You've Got To Write a Sequel Or Two

EDITOR (spoken)]
You see, Scribbler...

[sung] In this life, one thing counts
On the shelves, large amounts
I'm afraid these don't grow on trees,
You've got to write a sequel or two

You've got to write a sequel or two, boys,
You've got to write a sequel or two.

[WRITERS]
Large amounts don't grow on trees.
You've got to write a sequel or two.

[EDITOR (spoken)]
Let's show Scribbler how it's done, shall we, my dears?

[sung] Why should we break our backs
Stupidly checking facts?
Better get some chapters done.
Better write a sequel or two.

You've got to write a sequel or two, boys,
You've got to write a sequel or two.

[WRITERS]
Why should we all break our backs?
Better write a sequel or two.

[EDITOR (spoken)]
Who says crime doesn't pay?

[sung] Conan Doyle what a fool!
Threw his hero in a pool.
Literature’s fine, if you’ve got the time.
Get out and write a sequel or two.

You've got to write a sequel or two, boys,
You've got to write a sequel or two.

[WRITERS]
Conan Doyle missed his chance.
He had to write a sequel or two.

[EDITOR]
Take a tip from Patterson
He can sit back while it’s done
But I recall, he started small
He had to write a sequel or two.

You've got to write a sequel or two, boys,
You've got to write a sequel or two.

[WRITERS]
We can be like Jim Patterson
If we write a sequel or two.

[EDITOR]
When I see a genre niche,
Both my thumbs start to itch
Only to find some peace of mind
We have to write a sequel or two.

You've got to write a sequel or two, boys
You've got to write a sequel or two.

[WRITERS]
Just to find some peace of mind

[EDITOR AND WRITERS]
We have to write a sequel or two.

Currently Reading: Cider With Rosie and Akenfield

Akenfield by Ronald Blythe

Blurb
This colourful, perceptive portrayal of English country life reverberates with the voices of the village inhabitants, from the reminiscences of survivors of the Great War evoking days gone by, to the concerns of a younger generation of farm-workers and the fascinating and personal recollections of, among others, the local schoolteacher, doctor, blacksmith, saddler, district nurse and magistrate. Providing insights into farming, education, welfare, class, religion and death, Akenfield forms a unique document of a way of life that has, in many ways, disappeared.

Cider With Rosie by Laurie Lee

Blurb
Cider with Rosie is a wonderfully vivid memoir of childhood in a remote Cotswold village, a village before electricity or cars, a timeless place on the verge of change. Growing up amongst the fields and woods and characters of the place, Laurie Lee depicts a world that is both immediate and real and belongs to a now-distant past.

Upcoming event 1st June 2013

BSFA AGM

Where?
The City of Westminster Archives Centre
10 St Anne’s Street
London SW1P 2DE

When?
1st of June 2013
The AGM is from 10 till 5 PM

What?
I'm on a panel talking about writing Doctor Who at 10:00 AM and then being interviewed at 14:30 PM

Why?
Why? Why? You ask? Because it's there my friend, because it's there!

Films That I Like: Scrooged

CROSS

We have spent forty million dollars on a live TV show. You guys have got an ad with America's favourite old fart, reading a book, in front of a fireplace! 

(beat)

Now I have to kill all of you.

We continue with my occasional series in which I blog about films I like and the particular aspect of the film that I enjoy. These are not reviews, there is no attempt at objectivity or to create a holistic analysis or in fact any analysis at all. It's just films that I like....

Scrooged

(1988)

Written by Mitch Glazer  & Michael O'Donoghue

Directed by Richard Donner

It has Alfre Woodward in it

Which is a good thing in any movie.

GRACE

He's fired? But it's christmas

CROSS

Thank you, call accounting, stop his bonus.

GRACE

(into phone)

Eliot Laudermilk - code nine.

It has an excellent Danny Elfman Score

He's love of interwining the cheery, the twee and the sinister suit the themes perfectly.

Design and Direction

It's beautifully directed by Richard Donner who gives some of the early Cross scenes a sort of terrifying granduer and moves things along with wit and economy. I'm particularly struck at the use of practical, almost theatrical stage effects used to evoke the supernatural elements. These were more common in the far off days before routine CGI but while the film has access to the state of the art (in 1988) optical effects it doesn't lean on them.Good examples are the arrival of the Ghost of Christmas Present and the use of editing to switch through time periods during the Ghost of Christmas Past sequence.

CROSS

Did our people do that? We're going to get phone calls.

J. Michael Riva's production design is also brilliant in this film, I love the off kilter hospital corridor in the Ghost of Christmas Future sequence and the underground sewer and impromptu tomb that Cross finds himself in earlier on.

Japanese Cover!

Jyo-ou Heika no Majyutu-shi

Wizard of Her Majesty

Boy Nightingale is well Bishōnen ain't he?

I Have No Excuse For Posting This At All...

Nor do I feel I need one.

Ladies and Gentlemen I present Ms Iyeoka Okoawo

Trolls & Légendes Avec Moi

Once again avec moi Francaise mal! I shall be attending the Trolls & Légendes (note the pretty accent over the e) Festival in Belgium on the weekend of the 29th March. There I shall be mingling with the likes of Raymond E. Feist and making myself understood through the simple expedient of talking slowly and loudly at people. So to keep to the format...

Where? Lotto Mons Expo Avenue Thomas Edison - 7000 Mons - Belgique.

When? The 29th of March to the 31st 2013

What? I have no idea but hopefully drinking the good coffee and eating large meals will be involved somewhere.

Why? Did you not read the bit about the eating and drinking above.

Details: You can find them here!

That's all in foreign! Okay how about here - then.

Currently Reading: The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making

By  Catherynne M. Valente

September is a twelve-year-old girl, Somewhat Grown and Somewhat Heartless, and she longs for adventure. So when a Green Wind and a Leopard of Little Breezes invite her to Fairyland - well, of course, she accepts (mightn't you?). When she gets there, she finds a land crushed by the iron rule of a villainous Marquess - she soon discovers that she alone holds the key to restoring order. As September forges her way through Fairyland, with a book-loving dragon and a boy named Saturday by her side, she makes many friends and mistakes. But while she loses her shadow, her shoe and her way, she finds adventure, courage, a rather special Spoon, and a lot more besides . . .

Films That I Like: The Brother From Another Planet

The Brother From Another Planet (1984)
Written and Directed by John Sayles.

I remember going to see this several times when it was first released. Made for $350,000 and filmed on location in New York. It's a rambling structureless film that loses it's way in the third act by, ironically, trying to impose a conventional story on itself.

What drives the film is the device of making the Alien, played by Joe Morton, unable to speak so that he spends the film listening to the stories of the characters around him. Thus the film becomes a series of vignettes as the inhabitants of Harlem tell him their life stories, their hopes and dreams. His willingness to listen allows him to assimilate into his environment much more effectively than if he was constantly trying to impose his own viewpoint. This is contrasted with the two white businessmen who wander into a Harlem Bar by accident and never shut up long enough to learn anything at all.

Other highpoints are the alien bounty hunters, and their ultimate fate, the sequence on Ellis Island and what the Alien does with the record sleeve.

Suggested Reading

These are titles that have caught my eye by authors I like.

Hit Girls by Dreda Say Mitchel

Ten-year-old twin sisters are murdered outside their school. But they aren't just anyone's kids, they are gangster Stanley Lewis' daughters. When a rival gangster is arrested Stanley vows to take revenge. But his dad, feared villain Kenny Lewis, thinks there's more going on. So he contacts the one group of people who he trusts to help him find the truth...

Jackie, Anna, Roxy and Ollie. Four women with shady pasts who take the cases people don't take to the cops. They enter a world of easy sex and even easier violence where everyone, including the Lewis family, are hiding secrets. Then Jackie's son, a friend of the dead girls, disappears. 

The Complaints by Ian Rankin

Nobody likes The Complaints - they're the cops who investigate other cops. Complaints and Conduct Department, to give them their full title, but known colloquially as 'the Dark Side', or simply 'The Complaints'. Malcolm Fox works for The Complaints. He's just had a result, and should be feeling good about himself. But he's middle-aged, sour and unwell. He also has a father in a care home and a sister who persists in an abusive relationship.

In the midst of an aggressive Edinburgh winter, the reluctant Fox is given a new task. There's a cop called Jamie Breck, and he's dirty. Problem is, no one can prove it. But as Fox takes on the job, he learns that there's more to Breck than anyone thinks. This knowledge will prove dangerous, especially when murder intervenes.

Currently Reading: Set In Darkness

Set In Darkness
by Ian Rankin

Edinburgh is about to become the home of the first Scottish parliament in 300 years. As political passions run high, DI John Rebus is charged with liaison, thanks to the new parliament being resident in Queensbury House, bang in the middle of his patch.

But Queensbury House has its own, dark past. Legend has it that a young man was roasted there on a spit by a madman. When the fireplace where the youth died is uncovered another more recent murder victim is found. Days later, in the gardens outside, there is another body and Rebus is under pressure to find instant answers.
 
As the case proceeds, the Inspector finds himself face to face with one of Edinburgh's most notorious criminals...

Shameless Plug: Genius Loci

The re- release of the first ever novel(ish) length thing I'd ever written caused me to think about the only other book of mine that hasn't been pulped. I was very pleased with it at the time and for me it's a shame that it's not better known. So for those of you who had never heard of this magnificant octopus I give you....

Genius Loci
By Ben Aaronovitch

One day she will bring down empires and decide the fate of the universe. One day she will be feared by the creatures of evil and revered wherever people have had just a little bit too much to drink. 

 

But all that is yet to come...

 

Right now Bernice Summerfield is 21 years old and living hand to mouth and drink to drink. Offered a job beyond her qualifications she is lured out to the backwater planet of Jaiwan where nothing has ever happened - ever.

 

There she joins a disparate team of archaeologists who have just discovered that the planet of Jaiwan may have been just a tad more interesting than people thought. This could be Benny's big break and her ticket to a proper career in archaeology.

 

That's if archaeology doesn't kill her first.

It's available on Amazon or direct from Big Finish.

Tomorrow: A Blast From The Past

Twenty-three-ish years ago I was offered the chance to write the novelisation for my own Doctor Who story. Apparently this had become standard practise and I, being young and arrogant, jumped at the chance to have someone else pay me to learn how to write novels. It never occurred to me that I would do a bad job or that it would be hard work proving once more that ignorance is bliss, experience is the best teacher and that sometimes, if your lucky, you can get away with it.

So for the 50th Anniversary of Doctor Who they are re-releasing my first ever novella (it's less then 60,000 words long) for a whole new generation of Who fans to ask themselves that crucial question....

Who the f**k is Ben Aaronovitch?

Remembrance of the Daleks
By Ben Aaronovitch

With unfinished business to attend to, the Seventh Doctor returns to where it all began: Coal Hill School in London in 1963. Last time he was here, the Doctor left something behind – a powerful Time Lord artefact that could unlock the secrets of time travel. Can the Doctor retrieve it before two rival factions of Daleks track it down? And even if he can, how will the Doctor prevent the whole of London becoming a war zone as the Daleks meet in explosive confrontation?

An adventure featuring the Seventh Doctor as played by Sylvester McCoy and his companion Ace.

Voila! Murmures Souterrains

Un cadavre abandonné dans les entrailles de la station Baker Street, voilà tout ce qu’il reste de James Gallagher, jeune Américain étudiant à Londres. Sa riche famille est bien décidée à aller jusqu’au fond des choses pour comprendre les circonstances du drame.

Le problème, c’est que le fond des choses est situé bien plus profond que quiconque ne pourrait l’imaginer. Quiconque, sauf l’inspecteur Thomas Nightingale, officiellement le dernier sorcier de Londres, et son apprenti, Peter Grant.

C’est à ce dernier qu’échoit la mission d’arpenter les couloirs hantés du plus vieux et désormais du plus mortel réseau métropolitain du monde. Mais au moins ne sera-t-il pas seul. Le FBI lui a envoyé un agent de choc : jeune, ambitieuse, belle à se damner… Comme quoi, la vie réserve parfois quelques bonnes surprises!

The Much Delayed and Definately Last BBC News Regional Bias Report

I actually stopped this project at the end of January. I believe my point, that London is not unduly favoured by the BBC 6 O' Clock News, has been made and that my research protocol is really not sophisticated enough to glean much information beyond that.

In terms of raw minutes of coverage London and the North-West remained neck and neck through out the monitoring period.

Total Mins	September	October	November	December	January	Total
London	18.31	18.99	28.22	17.04	29.39	111.95
North West	42.66	18.76	15.70	12.89	20.52	110.53
Wales	14.55	24.46	26.59	1.37	14.01	80.98
Yorkshire +	19.76	11.08	23.41	4.34	15.04	73.63
South-West	5.60	22.88	16.19	16.44	11.93	73.04
South-East	24.07	9.91	7.85	9.08	10.86	61.77
Scotland	13.59	21.35	6.08	3.71	14.37	59.10
West Midlands	0.92	10.57	13.48	9.30	14.12	48.39
Northern Ireland	7.37	2.88	6.32	10.67	3.04	30.28
East	3.43	13.81	6.30	1.29	1.37	26.20
East Midlands	1.97	1.72	6.36	7.05	1.69	18.79
North East	6.55	-	1.13	0.23	5.16	13.07

If we adjust for population, so that 1.00 means that a region gets exactly the same percentage coverage as it has percentage of the UK population, we find that London comes 6th in the table. There is also a dramatic bias towards the so-called Celtic Fringe and that it is the Eastern parts of the UK that are the most neglected.

	September	October	November	December	January	Total
Wales	1.89	3.22	3.48	0.30	2.04	2.36
Northern Ireland	1.62	0.64	1.40	3.98	0.75	1.49
North West	2.41	1.07	0.89	1.24	1.30	1.40
Yorkshire +	1.49	0.85	1.77	0.56	1.27	1.24
South-West	0.42	1.75	1.23	2.10	1.01	1.23
London	0.89	0.94	1.38	1.41	1.60	1.22
Scotland	1.03	1.64	0.46	0.48	1.22	1.00
West Midlands	0.07	0.76	0.96	1.12	1.12	0.77
South-East	1.11	0.46	0.36	0.71	0.56	0.64
North East	1.00	-	0.17	0.06	0.89	0.45
East	0.23	0.95	0.43	0.15	0.10	0.40
East Midlands	0.17	0.15	0.56	1.05	0.17	0.37