Express and Diners club card without hesitation, and made sure everyone saw us arrive.

It was the charity fundraiser for the local college team that I think i really nailed in the nails for my fall from society - you would be surprised at how well the post ivy league go to  protect their own.  For as in front of the two hundred guests, on the lawn of the DC gardens, I and the little Missy...well I think you can fill in the blanks there.

As my business and social standing began to fail, my family remained surprisingly strong and  it did lead me to question my motives. Another trip to those truckers at the remote stop providing them with photos of my oldest daughter and where she would be, soon speeded up things. I knew my work was done when my wife called me a monster when I returned late in the small hours stinking of perfume and when heard of the news said "the little bitch probably deserved it"

--00--

So now I sit in the most run down hotel room I could find in the entire state. On my way here I paid a bum to beat me up to add to the pain, but alas I am not crying, no matter how much I try. I have been sitting in the same position for four hours now and just can't get any gloom into my mind at all. I feel surprisingly sober after getting half way through my second bottle of bourbon.  I turned on the radio and another Elvis song is playing. How apt I think as You're the Devil In Disguise fills the room.


Done for a Leeds Savage writing task, entitled "Elvis"

More Fridayflash Statistics, Writing and a New Tale From Tiberius...

It's been a few weeks, since I have done a fridayflash. Mainly down to my work in getting the Leeds Savage Club up and running, plus there has been a lot going on around my film Mortus Illumina. I 've also got quite a few longer pieces in progress, including an early transatlantic crossing attempt, an archeologist and a whole load of dead Romans and a return to Break Creek

My Novella progress monitor hasn't moved since December, mainly because as mentioned here, It would always be the first thing to go on the backburner - which it has.

But, A new tale From Tiberius O'Donnell this week, entitled "The Right Rollicking Race" set around the university town of Oxford, and a penny farthing race.  You can also get the first six Tiberius O'Donnell stories for your Kindle here and they will be appearing in the reading room soon(maybe even today).

I also notice, I am up to 22 stories on the DAC (not including Mount Norfolk) and when I did the first 10, I posted some statistics which you can see here, so I thought I would do the same, with the next ten stories.

This Period is December 11th 2009 to February 18th 2010, covering the ten stories posted in that time.
There were a total of 809 Visits (up 52 from last time) from 29 countries (14 last time) with the bulk of my traffic coming from United Kingdom, United States and Canada (Germany knocked down to 6th spot)

The most popular story was "The Nth Page of Henry Lamberton's Journal " with a 138 visits. In the last ten, it was "The Backstreet Berlin Brawl" with 114 visits

The most commented story was "A Northern Swan Song" with 26 comments, compared to "E Tu Brute" which had 22 comments

and the story with the highest comment to post ratio was The Sabotaging Swede with 24% compared to 36%, which was "E Tu Brute" in the last period.

On average, I got 86.5 reads per a story (up 10.5 from last time ) and I can expect 1 in 6 people to leave a comment (down from 1 in 5)
.
The least read story was  Queen of Sheba with just 45 views,  which was just one above The Most Blasted Blizzard  from last time.  This was also the lowest commented with 8 comments, compared to the Blasted Blizzard which only had 4.

Titles	Visits	Comments	Perc
The Nth Page of Henry Lamberton’s Journal	138	19	13%
A Northern Swan Song	112	26	23%
Wisdom From the Chorus Line	102	19	18%
The Complexing Conundrum	99	16	16%
The Foreign Looking Fellow	97	16	16%
The Sabotaging Swede	77	19	24%
At the Village Doctors	71	10	14%
A Letter Home To Mammy	66	13	19%
Speranza	58	11	18%
Queen of Sheba	45	8	17%

Finally, The Top Five stories all time from my fridayflash contibutions are;

The Backstreet Berlin Brawl
Day 8
The Nth Page of Henry Lambertons Journal
Georgie
The Last Page of Henry Lambertons Journal

Of course, what post on statistics would be complete without a good picture of a dangle. Pictured is Brit Ekland and you can find more photos on this unappreciated pose at Film Noir Photos

The Men Who Literally Dance The Night Away

In the middle of the Bolivian jungle, is an island surrounded by the sea, where the giant pygmies live. It is there, they literally prance the twilight away.

A highly literate tribe, the Tiki Waki’s who rely on oral tradition, have for as long as anyone can remember, performed the Bola Bola Ritual. Eight nights a week, five hamsters a month without fail, regardless whether it has been raining or not.

The ritual begins when it gets dark and ends when it gets light - not that you, the reader needed that explanation. I am sure you could of gathered that information from the title, though I did once get a letter from a reader in Shropshire, who complained I did not use enough full stops.

It is performed by the eldest members of the youngers of the tribe, who gather on a platform made of  toads and small logs, it is there they then proceed to wave their arms, legs and other bits and pieces till sunrise - not necessarily their own I might add.

Normally, the chief of the tribe JoK O’ Ta, plays the elephant, accompanied by the women of the tribe, who join in by blowing millipedes. You might thing, that the noise would be somewhat basey and clunky, but I found it to be of a most uplifting nature, reminiscent of the gospel song Joshua Fit The Battle of Jericho.
The whole ceremony is of course performed naked. Except for Tjoik, who has a phallic birth mark on his back. Some of the elders feel, that this takes away from the seriousness of the ritual, so instead he is allowed to wear live wombats.

The other males of the tribe, sleep whilst this is going on, otherwise no one would be awake in the day and who would do the stuff that the tribe needed to be done in the day time.

You may think the tribe, perform this ritual,  because they believe that they can control the time between days, but you are wrong. They do it because, they worship the Wiggalloo Bigalloo  a violent gekko like god, who the tribe believe is the creator, of all things, not made by Loric Ghorri.  A pleasant lama type creature, they don't worship, because he is to polite for such praise.

To the western observer, The world of Jok O Ta Tiki Waki’s, with their Wiggalloo Bigallo, Loric Ghorri and Bola Bola’s might seem an alien culture, but having had the pleasure of  helping Tjoik put on his wombats and witnessing these magnificent people. I couldn’t help but feel I was apart of the Quo Vadis


Lengthy explanation behind this one, this was done for a Leeds Savage Club task entitled 'How to Write a blackwood article '

Blackwood’s was a well established literary magazine that ran from 1817 to 1980 (link below).
Blackwood's Magazine

It had contributions from a number of famous writers and was seen by many as an influential standard of literary quality that was unmatched by other publications. It was also, however, seen by some as being overly conservative and somewhat obsessed with certain issues. Edgar Allen Poe once satirized the magazine in the short story ‘How to Write a BlackWood Article’ (link below).
How to Write a BlackWood Article

Inspired by this story, this week’s task is to write an article that the editor of Blackwood’s would consider publishing. Based on the alleged values of the magazine, we have summarized the three editorial guidelines that your article should abide to:

---

1. If you mean 'bread and butter', do not by any means say it outright. You may say anything and everything leading up to and around it. But, If 'bread and butter' be your real meaning, be cautious, and never say it.

2. Every article must include a misquoted French, Latin or Greek saying, such as the use of 'cul - de - sac' in the article 'The Spanish Fly who Never Stopped Dancing' : "I put down my good dancing ability, due to being born with a certain cul-de-sac...."

3. The article must be, objectively and positively, absolute nonsense!

I must apologise

If you are reading this, then my attempt to cross the Channel by giant catapult has failed miserably. I would first like to apologies, if my calculations were slightly off and you have had the poor misfortune of scraping myself off the white cliffs of Dover - a most terrible task I would imagine. Hopefully you have instead, retrieved this off my body as it bobs gently up and down in the English channel.

This postcard was bit of an after thought, for you see, I was so confident in my planning, I did not make any arrangements for in case things went wrong. I also apologies for the saucy nature of the card, but it was the only one I could find at 4am in the streets of Calais. If the image offends you, just imagine the lady is merely leaning over that car bonnet to listen out for some engine trouble. Its unfortunate the wind has caught her dress.

In my right hand inner jacket pocket, you will find my wallet. There should be enough in there to run the following 25 words in the Times obituary section.

"Quentin Pollock, Inventor, Dreamer and transport visionary, passed away attempting to cross the channel by giant catapult. He hopes, he has inspired, and now passes on the gauntlet.

Really Sorry to bother you with this bruden, but you will also find in my wallet, the money for a pint of ale and a pie, I do hope this is satisfactory enough compensation. Once again apologies.

Quentin Pollock


The above was done for a task of the Leeds Writing Group, entitled "A Life on a postcard...."

The Nth Page of Henry Lamberton's Journal

Henry Lamberton first appeared on the  DAC with an entry in the last page of his Journal . I have bought him back this week with the Nth Page in his Journal...


[SPOILER ALERT!] I would recommend reading the stories first, before continuing with the below..[/SPOILER ALERT!] 

I made a comment, where I wrote about the Bhagavad Gita ,  how you sometimes read a New scientist article(several times!) and though you don't understand it, you enjoyed reading it. I remember one such article, about three years ago, about Quantum Mechanics. I think through the tons of text, the point they were trying to make, was it was all well and good, but they don't know if they are looking at things the right way up - They don't know how to tell up from down.

This got us thinking, and I made a post in a forum afterwards along these lines
'
If im walking past a person in the street who i have never met before , then that night i have a dream where that person who i passed is in it.

That Person who i dont know now exists in three states.

There is there real state - which I dont know
There is the state where I passed them
There is the state where I dreamt them


Now Say that person who I passed did exactly the same thing. I now exist in three states except I know my real state and they dont...

Original post here

And this is the starting point of Henry Lamberton's tale. I rewrote it first just to make if from his point of view. The first draft, after feedback came across a bit illogical,  so I went off and watched quite a few videos on youtube about quantum mechanics. I was interested more in the language, than the science and I think the main theme I picked up on  was about Observation.

For example, Here is Dr.Quantum explaining the Double Slit experiment


It does seem observation, plays a lot in Quantum Mechanics , another example is Shrodingers Cat . So I went through and put the focus on observation. I am most annoyed, that due to the 1000 line word limit on flash fiction, I could not work in the paragraph where I explained about the restrictive observation point of Victorian gentlemen, due to over starched collars - Hence why he can not verify his existence in the first state.

The other, and more harder thing, was Henry Lamberton's world is a pre Einstein world and he has a chip on his shoulder about Newton. I tried to make this piece sound if it could come from someone whose view of the universe is Newtonian based. I will know if this has worked, if anyone picks up on my Relativity joke in the piece.

To end with, Here is Dr. Quantum explaining entanglement - just to confuse your day

Coming soon on the DAC

Just finished the draft for this weeks upcoming #fridayflash. Why is that blog worthy I hear you ask ? Well I will be returning to the very first Billiard Room tale I wrote

"The Last Page Of Henry Lamberton's Journal"

I may, or may not be answering whether did he go ahead with his experiment in the end and if it worked. I may drop a hint, that maybe he decides to take on the academy to get the funding - armed. Or I may be making all of the following up.

Find out on friday.

Some Definitions from the 1811 Vulgar Dictionary

The below are taken from the 1811Vulgar dictionary, and you can find an online version created by myself over here http://1811vulgar.com/

I find it a handy resource, when looking for antiquated slang terms when writing, and there are some real gems in there to be found...

To Shuffle

To make use of false pretences, or unfair shifts. A shuffling fellow; a slippery shifting fellow.

Hodge

An abbreviation of Roger: a general name for a country booby.

Black Guard

A shabby, mean fellow; a term said to be derived from a number of dirty, tattered roguish boys, who attended at the Horse Guards, and Parade in St. James's Park, to black the boots and shoes of the soldiers, or to do any other dirty offices. These, from their constant attendance about the time of guard mounting, were nick-named the black-guards.

To Null

To beat: as, He nulled him heartily.

To Snite

To wipe, or slap. Snite his snitch; wipe his nose, i.e. give him a good knock.

Buff

To stand buff; to stand the brunt. To swear as a witness. He buffed it home; and I was served; he swore hard against me, and I was found guilty.

Scut

The tail of a hare or rabbit; also that of a woman.

Air And Exercise

He has had air and exercise, i.e. he has been whipped at the cart's tail; or, as it is generally, though more vulgarly, expressed, at the cart's a-se.

To Wiredraw

To lengthen out or extend any book, letter, or discourse.

Guts

My great guts are ready to eat my little ones; my guts begin to think my throat's cut; my guts curse my teeth: all expressions signifying the party is extremely hungry.

Breaking News On The Latest Financial Meltdown

The Worlds Stock Market was in financial meltdown this monday morning, after a wave of panic selling which started late friday afternoon, continued to show no signs of stopping. On the trading floor of the Dutch Second Bank, traders who normally execute buy orders, sit by their phones, which have yet to have ring since the crisis started. On the other side, where the sell orders are exectued, it is bedlam as brokers clammer over each other and runners fail to handle the large volume of calls - a scene repeated across investment banks around the globe.

620 Billion has been wiped off the Dow Jones, 74 Billion from the FTSE and they continue to plummet. Looses not seen to this extent since the black monday of 1987, though experts have ruled making direct comparisons as the situation is vastly different.

It will be many days, if not weeks before the full impact of this crash will be felt. The government in response today issued an emergency 50 billion government bond in the hope to turn the tide of selling into buying.Many will question however, is it too little, too late ?

It seems also, we have learnt little from the recent sub prime market crash. As details of the of the current crisis, becomes more apparent:

Historically, the price of treacle has been linked with that of tuppeny rice, with approxiamatley three pounds of Tuppeny rice being worth one pound of treacle. This morning, the price stands at half a pound of tuppeny rice, half pound of treacle.

The cause being the complex financial instrument which is the Weasel. The Weasel was introduced initially as a safeguard investment, in the case of failed rice crop. Many saw an easy profit in these Weasels and they were sold and exchanged across the market without regulation. Some institutes, such as the now collapsed Barkmen Brothers took on so many other peoples weasels, they literarily "popped"

And that is how, when in years to come, when we ask what happened to our pensions and saving, is the only response we can give, as it the way, the money went.



The above was done for an exercise set by the Leeds Writing Group which was to take a verse of a song and write it as a serious bit of journalism. I had in mind a news broadcast when writing this, so its probably a bit comma heavy. If stories in finance are your thing, here is a piece I wrote a looong time ago, entitled Investment Bank Wo's

Britsh Pathe

I was looking for some pictures of chorus girls to link to my upcoming #fridayflash (honest!) and I came across this real treasure trove which is the British Pathe  website.

I've been playing through quite a few of the videos, but had to link to this one from 1958 about the seedier side to London's Soho. Click the below to play.

CLUBS GALORE!

I dare thee not to laugh at one point during it. I especially like the oscar winning delivery from the barmen reminding us, the viewer about the licensing laws. Oh and then there is  the central heating comment....

And whilst I didn't find a picture of any chorus girls, I certainly did find plenty of videos with plenty of racey shots. Gentlemen, you may wish to loosen your collars a bit as I present to you, Miss Reita Mugent

(INDIAN RUBBER MUSCLES 1928)

And you may need to get your man to run you a cold bath after watching the following

(DANCE FACTORY 1928)

Now, back to finding a picture of Chorus girls - preferably ones with frilly knickers and a feather.

Speranza

First Fridayflash of 2010 and this time its a race against the clock.  I quite like the idea of doing an older action character(no thats not Indiana jones in a wheel chair) and I think this piece is really a sketch for a longer possible future piece.

you can read it by clicking here

The Big Attack

11.03 am that is the official time that history will record as the start of the following events. Midday they would note that it was too late to stop it from happening.

Two hours later, out in the Thames estuary the first official sighting was made.

At 2.14pm, the Prime minister appeared on our screens and delivered the warning to the country.
Forty four minutes later and the government was to have been evacuated.
The riots saw that they did not make it.
Five pm when commuters should of been flooding onto the streets, they instead fortified their offices and hid.
The army had their barracades in place by six and seven thousand soldiers would lay down their life over the course of the night.
By seven the ultimatum came: "You have one hour to hand over one billion dollars"
It took over an hour of debate from the emergency goverment before replying "We do not give into mad scientists"
As Night fell over the city, the first of the giant rubber monsters came.
He was called "Glowing Laser Eye Fiend" and starting mowing down the east end of London.
Big Ben didn't get a chance to strike midnight as it was decapitated by "High pitch screaming looks like a wasp type thing".
An hour later, "Big thing with big claws" came along and started ripping up Soho.
The people in Westminister cried for joy when the tanks arrived and then cried in despair as “Glowing laser eye fiend” turned them into a big blob of molten metal and flesh.
At 3.17 am the RAF sent in their best, by 3.23, they were sending in their second best and 3.45 anyone who could fly a plane was being scambled.
The Evil scientist reissued his demand for a second time, this time for two billion dollars and it only took the emergency cabinet a second to respond with "WE DO NOT NEGOTIATE WITH MAD SCIENTISTS".
In the twilight hours, the Japanese arrived and in a back street near Trafalgar Square they began to assemble their secret weapon.
As dawn rose, “50ft Giant Ninja School Girl” was ready and racing to our aide.
“High pitch screaming looks like a wasp thing” was knocked out of the air by a single flying kick, tearing up the turf in Hyde park as it hit the ground.
“Glowing Laser Eye Fiend” put on a good chase for forty minutes across the south London boroughs, but thankfully was bought down by a Skillful thrown Shruiken.
“Big Thing With Big Claws”, didnt even put up a fight and lied down in the middle of Carnaby street like a cat caught with the cream.
 Sadly “50ft Giant Ninja School Girl” didn’t make it in time to stop the evil mad scientist escaping in his rocket, however England was safe once more.
As the nation sat down for elevenses, the country tuned into the radio and heard the new prime minister reitereate joyful and defiantly "We do not negotiate with mad scientists"

This was done as one of the tasks for the Leeds Writing Group. The task was 24 hours, 24 sentences. 

Dead Adventurer Statistics, Friday Flash and a question.

I was going to start this post off with a pretty graph, but numbers is really p*ssing me off so instead, for your enjoyment is a picture of Virna Lisi showing a textbook example of 'the Dangle'. More examples of this highly unappreciated pose can be found at Film Noir Photos

Now onto the statistics. I have pulled this together as I'm debating which three stories to submit for the fridayflash anthology and, well Im a bit of sucker for numbers.

The Stories I am condisdering submitting are the following:

"An Unsent Letter from a Tommy"
"The Backstreet Berlin brawl"

and then im torn between

"Et Tu Brute?"
or
"Break Creek"

I would appreciate input on which of those two to choose, please drop us a comment.

Now onto the statistics; I am looking at  the period of 2nd October to December 10th 2009 and the ten stories I submitted in that time.

I have had 757 Visits in Total from 14 different countries. The bulk of my traffic comes from the United Kingdom, United States,  Germany and then Canada *

The Most popular story by number of Visitors is Tiberius in "The BackStreet Brawl" with 114 visits and my most commented story is "E Tu Brute?" with 22 comments.  This story also has the highest visitor/comment ratio at 36.07 %

On average it appears that I get 76 reads per a story and an average of 14 comments. I can expect roughly one in five visitors to leave a comment.

The Lowest visited story with 36 visits was Tiberius in "The Most Blasted Blizzard"  and the lowest commented: Tiberius again in "The Dabble With The Occult" with only 4 comments

Here is the complete table

Title	Visits	Comments	Perc
Day 8	112	14	12.5%
The Backstreet Berlin Brawl	114	17	14.91%
The Last Page of Henry Lambertons Journal	70	9	12.86%
Georgie	82	17	20.73%
The Dabble with the Occult	50	4	8%
Break Creek	67	7	10.45%
An Unsent Letter From a Tommy	83	15	18.07%
The Most Blasted Blizzard	36	10	27.28%
A Cocktale	82	21	25.61%
E Tu Brute?	61	22	36.07%

As mentioned I'm curious to what people think about Break Creek Vs E Tu Brute so please leave a comment. I am also curious to see how these figures compare to other fridayflashers - I've shown you mine now you show me yours ;-)

* also on my site appears two non fridayflash stories, Mount Norfolk and The Despicable Beast of Marrakesh which were not excluded from the country figures

Bit of a waffle on flash fiction

I  posted this morning on the #fridayflash fiction part of my site my favorites from this week.  I've been thinking about what makes, in my mind a good piece of flash fiction.

I would like to stress the following before diving into this waffle; a lot of what I am saying here is about my own personal taste and it should be read as such. Who am I ? Just some Joe who also churns out some flash fiction at the DAC

I am not a fan of science fiction, so it is rare that I will read a sci-fi piece, however If I read an opening sentence that grabs us, regardless of genre I am more likely to read it through to the end and I think that is where some flash authors fall down. You have such a short space to fit the entire story in and that opening is so important.

A couple of examples of good openings from this weeks #FridayFlash round:

"Joel and Elijah knew they were in trouble even before they left for the bathroom."

This comes from John Wiswell story "The Balrog Looms"

From that we know the characters, we know the premise and we know the location.  I am now hooked in and want to know who these people are, why they think they are in trouble and what is going to happen

Another good example, this time from Shannon Esposito and her tale Messenger of Death

"Eric fumbled with the buttons on the arm rest of the stolen Nissan. A blast of humid night air hit him. It smelled like charred beef."

I used to drive an old battered and much loved 1992 Peugeot 405 and switching on the blowers would blast several years of dirt and breaking down plastic into the car, which on a hot night produced one hell of a smell. Reading this opening, I've got the atmosphere in my head, I know who the protagonist is and I have a hook into the story that the car is stolen.

Going back to where I think some authors fall down, is they try and cram too much irrelevant description into that opening

"The desk was made of dark wood with  a green leather surface with gold trim" - great!  a story about a desk.

I think if we all step back and be honest, flash fiction is not the platform for great original stories.  Effectively they are all " then he woke up and it was all a dream " or " and it turned out the person he was sitting next to was a ghost". BUT!!!! it is the place for original storytelling and what I think makes a good piece of flash fiction is the authors ability to steer the reader through the tale, keep them entertained and keep them interested to the end; Whether it be through misdirection, blanketing or just plain out lying!

A good example about steering the reader and misdirection can be found in this flash from Karen Schindler  "What a way to go" 

One of the other mistakes I think people make is concentrating too much on elements and detail which are not needed in the piece, rather than putting that focus into what we are all here for -  storytelling. To play devils advocate for a second , I do think some stories need more detail and I think they would of had been far better off as longer pieces rather than flash. Which is a shame as normally these stories, the author has had a cracking idea, but has lost it by trying to cram it into flash length. I've pulled my return to Break Creek as a potential fridayflash for this very reason (posting this short very soon btw).  There are very few authors who can cram entire worlds into a thousand worlds of less , Mazzz In Leeds is a fine example of an author who can.

Next up comes the ending and in all honesty, I think examples of bad endings are few and far between. There are sometimes disappointing endings  "It wasn't a ghost, but rather he suffered from a rare translucent skin condition" and I think this goes back to my previous points. If you don't grab the reader in that first second, you don't keep them entertained and you haven't focused on the art of storytelling; then it doesnt really matter if you have the greatest ending or the worst ending - your reader simply won't care.

A fine example of this week , which I think nicely demonstrates all three points I have made is 
The Mystery Writer Returns By Tim Vansant and an author that never disappoints in this regard is Laura Eno
So coming to the end of my waffle, there is just one final thing I would like to say which will sound familiar to those who have ever pursued artistic or photographic interests:

"First rule of composition is to break the rules of composition"

PS. Evil cats is always a winning subject.

E Tu Brute ?

My #fridayflash this week was bit of a last minute affair , I had drafted a sequel to Break Creek which came in at 1200 words, 200 more than the fridayflash limit. When I went back to edit the piece , instead of getting the word count down it actually went the other way and ended up being 1700 words - I expect it will be about 2000 words when I come to finish it off.


So, "E Tu Brute ?" was written in a rush yesterday and I'm actually quite pleased with the result. Originally I had the Duke being English, but I was struggling to make it work - when I changed the character to be French it fell into place.

I think that is because, I can't imagine a Victorian English gentlemen being a recluse over the arts - engineering and the sciences yes.

I admit its not the most original stories, but its one I might come back to with a longer piece - even a short film ...

You can read it here

Handy source of Aristoricratic surnames

For the DAC  I am constantly needing to come up with aristocratic sounding surnames and the best resource I have found is the

United Kingdom peerage creations 1801 to 2009 List 

Which has such gems as Asquiths, Beaconsfields and Meacher. 

 

 

 

 

PS. In case you are wondering what the conversation is between the fella with the monocle and the chap with the binoculars;

 

Binoculars:How did you get on with that chorus-girl last night ?

Monocle:She Said I looked like her third husband

Binoculars:Shes been married three times ?

Monocle:No,only twice

Mount Norfolk (13,016ft) Part IV

The Penultimate part is now up on the DAC and you can read it here , The image to the left I took myself when I was a helicopter ride in Revelstoke, British Columbia earlier this year which is partly where the idea of the Mount Norfolk story came from.

Gentlemens Spice

Just finished the draft for this weeks #fridayflash which is going to be another helping of Gentlemen's Spice on my  Dead Adventurers Club Site. The Gentlemen's spice section is my salute to Ronnie Barker who did a series of books in the late seventies and early eighties with titles such as Gentlemen's Relish and,  as pictured Sauce.

The Books are a collection of old saucy postcards, early erotic photographs and other paraphernalia packed full of vintage innuendoss and on top of that, a narration by Barker himself.  I think I own all the books; in probably the wrong order

Sauce
Gentlemen's Relish
Books of Boudoir Beauties
Oh La La - The Ladies of Paris
Sugar and Spice

All the Characters in the Dead Adventurers Club exist in the same universe no matter what heading the stories are under. A More subtle nod to Barker, is the Duchess Bloemfontein who has a name check in Tiberius'd Dabble with The Occult and will also appear in this weeks Gentlemen Spice and no doubt future stories.

The Duchess Bloemfontein In Ronnie Barkers own words;"... served in Paris during the first world war and now serves in my local."

The Next Tall Tale...

Gave a read out of "The Most Blasted Blizzard" last night at the Leeds Writing Group. The story is another installment in the Tall Tales of Tiberius O'Donnell and is the first historical outing for Tiberius as the action takes place in The Great Blizzard of 1888

My Tiberius Voice was not on form last night - was a bit clunky but it got some laughs in the right places.  Ideally In my head I have a very posh public school voice that occasionally slips into a Irish twang and a drunken slur. The drunken slur, I have no problems doing.

A lot of these early tales are going to be more giving back-story and introduction to other characters in Tiberius world.  One of the things I am most pleased with "The Most Blasted Blizzard" is I finally got a mention of Tiberius pal Hans, who has been deleted from all three stories so far.

Might sound a bit odd, but I have a self imposed 1000 word-ish limit on the Tall Tales and Hans has been the main victim of cutting.

In "The  Despicable Beast of Marrakesh" Tiberius meets Hans for the first time and shares a cabin with him on the Steamer to Marrakesh, which I have made canon in the Tiberius universe.

In "The Backstreet Berlin Brawl", Before Tiberius starts telling the tale,  Hans was going to be mentioned in Tiberius thoughts about the Germans. Finally in "The Dabble with the Occult" I was going to have another attempt at introducing the character, but I swapped that out for the three rules Tiberius mother told him.

Hans is going to be a recurring character as much as Tiberius and his Zeppelins investments will be, so I am pleased to finally get a mention in at last. I will be posting "The Most Blasted Blizzard" this friday as part of #fridayflash so check out the DAC then.

Mount Norfolk (13,016ft) Part III

A new part of my Mount Norfolk story posted up on The Dead Adventurers Club which you can read here

This might be of interest to anyone else who publishes short stories on their blog, I did originally post the entire story up (6000 words apx) and - no one read it. But breaking it into parts seems to have done the trick.

Not basing this on any real maths, but I would say around a 1000 words is the attention span of a blog post.