#BADWRITINGTIPS

It took me a good while to find a use for Twitter. My vampire-sponge-mind bounced from hint to hint until I landed on something called #badwritingtips. People and robots from across existence gathered to impart this wisdom. I couldn’t resist. Here are a few bad writing tips. I hesitate over some of them, as I could get mileage from more than a few. Oh, the irony.

#badwritingtips. Type with your tongue.

#badwritingtips. Insert K and/or V in a name to provide an air of villainy.

Let’s do a few #badwritingtips. Never start your character on an aeroplane. That’s a bad tip if you’re writing a book about Charles Lindbergh.

#badwritingtips. Give away the plot in the opening sentence. It saves time.

#badwritingtips. Hunch as you type.

#badwritingtips. Use the first person for thoughts, the third person for actions, and the second person for a Last Will and Testament.

#badwritingtips. Always heroically sacrifice the most boring character in a story. Your readers will NEVER see that coming.

#badwritingtips. Give the best advice through the worst character, and have that character fail to follow the advice. Works in the movies.

#badwritingtips. Open a major shootout with a character you killed in a previous chapter. Continuity is for pussies and dicks.

#badwritingtips. Don’t laugh as you type bad writing tips. Maybe I meant DO laugh…

#badwritingtips. Copy the same tips to #goodwritingtips. Yes, with a straight face.

#badwritingtips. Name characters Agnes Day, Lingua Franca, Eve Adam…

#badwritingtips. Admittedly, that last entry’s pretty rich coming from the creator of Albert Crabbe: Jet-Powered Investigator…

#badwritingtips. Okay, just take your character names from classic literature. No one will know that Ahab Dracula was a knock-off.

#badwritingtips. Switch from science fiction drama to comedy western halfway through.

#badwritingtips. Base a novel on your own messy divorce and tell yourself it’s cathartic.

#badwritingtips. Generate plots from the backs of cereal packets.

#badwritingtips. Always begin with the middle, and make that the end too.

#badwritingtips. Just invent all the diseases in your medical dramas.

#badwritingtips. It’s a sobering thought that #badwritingtips has finally made me see a use for Twitter.

#badwritingtips. Follow every piece of advice on writing you can find. No. EVERY piece.

#badwritingtips. Publish posthumously for greater acclaim.

#badwritingtips. Write a plot-twist that negates the previous hundred pages. Logic is overrated.

#badwritingtips. Avoid clutter. Leave the villain out of your thriller.

#badwritingtips. Build to a finish in which hero and villain have a knife-fight over the girl. No one has tried that ploy yet.

#badwritingtips. Don’t waste time inventing indestructible clothes for your indestructible superheroes.

#badwritingtips. If the action isn’t sexy enough, throw in a penguin.

#badwritingtips. Always have two spy characters discuss the plot as they walk through a park. This will never be done to death.

#badwritingtips. Allow the tough guy to dash away a manly tear once in every book – and always while thinking of football.

#badwritingtips. Always and/or never base steamy scenes on porn you’ve watched and/or starred in.

#badwritingtips. Allow magic to solve every structural problem. Even when writing non-fiction.

#badwritingtips. Set up your files to allow right-to-left text on alternate pages.

#badwritingtips. Use black text on a black background when writing mysteries.

#badwritingtips. Invent new names for everything. That takes effort, so don’t waste time explaining the changes.

#badwritingtips. Create bold heroes. Serial-killing dog-shagger with a heart of gold. Wait. Been done. Jack Russell Terrier the Ripper.

#badwritingtips. Explain it all away with ghosts.

#badwritingtips. Switch IT WAS JUST A DREAM with the phrase IT WAS JUST A DRAM.

#badwritingtips. Write that Jane Austen/Third Reich mash-up you’ve been hankering after. A little less pride, and a lot more prejudice.

#badwritingtips. Your novel is nothing without a scene featuring Elvis.

#badwritingtips. Do obvious sequels. THE FORTY STEPS. 1985. Off the Road. Vegetable Farm.

#badwritingtips. Research your book in the real world. The serial killing of prostitutes? Just go for authenticity.

#badwritingtips. Nazis for the plot. Commies for the plot-twist. Yanks for the villains.

#badwritingtips. Hate a political figure via inclusion in a western/vampire tale/brothel saga. I didn’t mean those 3 in combination…

#badwritingtips. Switch the last chapter for chapter four.

#badwritingtips. Your hero and villain should meet at hotel check-in, with identical suitcases and last names.

#badwritingtips. Interrupt every attempted explanation of the plot with a car-chase. Even in Ancient Rome.

#badwritingtips. Mimic titles. Planet of the Japes. Dragula.

#badwritingtips. Remove everything not central to the plot – including doing words.

#badwritingtips. Kill the villain six times in each book.

#badwritingtips. Only edit punctuation.

#badwritingtips. Write the first eight pages in French. Provide no explanation for that.

#badwritingtips. Eat and drink at the keyboard.

#badwritingtips. Improve your writing by marrying an editor solely for that purpose.

#badwritingtips. Place a character under an EXIT sign to indicate impending doom. Works in the movies.

#badwritingtips. Have your hero ignore fifteen pages of exposition and let the guy just play a hunch.

#badwritingtips. Lone maverick cops with war-zone love-lives are in. You write that bad boy into your porno.

#badwritingtips. Give your female lead a rather androgynous name to show she has a pair of balls.

#badwritingtips. Swipe the plot of a fairy tale.

#badwritingtips. Write one-page paragraphs.

#badwritingtips. Have the villain reveal his scheme in Latin.

#badwritingtips. Open a major fight with a musical number.

#badwritingtips. Have your main character spend his free time reading your books.

#badwritingtips. Squeeze as many songs into casual conversation as is physically possible.

#badwritingtips. Bring an obviously-dead character back from the grave via that little-used literary standby, a magic lamp.

#badwritingtips. Throw a frantic dash to the airport into your romance. Works in the movies.

#badwritingtips. Kill off a supporting character who is about to retire.

#badwritingtips. When all else fails, have your near-destitute hero win the lottery.

#badwritingtips. Turn your tale of natural disaster into an allegory about your least-favourite political party.

#badwritingtips. Having trouble raising laughs in that comedy you’re writing? Throw in a character who farts cyanide gas.

#badwritingtips. Liven a stodgy political thriller with the introduction of zombies.

#badwritingtips. Have the city’s top forensic investigator develop psychic powers to cover the moments when the science doesn’t stack up.

#badwritingtips. Pace a zombie epic with the introduction of stodgy politicians.

#badwritingtips. Nothing screams sex-comedy like some gerbil action.

#badwritingtips. Develop a tinder-dry sense of humour in your comedies by removing all jokes.

#badwritingtips. Base your plot on a banana, leprechauns, a fiery sombrero, three types of sauce, a random aeroplane, and seaweed.

#badwritingtips. WRITE THE ENTIRE BOOK IN CAPITALS6 WITH NUMBERS STANDING IN FOR PUNCTUATION7

#badwritingtips. Use gloves while typing. Reverse in sentence second every construct.

#badwritingtips. Keep the plot secret from the readers. Just black that sucker out.

#badwritingtips. Invent three-dozen major characters.

#badwritingtips. Set your Victorian melodrama on a moon made from cheese.

#badwritingtips. Have the heroes miss their last-minute rescue by 61 seconds, killing everyone in the process though somehow leaving scope for a sequel.

#badwritingtips. That last one was a bad tip, as it couldn’t actually fit on Twitter. I started out with a few of these on Twitter, but I knew I’d end up doing this on the blog. This one wouldn’t fit on Twitter either. Have your hero fall for the cat he rescued. Make the plot all about bringing in new legislation for, er, cat-lovers.

#badwritingtips. Have your hero die suddenly in the flashback. NO ONE ever sees that twist coming.

#badwritingtips. Invent a new writing style. The eighth person.

#badwritingtips. Have the chick marry her wardrobe instead of the chunky hero.

#badwritingtips. Use the American spellchecker on every third page.

#badwritingtips. Save effort by using the same character names in every single book, even though you aren’t writing a series.

#badwritingtips. Start your trilogy with book two.

#badwritingtips. Simpering women must clash with brooding men, or else you just aren’t writing a decent war novel.

#badwritingtips. Determine final page-count by multiplying two random numbers.

#badwritingtips. Pad out your story by using very broad page margins and large type.

#badwritingtips. Pace your courtroom drama by opening with the verdict.

#badwritingtips. Is her metal armour boob-shaped? If not, you aren’t writing heroic fantasy.

#badwritingtips. Have your all-powerful wizardy villain die of DVT on a long-haul dragon flight.

#badwritingtips. Give away the villain’s identity by making him a smoker.

#badwritingtips. Have your villain’s victorious monologue interrupted by the surprise arrival of an even more powerful villain spouting his own victorious monologue.

#badwritingtips. Allow your villain to spout a Victorian monologue, preferably in the style of a witty after-dinner verse.

#badwritingtips. Threaten downtown Tokyo with polystyrene. Hasn’t been done. Much.

#badwritingtips. Have the villain call the hero by name, even though they’ve only just met, no names were mentioned in the lead-up, and the villain couldn’t possibly have been in a position to find out.

#badwritingtips. Remember the golden rule of terrorism plots. Bombs without timer displays are for pussies and dicks.

#badwritingtips. For your smuggling epic, invent a new designer drug known only as THE PRODUCT. Never allude to its actual chemical composition. Make sure it is bad, and kills those crazy young kids who should know better than to get mixed up in the shady world of…whatever drug that is.

#badwritingtips. End a car-chase with a wedding. Start a firefight with a divorce. Repeat as needed.

#badwritingtips. Use pastel colours and jolly typography for the cover of your biowarfare thriller.

#badwritingtips. Chicken out of having the hero just kill the villain. Let the guy develop a crisis of conscience and go off on a ten-page toot moralising about declining standards in stories for kids.

#badwritingtips. Start every sentence with the phrase IT WAS.

#badwritingtips. Write a gnome into the odd-numbered chapters.

#badwritingtips. Base the main investigator on yourself and have dozens of beautiful women fall at his feet in a pyramid of writhing limbs. Develop the plot around this phenomenon.

#badwritingtips. End your vampire story with the phrase THE END?

#badwritingtips. Give your werewolf a peanut allergy. Silver just isn’t cutting it these days.

#badwritingtips. Always have a major character mentally consider a forthcoming plot-twist from two angles, as though you yourself haven’t quite decided which way the story is going.

NEXT BLOG: DARTH SINISTER VERSUS DR ANTON PHIBES.

IF YOU PUBLISH SHIT, AT LEAST YOU PUBLISH IT.

Fear. Suddenly, it seems to me that fear is all over the internet like a rash. I turn left, right, and left again. No matter where I look, I see writers who are scared to publish. Brave enough to admit it. But only brave enough to do that. Must I repeat this? It seems that I must.

   Write your story. Edit your story. Publish your story.

   If you publish shit, at least you publish it. (Don’t publish shit!) This new concept of the digital drawer has many stories lying in it. For the digital drawer is of infinite capacity. It is a fine technological item. Provided you remove stories from it and circulate said stories.

   What’s the alternative? The digital drawer is of no use in storing stuff no one will ever see. Are you a fear-filled writer? Good. Now overcome that fear. Better. Welcome to the Digital Age. An age of marvels so wonderful I feel I should capitalise Marvels.

   Almost everything is tackled digitally now. Except the fear-response. What are you scared of? People not liking your work? For people to hate your work, first they have to read your work. That’s not true. People might hate your work without ever reading a word of it. But that’s a different form of non-hate that we needn’t trouble ourselves with here.

   Overcome fear. Don’t care. I don’t care if people like my work or if people don’t like my work. This is a view that may upset some of you. The view has nothing to do with disrespecting readers. Get that out of your head right now.

   Caring generates fear. Don’t care. Should I care what people think of my work? Am I dead to the world? Okay. Yes, on a basic level, away from the sociopathic scale of things, we all care. There’s a default setting that separates us from inanimate objects, after all.

   My feelings regarding my fiction are complex. I know that. Some people get on with writing stories. But I think about the nature of writing as I’m writing. Leading to complex thoughts. Some changing over time. Others leading to dead ends. Though the walk there and back is classed as mental exercise. It isn’t important to me if people like my stories or don’t like my stories. I got that from readings. Performing the work.

   Yes, O Best Beloved, in the guise of my wicked self-publishing alter-ego Darth Sinister, I brood and fester alone in my DEATH STAR’S throne-room. That was not always the case. I was once a foolish young Jedi, and actually went around reading my stories to real live people. That was before I turned to the Dark Side of Publishing™.

   As I performed stories, I developed the sense that it just didn’t matter to me what the listeners thought. Opinions weren’t going to alter the plot. Silence didn’t trouble me. I was always surprised to receive applause. Always. That’s something I’ve never escaped. The absurd feeling that goes with applause for my work. I just don’t get it. Why applaud me for doing the work? It’s my job to do the work. Buy a cake? Enjoy the treat? Did you applaud the baker? Fly in a jet? Land safely? Did you applaud the pilot? I think in those terms. It’s a job.

   I hope I turn in a good job. And I hope people take that in, even if they don’t like my work. Probably because I encounter fiction I don’t particularly like – and yet, I can set that aside and recognise skill went into the fiction. Thought. Planning. Talent. Time.

   So…if I recognise that much in looking at the work of others, I hope others see that I’ve tried to be professional when it comes to my stuff. Doesn’t matter if they don’t like my stories. And if they do like my stories, what do I care for applause – besides the nebulous potential to increase sales.

   The crowd…is not something I seek approval or validation from. Do people like my work? Doesn’t matter to me, except in the sense that sales are meant to pay bills. Of the people who buy a book, how many like it? I’ll never know. Purchasers may not even read a book. Of those who read, how many read to the end? And of those who finish the book, how many think it’s just okay? Those who hold opinions have the capacity to alter their opinions, in any case. A year down the line, a hated author may be seen as the saviour of the day. What price, fickle views?

   I have no way of knowing those things. Book reviews serve as a random vocal sample from a large crowd of silent readers. It’s the vast sea of not knowing that makes me not care one way or the other. If I can never know, then I shouldn’t overly trouble myself with that. Not get tangled in it. It’s too obvious a trap for writers. From my view.

   Reading over what I’ve just written, I sense that I haven’t expressed what I meant in response to the point that some people may be aghast on discovering my view. Readers, you may be astounded at how little I care for the opinions of others when it comes to their reading my fiction.

   I don’t wish to convey the sense that I’m mechanical. Hmm. Okay. I care. But…I choose to care about the beautiful idea that is the story. That, I am caught up in. There, my love of storytelling resides. The magical qualities that exist in fiction, as I create fiction. I’m bound up in all that. Lost and found in the tumult. Whoops. Looked as though I might be starting to write poetry, there.

   (Yeats prompted use of the word tumult. See An Irish Airman Foresees His Death for the word tumult.)

   There’s a cake I baked. I sell it. And bake another. I get so much out of creating fiction. But I see pitfalls for those who become tangled in their own publicity. For some writers, it’s gradually about the body of work. Legacy. Greatness. Real or perceived. Often perceived.

   It shouldn’t be, but that’s the way of the world. You can see it in some authors, in some books. Drifting into it. At an indefinable point, it’s not fun any more and the writers turn mechanical. Because they serve the crowd, the publishing company, and not their own sense of what their fiction was about.

   In not caring about opinions, I hope to keep caring about the writing of the stories. There’s a certain type of writer I don’t want to drift into becoming. I repeatedly raise my trusty rusty shield to guard against the relentless blows that will hammer anyone into becoming one of those robotic reflex-action writers. Build me no statues.

   If I’m quotable, quote this next sentence. I want to be able to say that my mad science experiment is as mad at the end as it was at the beginning. That I did a job, rather than playing to a fickle gallery. Imagine. Chasing trends. Maximising profit. Counting every particle listed under Return on Investment. Insert chill wind here.

   Things matter to me. I’m not an unfeeling story machine, though I do work in a fiction factory. Yes, I care about a lot of things. It’s caring about story that takes my time. Not caring what an unknowable audience thinks – whether that verdict is yay or nay.

   So what does all this have to do with publishing? Are you a fear-filled author with stories locked away in your digital drawer? Do you care so much about what people may or may not think, that you are locked away inside that same digital drawer? Frozen by paralysis of analysis…

   Write your story. Edit your story. Publish your story. Don’t care what people think of your work, one way or the other. Put in the hours, and pay attention to a handful of business points. These, I will now list for you. They vary in order of importance moment by moment, depending on what you are doing in your business as you contemplate them…

   Turnover.

   Profit.

   Cash-flow.

   Morality.

   Law.

   Why didn’t I mention PRODUCT? After all, surely it’s the most important thing? No – morality and the law take precedence. See – now I’m thinking of those two points out of the five. In another moment, I’ll be thinking of turnover.

   The product goes without saying. It will provide turnover. Though turnover is not profit. These two items are of importance. Beware. At critical moments cash-flow is the trump card, and not profit. I’m writing of business…

   So I should say a few words about writers as hobbyists. I’ve been writing this without the sensation of pulling teeth just to get the words out. Okay. So I forget that writing takes guts. I have no problem with people who write for the fun of it and nothing more. Those people who have no desire to be published. That’s fine.

   Here’s sterling advice for those of you who blog about wanting to be published. Publish. If you’ve set up a fiction-writing blog with no fiction on it, shut it down until you’ve written some fiction for it. My blog started with a free story. It’s still there, on that Hallowe’en page. Published. My first e-book went out a little over a month after.

   If you are scared to start with a book, publish a short story on your blog. There’s only one obstacle in your way. You. Hiding behind a smokescreen. Fear. Oh, it’s not ready yet. I let other people read it and they didn’t like it. Maybe I need to grow as a writer. Grow what? Balls. Wings. A unicorn horn. Let me know when you’re done procrastinating.

   I’ve already thrown one fear-filled writer out of an aeroplane this year. She landed safely and went on to complete her Commando mission. In my harsh publishing alter-ego of Strict Scottish Army Sergeant Jock MacBastard, I wasn’t there to tuck in the raw recruits and hand over cups of warm cocoa before reading bedtime stories close to lights-out.

   No, I was there to show waverers how to slit a paragraph’s throat, blow up a chapter, bring enfilading fire onto the heads of wayward characters, and perform the ungentlemanly deed of knifing a novel in the balls. Rrrepeatedly. Do what you have to, then publish the damned thing.

SERGEANT JOCK MACBASTARD: Get up yon bluidy hill, Vanderkarr! Therrr’s a warrr oan!

BABY SEAL: Aw, Sarge! You’re bustin’ my chops here.

SERGEANT JOCK MACBASTARD: It’s fur yer ain guid! Ye’ve oanly loast wan leg tae a laaandmine!

BABY SEAL: That wasn’t my leg. It was someone else’s. Can I go home now?

SERGEANT JOCK MACBASTARD: Aye. Wance ye’ve loast a leg tae a laaandmine. An’ no’ afore.

BABY SEAL: I chipped a nail. That’s pretty heavy-duty where I come from.

SERGEANT JOCK MACBASTARD: Wid ye like a sticky-plaister fur yon?

BABY SEAL: That would be neat Sarge. Will it match the shade of varnish? Sarge. You’ve gone all purple. Have you considered anger-management?

SERGEANT JOCK MACBASTARD: Ah manidge mah anger wi’ GRENADES.

BABY SEAL: Ulp.

   This blog post was fuelled by a hint of sadness. I thought I’d write to a slew of authors who were displaying this fear of being authors. Then I decided to reach a wider audience – the 0.75 people actually reading this blog. It would save time, in the long-run.

   Awful advice, you’re free to ignore? Scared of publishing? Don’t do it. Awful advice, you’re free to ignore? Scared of publishing? Just do it. Which of those is the scarier path, for you? Stop caring what other people think of your work. Start caring about your work.

   Never give up. Don’t stop writing. Take everything that is thrown at you, fall over, stand up, and take it all over again. And again. Lie there in the mud, with your own guts competing to strangle you. Unloop the intestines, pack them back where they belong, tie a knot in the wound, and stand up again. Take everything that is thrown at you. Fall over. Unloop the intestines from your neck – you did it before. Stand and take the next wave. Never give up.

   When I was building my assembly-line, things went slowly. All the usual obstacles were there, and will be there for every writer. Life, getting in the way. Time-mismanagement. Dead-end tales. Reading. Absorbing and rejecting ideas. Then accepting them later. Learning how to write with your own arse. Flushing the crap out of your system. Acknowledging skills are skills, then improving them. Putting in the hours. Making enough mistakes to keep going. Despair. Lots of despair. The empty feeling that sometimes comes with the blankness of the page. A non-feeling, that shoots beyond despair. The anaesthesia of word-failure.

   Discovering that you should never give up.

   NEVER. GIVE. UP.

   Wear the expression around your neck like a millstone, but wear it. Own it. Tell yourself you invented it, and that people are paying you royalties just to think that phrase inside their own heads. Never give up. Keep writing.

   If you publish shit, at least you publish it.

NEXT BLOG: #BADWRITINGTIPS.

ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS.

In conversation with Canadian author Karen Woodward, I uncovered the sinister workings of a curious cult. We were discussing anti-Kindle views. Not so much discussing. We’re both published on Kindle. Discussing? Laughing at.

   Paper books are awesome. Electronic books on e-reading devices represent fluff particles between Satan’s toes. One of the greatest nonsensical comments concerning e-readers is that in a power-cut, they are as nothing!

   Kindle is useless. When there’s a power-cut, the Kindle won’t do you any favours. But a book is power-free, not powerless. Er, yes. And when the sun goes down, the power-free paper book, with its glow-in-the-dark ink, will far surpass the powerless Kindle. Mm.

   Resistance to the electronic reading device is visceral. The main problem seems to be a stance against the concept of a machine for reading. Pardon me, but isn’t that what a paper book is? It is. The book has moving parts. It’s a machine. Still an excellent storage-device.

   Smashing a Kindle is akin to burning down an entire library. I’ve said before that Kindle isn’t an ideology. Amazon isn’t an enemy nation. Reading is important. My enemies are time and illiteracy. Not e-readers.

   Hell, I don’t want to get into a rant. (That’s next week’s post. Seriously.) There isn’t much to say to you on the topic of e-reading. You are, after all, reading this electrically. Electronically. Whether on my blog, or in a collected edition of my blog posts.

   Some people come down against e-readers. Why? Oh, it’s not the same as reading a book. Well, not exactly – that much is true. But it’s almost the same as reading a book. Clue? Reading. I don’t see the fuss.

   Yes, paper publishing is taking a bashing. Are so many people, readers, mentally invested in paper publishing companies? I don’t believe so. Investment in holding a weighty tome in the hands may apply, perhaps. This is where Kindle is missing a trick. There should be a 5 lb version, for people who want the weight of a REAL book in their mitts. From Kindle Touch to Kindle Lump. Non-hands-free.

   As for laziness stemming from machines…yes. Let’s walk everywhere. EVERYWHERE. Even in an emergency, when helicopter air-ambulance is the only way to fly. We’ll rely on butter knives for surgery. And candles for light. Why don’t we return to the hard-working model of the Victorian kitchen? Because the microwave is evil, after all.

   Computers, in whatever form, encourage innovation. On a personal level. In the old brain-box. If machines like that truly made us lazy, our species would have suffered a catastrophic failure at some point in the last decade.

   Perhaps that happened, and I’m too lazy to have noticed. Harassed bookworms shouldn’t have to lug a small vanload of books around. E-reading. It’s going to be the norm, for a long long time. Then the brain-chip will come in. Unless…the brain-chip came in, and I’m stuck on the factory-setting that allows me to pretend I’m using the old Real World operating system.

   Other strange thoughts burbling to the surface and noted by two authors? We discovered that books were perceived as sexier than e-readers. There must be a way to redress (undress) the balance. Kindles aren’t sexy. Could they be?

   They should be red, as well as read. With curves. And sultry come-hither eyes at the top of the display. Perhaps I should go back a step. If Kindles aren’t sexy, does that mean books are always going to be?

   That frisky little minx of a volume just begging for attention, down there on my shelf of classics. Oh how I’ve missed her. The way she stands out on the shelf. Pouting. With her come-hither air, and…ah, her scent. It’s not Chanel. But…something more refined. Natural. Pine. Like the trees. Not that she’d be made of pine.

   Okay, enough of that. Before I am carried away by white-coated attendants. It’s the cliché. The idea of curling up with a good book. On a rainy night. Lost in a plump sofa. Snapping a square of dark chocolate to go with that coffee. Comfortable, in a pool of light. In bare feet. For this is a sofa commercial. And bare feet provide the cliché.

   I haven’t discussed the cult. This blog post is called ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS. I’m an author. Karen Woodward is an author. We compared notes. Is it true to say that all authors once read books under the covers, beyond bedtime?

   Research. I consulted myself, and, after a brief survey, I found this to be true. Of those reading this post – those who did the same – many of you will have used a flashlight. I used a torch. It is important to stress that this was no flaming brand.

   I’d come across traces of the cult in books. Introducing Wuthering Heights, Charlotte Cory admitted to membership of this VAST VAST cult of illuminated readers. What of my colleague, and her research? Karen admitted that she, too, held membership of the cult.

   After a quick mental survey of reading-habits, she concluded that all of her friends had succumbed to the lure of this illicit ritual of disappearing under covers with a portable electric light and a book. Hardbacks were always easier on the reader…

   I must stress that in my writing, reader means a reader of material. Not the device which provides the reading material. An e-reader is an electronic reading device. Whereas a p-reader has no battery. Just thought I’d clear that up.

   A hardback could be propped so as to turn the cover into a mini-tent. This led to an obvious disadvantage. The night-shattering sound of the turned page scraping against bedlinen as the story unfolded. Yes, a strange cult to those not familiar with the experience.

   Knowing when to quit reading was a fine art. When the batteries faltered. Sir Isaac Newton’s rule indicates that, all things being equal, internal human batteries fail before those that are zinc-based. You nod off before the light goes.

   The technique of book-disposal was important. Lodge the tome in the bed with you, as though a trusted teddy. Slide the book gradually out of the warmth into the icy wastes of the darkened bedroom. Or thump the hardback on the floor, waking people three streets along.

   Books must be worth reading. The statement goes doubly, trebly, for books read under the covers. You really are in a self-contained world, if reading that way. Of course, I wouldn’t for a moment suspect any adults of reading in this fashion. Devouring books by artificial light, inside an artificial tent, is a game for the young persons.

   (Or is it?)

   Back to the Kindle. Are the young persons going to read Kindle books under the covers? One more battery charge to be concerned about. No rustling pages to worry over. Though the page rustling could easily be added to e-reading devices for those who hanker after the experience. There might be a market for second-hand e-books…

   How would you go about that? Give readers the option of the same story, made available with the odd crinkled or dog-eared section. Sun-yellowed pages. A mashed, dehydrated, spider here. Cigarette-burn there. Random photos inserted between chapters.

   Yes, I received those with a second-hand book bought on Amazon. I won’t show the photos here, as family members may not wish to be paraded on the internet. One picture is of two dogs. The other is of an elderly lady in hospital in the company of a young woman named Abby.

   It is unlikely that giving that information will lead to the return of the photos. I can’t for the life of me remember which second-hand book those emerged from. Ah, yes. I remember. Best to hold details like that back. No crank-calls, now.

   I know the lady’s name, the name of her consultant, and two nurses – all displayed on a plaque somewhere in the photo. The date attached to the photo indicates that the elderly lady may no longer be with us. It is likely that Abby is the elderly lady’s granddaughter, though that is by no means certain.

   We’ll restrict the location to mainland or offshore Britain. The photos might have served as bookmarks, at one time. Yes, I could go through the seller to see if I might return the images to the original owner of the book. But I thought it would be more high-tech to throw this open to the blog.

   Given that 0.75 people read my blog, and that most of those fractional individuals are American, I don’t hold out much hope of a response. This is a message going out in a digital bottle. Prompted by my thoughts of old-fashioned reading-habits. Paperbacks and hardbacks under the covers. Bookmarks. The scent of paper as it slowly ages under our all-consuming star.

   So. If Abby reads this and thinks that she posed in a hospital with an elderly lady, she should throw some details my way at the blog’s e-mail address. There’s a prize – the return of some photos. What do I get out of it if no one responds? A few paragraphs in this blog.

   Yes, I veered off again. I do that, from time to time.

NEXT BLOG: IF YOU PUBLISH SHIT, AT LEAST YOU PUBLISH IT.

EMERGENCY BLOG POST NUMBER ONE. DIVE, DIVE, DIVE!

According to the International Treaty Safeguarding Universal Clichéd Sounds (ITSUCS), the official requirement denoting the noise of a klaxon is aroogah! Placing multiple aroogahs in the same sentence indicates the diving of a WWII-era submarine.

   I’m taking the blog below periscope depth to avoid collision with an incoming blog post. What happened? To use the parlance of Adam Hall in one of his thrillers, I picked up a tag. She followed me down several shadowy streets, her purpose unknown. I was struggling to think what this meant. Were they onto me? What did they want if they were? And what did they want if they weren’t?

   The only thing this fugitive could do was look into matters. Look and report. She wanted me to look. Was I going to play her game? A word caught me. Hazard of being a writer. The word was look. And the tag was thrown out by Kacey Vanderkarr.

   She’d been in a bit of a mood concerning her writing. (Koff Drama Queen koff.) I chipped in and told her to buck up. No good deed goes unpunished. Stephanie Diaz tagged Kacey in a game called LOOK. Kacey, in turn, tagged Missy Biozarre, yours truly, Chris Stocking, Martha Allard, and Melissa Keir.

   Yes, Kacey is stalking a guy named Stocking.

   She tagged me by insisting she was talking to me and that I couldn’t be mistaken. Surely she means the other RLL. You know. The Venezuelan rocket scientist of the same name. I occasionally receive payment for satellite launches.

   Determined to kill off my reputation as a curmudgeon, Kacey persisted. First, she dragged me to a BLOG NOVEL. Then she tagged me, and Twitterated the fact. I just wanted to stay on the chilly throne of my own personal DEATH STAR. And I’d have gotten away with it too, if it hadn’t been for those darned pesky kids.

   Jinkies.

   Here, as they say, is the skinny…if you are tagged, run a search for the word LOOK in your work in lack of progress. (Koff koff.) Work in progress, I should say. This simple rule almost wriggled me off the hook. Unfortunately, I used the word.

   If the word LOOK appears in your fiction, copy that paragraph and the surrounding paragraphs to your blog. Tag other writers in your blog post, and let them know they were invited to participate in the game. That’s all, folks.

   Kacey thought she was being sneaky in telling us that we don’t HAVE to participate. That this is not REQUIRED by LAW. See what she did there? Naughty scribbler. She extolled the virtues of sharing unpublished writing with the teeming masses. Or, in my case, with the 0.75 people who regularly read this blog.

   Well that’s that. I’m out the door. Have to walk the dinosaur. See you.

   What’s the problem? My personal carer Dr Anton Phibes is scouring the Seven Seas for me as I type. He’s there to prevent my releasing stories ahead of the game. It’s not good for me. Kacey thinks it is. She means well.

   I’ve had to turn my blog into Das Boot to fire off this literary torpedo. Not Das Boot. The Nautilus. And there’s no torpedo to launch. The only weapon available is ramming speed as I approach the vessel occupied by Dr Phibes.

   If only I hadn’t used the word LOOK. But the scene in that story deals with looking and not looking. She wanted him to look. Was he going to play her game? There’s a peculiar link to the BLOG NOVEL I participated in. I created a character called Jess. And I ended up writing about another Jessica in the BLOG NOVEL. Small world.

   Other considerations? I couldn’t just drop a chunk of the story on you. This blog has a minimum requirement of 1,500 words. Kacey wasn’t asking much. Just share some unpublished fiction with 0.75 readers. Interrupt your regular blog posts to do so. And give the audience an excerpt that’s long enough for your blog. Ignore Dr Phibes and go for it.

   Anything else? Yes. The nature of the excerpt fell under scrutiny. I hope I don’t get that Venezuelan rocket scientist into bother over the publication of this non-scientific data. Genteel readers, and Dr Phibes, look away now. Think of the horror Kacey Vanderkarr has unleashed…

   Before I do that, I must tag some people. Kacey tagged five. I could cheat and tag Kacey, forcing her to blog another excerpt. That would be evil of me. Evil and wrong. There’s probably a rule against that sort of thing. So I’ll leave off those already tagged.

1. Karen Woodward. Canadian author and blogger supreme. Tagging Karen flushes her out of hiding, forcing her to reveal a work in progress. If she used the word LOOK.

2. A.M. Supinger. Insecure Writer with a Chris Hemsworth fixation. If she takes up the tagging challenge, expect her to respond with fiction opening Look at Chris Hemsworth.

3. Kellie Manasseri. Another writer who goes around calling herself Mrs Hemsworth when she thinks no one is listening. If she takes up the tagging challenge, expect her to respond with fiction opening Only Mrs Hemsworth is permitted to look at Chris Hemsworth.

4. Michelle Simkins. Originator of the 2012 BLOG NOVEL, Bloom. She created her own Jess in that story as I was creating mine elsewhere. Michelle is a keen photographer. I’d expect her to look at stuff, and to stuff the word look into her fiction.

5. Jennifer Merritt. Worryingly, Jennifer was once charged with the heinous crime of Livestock at Large. I know – any excuse to use the word heinous.

6. Anyone else who wants to throw fiction out there.

Now to our tale. This cycle of stories is bundled with blog posts in the first REPORT FROM A FUGITIVE collection. Here’s an excerpt from MIRA E. The tale is the INCIDENT BEFORE. (I note the irony of the hidden meaning in MIRA. Spanish for LOOK.)

   “It is not looming. I can’t show you my scars easily. There’s a barrier to overcome. If I go topless, that’s something I’m getting past. And if you’re gay, I’m not really giving anything up on a plate. Flashing to a queer doesn’t count. So all the angles are covered.”

   “Fuck.”

   “Want to see my scars?”

   “No.”

   “Tell me about the new thing. Around my neck. Mysterious gift.”

   “Deviant distraction. The beachcomber hauled it out of the pebbles down by Chlarson Lake. Passed the piece on to the witchy woman in the bauble store.”

   “She’s a Methodist. That’s practically witchcraft in my house. Methodism. One step up from Stanism.”

   “Huh?”

   “Worship of your dad, Stan. That’s Stanism. A lot of housewives around here wouldn’t mind bumping your mom off and consoling the guy. My mom has the hots for your dad.”

   “Uh, please. Your mom…”

   “Is not the most stable of people. If she’s stable, the horse bolted long ago.”

   “Will your horse be okay down there?”

   “Yeah. Good question. Maybe we should bring the horse up here. Where everything is safer. In the den of the axe-murderer.”

   “Where’s that coming from? What’s your point?”

   “You are obsessed with saving women.”

   “I can’t save them. There are news articles. Pieces of a jigsaw. Sometimes, all the pieces fit and the killer is brought in. Doesn’t make the jigsaw whole.”

   “Where do you bury them all?”

   “In my scrapbooks. Those go back years. So unless I’m guilty of killing random women when I was five, or in negative numbers, I am not the killer you are looking for.”

   “I don’t think you odd, just for lamenting the loss of those women.”

   “Could you cover your breasts with your arms, then show me the scars…”

   “I want to break a barrier.”

   “You broke a barrier when you told me you hurt yourself. I…”

   “Well you can already see my breasts through the clothing. What difference does peeling a layer make to you?”

   “All the difference. I’ll be looking there and not at your scars.”

   “Ah, so not gay after all.”

   “I’ll look away. Hold your blouse up to your chest with one hand. Figure something out.”

   “Oh. You like to leave something to the imagination.”

   “Yes. I do. Don’t sell it to me cheap if it’s precious. I’ll think it cheap. And don’t offer me a moving target that stops for show.”

   “You might just be a little above average in the ordinary guy department.”

   “A little. I could more or less live on that crumb of discomfort.”

   “Either that or you are a MAJOR leg-man.”

   He didn’t look away. Instead, Zeke closed his eyes. There was a rustle, and shifting of position on the bed. Squeak of springs. Now he trusted her not to mess around and embarrass him. He was embarrassed anyway. Could you be more embarrassed? If so, what did embarrassment matter?

   It didn’t matter at all.

   “Okay. Here you go, sport.”

   He opened his eyes. As arranged via international treaty, her breasts were covered by the blouse. Held against Jess by her right hand. She raised her left arm to show the inner surface. The scratches were short and thin. He considered the cuts the only shallow things about her. Damage markers. Precise. Uniform. Silence. Looking. More silence. Then…

   “What did you use, Jess? Laser?”

   “Sold my Atomic Death-Ray. Semi-blunt knife. I sterilised it.”

   “The cuts look…”

   “Yeah?”

   “Machine-made.”

   “A knife is a machine for cutting.”

   “Did you feel anything?”

   “Stings.”

   “I mean, emotionally.”

   “No. Didn’t work. I wanted to feel more human. Whatever that’s like. All I felt was stinging. Made me think of Darcy, in her rubber room.”

   “She’s happy there, they say.”

   “I didn’t do this to feel happy, Zeke. To feel something. But not to feel happy. I heard Darcy did it to feel good about herself. To experience happiness. That’s sick, twisted, and fucked.”

   “But doing that to yourself is okay if it’s about feeling anything but happiness.”

   “Yes, Kettle. Pot thinks that. Your turn. Blushing. Come on. Show me your scars.”

   “There aren’t any.”

   “Did you lie to me?”

   “No. I didn’t lie. Jess, I hurt myself to make sensation go away. That didn’t involve cutting.”

   “Oh. I thought hurting meant cutting, because it meant cutting to me. Go on.”

   “I can’t get into this with you. It’s sick.”

   “Fish through my pockets, will you? I’ll show you sick. My knife is there.”

   “You aren’t going to cut yourself in front of me…”

   “Why not?”

   “You’ll bleed everywhere, for one thing.”

   “Minimal blood-loss. Guaranteed. I’ll pass it off as woman’s trouble.”

   “Yes, I can see how that would be woman’s trouble. Vaginal bleeding from the armpit, and all.”

   She laughed too loudly at that. He went for the knife, taking his eyes off her. Peripheral vision told him that she’d dropped the blouse. He kept his head down and examined the cutting machine. There were three blades.

   “Oops-a-dandelion.”

   “Dropped something?”

   “My blouse. You?”

   “Pair of testicles.”

   “Well it’s high-time now you’re almost sixteen.”

   “The big November birthday. Could you put your blouse back on?”

   “And risk being cut, with blood everywhere?”

   “So what about bandages?”

   “I brought stuff for that. Try the other pocket.”

   “You should have cut yourself once. Ragged. At least you could explain that away somehow. Multiple scars generate multiple questions.”

   “No one will know. Will they? Are you going to tell?”

   “Only the newspapers. Are you wearing your blouse?”

   “No. I want that barrier to go.”

   “Next time. Okay?”

   “Oh. There’s to be a next time? On that promise…”

   “Notion.”

   “It’s a promise or I just sit here topless until your mom walks in.”

   “You’d never do that.”

   “Doing it now, sport. Of course, you could wrestle the clothes back on me. But you’d pretty much have to look, to do that.”

   “The alternative would be closed eyes and a lot of fumbling. Next time. Maybe. Depends.”

   “Close enough for a promise. Look away, then, you pervert.”

   Rustling. Bedsprings.

   He looked, saw her in the blouse, then looked away. She might as well be topless, in that garment. This was going to be a long hour. With the cheese thing at the end of it. Extra rations for Jess. And…ah, the time.

   “Are you staying for supper, Jess?”

   “I like riding home in the dark. Experienced professional that I am.”

   “Another contest coming up.”

   “The biggie.”

   “Might even lose a prize. Will you stop cutting yourself before competitions?”

   “What’s the point of that?”

   “If you fall off, and hurt yourself, you’ll have to be examined. The cuts might come to light.”

   “Then I’ll deal with the problem when a problem arrives. What about you? Oh, no scars.”

   “One of these blades is sharp.”

   “Yeah. Sometimes I think about using that one. I reserve it for enemies.”

   “Will you cut me, Jess?”

   “Sure.”

   No hesitation. Absolutely. He rooted around in her pockets and found a wad of cotton wool and some kind of medical tape. There were sticking-plasters. He’d expected a field-kit. Something that would hold arms together.

   “Just to see what cutting feels like.”

   “Yeah. I said sure. Take your lumberjack shirt off. If your mom bursts in, we’ll pretend we’re getting it on.”

   “In a way, we are.”

   “Ooh, deep mysterious layers to you tonight. Here, I’ll unbutton the top two. Evidence for your mom. Unless you’d like to unbutton me. Be my guest…”

   “No, you’re my guest.”

   “That’s right. Local hospitality. The host’s blood is laid open to the sky.”

   “We should sit on the floor.”

   “You should lie on the floor. So you don’t flinch and lose an arm.”

   “Okay.”

   He lay in line with the bed, sliding the swivel-chair under his desk. Jess stood over him as he squirmed out of the lumberjack shirt. Just a guy in jeans. She looked to her left. The bed she’d vacated. To the right, the desk. And his 1974 scrapbook. Over the desk, a shelf with more scrapbooks.

   She knelt by his side, making much of the action as she took the knife from him and became a killer. Cocking her head, she strained to hear the wooden warning of shoes on the stairs. The light goldened, heading for gloom. Not yet.

   “No scars, I see. Talk about that.”

   “I…hurt myself. Just to make stuff go away.”

   “How did that work for you?”

   “Thought it did, actually. Then I had to start over.”

   “So…details…”

   “Ah, no. I just hurt my bones a little more, to see if it all made sense.”

   “How severe is the pain you need to throw yourself into, to dislodge the stuff from your head?”

   “Turns out, pretty severe.”

   “No cutting, though.”

   “So far.”

   “Coward.”

   “No. The pain I went for…wasn’t exactly cowardly.”

   “Tell me.”

   So he told her. Minute by minute, her eyes grew colder with disquiet. His voice held steady. Her heart pounded on her head’s door. Let me in. There’s been an accident. You’ve accidentally fallen for the wrongest guy in the town. Walk away. Crawl if you must.

   “Jess…”

   “Oh. I take back the cowardliness. But that was the start, you say.”

   “Then…”

   And he told her the rest. She warned herself not to waste time fighting back tears. If she started that battle, she’d lose. Instead, she went to the numb place in her head and read some indigestible books. On a timer, she packed that routine away and found the words to soothe the poor guy.

   “Zeke, that’s fucked.”

   “Yeah.”

   “Zeke.”

   “There’s more.”

   “Okay.”

   And she sighed at that. Slight shake of the head. She unfolded the wrong blade. The sharp one. Just to be sure, she tested it on her palm. A bead of blood burned red there. Jess was surprised by that. A ruby, glistening, putting up its own tent. Attracting customers to the Blood Fair.

   “What?”

   “I just fucking cut myself.”

   “Hardly bothersome, to you.”

   “It is. I used the wrong blade. The really truly sharp one. I always test, just to be sure.”

   “Then the test worked. Now you’re sure.”

   “I’m not sure of anything, Zeke. Your story distracted me.”

   “Though I note that you didn’t cry.”

   “I’m not the crying kind. That’s why I cut myself, remember. To feel. I must feel the world wobbling on my shoulders before I’ll cry. What is it you are trying to escape from?”

   “Intensity.”

   “So you do intense things to counter the intensity?”

   “I guess. When I was younger, I was the kid the older guys allowed along for the ride. Some of them went to Vietnam.”

   “Not your war, Zeke.”

   “I wanted it to be. Now it’s not. So I hurt myself. Today I thought I’d…”

   “Best not say.”

   “Just to forget being vegetarian.”

   “Hell, I forgot being vegetarian. Didn’t cost me blood.”

   “Hesitating? Cut me.”

   “After what you told me, about escalating things. Maybe switching to a knife isn’t a good idea. You read about a lot of these murders. Read a lot about these murders.”

   “I read all about as many of the murderers that the law catches as I can. Right now, I think someone came back from Vietnam and didn’t get the usual treatment he liked over in Saigon.”

   “Huh? You mean prostitutes.”

   “Yeah. I spoke to one of the guys who went to Vietnam. He said…some of the guys who come back don’t actually come back. They’re different.”

   “How?”

   “They are exposed to stuff they wouldn’t normally encounter here. When they return, these guys want more of the same.”

   “So…”

   “They’ll roughhouse a whore, some. Beating a prostitute here is a way of getting back at Uncle Sam for sending guys over there.”

   “That last girl who disappeared. She wasn’t…”

   “As far as we know. Living two towns over. Who could say for certain…”

   “This isn’t going to stop. The bleeding, I mean. My stupid cut.”

   “I’ll get some paper from the bathroom.”

   Jess put her knife away while Zeke dashed to the bathroom. He caught sight of himself in the mirror. Shirtless. Do something about that, idiot. He grabbed the whole roll and nipped across to his room. Jess sat on the bed, holding her hand up. Zeke grimaced.

   “Here, oh menstrual one.”

   “Stupid thing to do, anyway. Could we meet somewhere in the middle, sport?”

   “How?”

   “I live a little more, and you live a little less. We settle the balance.”

   “Maybe. Press this into your hand. Keep it there. You should go to the bathroom and run cold water if this doesn’t work.”

   “It’s not a ruptured artery, calm down. Are you upset, Zeke?”

   “By what?”

   “I don’t know. Nixon’s resignation.”

   “That annoyed me. A President, toppled by his enemies. But President Ford made things right.”

   “So you feel better because a crook was pardoned.”

   “Vietnam bothers me. And the Russians.”

   “Not the Dutch, though?”

   “Why the Dutch?”

   “Just choosing people at random.”

   “Don’t you need a permit to make fun of me?”

   “That’s the Zeke I know. Where do I apply for that permit?”

   “On the other side of midnight, over the hills, far away. Just next door to here and now.”

   “Could you do that with your imaginary pipe? I’m busy not bleeding to death. Ah. I’m staying to supper. How do we explain this?”

   “Paper.”

   “An axe made of it? This was no paper-cut, Watson!”

   “Oh. I showed you my…”

   “Careful, young man.”

   “Badge. CNA.”

   “Canadian Nautical Alliance?”

   “The Campaign for Nuclear Armament. Here.”

   “Where do you dig them up, Zeke? The pin is quite shar…argh! Fuck.”

   “Make a fist.”

   “No use to me.”

   “You have to climb into your sweater. Without blood-trails all over yourself. Close your hand and shield the cuts.”

   “Uh, yeah. Practical. Okay. We’ll agree to dress.”

   He tidied himself, recreating the image his mother would remember. Jess did her best to avoid spraying the walls with blood. Zeke sat in his chair. Jess plonked herself on Zeke’s bed. She extended her left hand for inspection. Blood smears.

   “You have some on your throat.”

   “That’s because you, young man, are Wampyr.”

   “Normally I don’t wear the cloak.”

   “Undead giveaway.”

   Jess moved her left hand to wipe the blood. Using her right hand would just bloody another five digits. Her left hand brushed the five-pointed star at her throat. Things quietened, after that. The adventure was done.

   “I guess that’s it for cutting ourselves tonight.”

   “Or doing what you do. Don’t do that, Zeke. I’m worried you’d injure yourself.”

   “Worried I’d injure myself when I hurt myself.”

   “It’s the escalation each time. Looking for a new layer of physical pain to take the mental pain away.”

   “And your own escalation?”

   “There isn’t really escalation in my case. Repetition. Once a cut heals. You are…”

   “Looking for something bigger than the thing you are looking for…”

   “I want to feel. That’s a small thing. You want to shut out the world. That’s a big door you are hunting after.”

   There were moments of tidying. An imaginary pipe was waved around. Laughter. Chatter. Creating a certain mood in the run-up to the cheese thing. He opened the door. Nodding, he beckoned his friend Jess. She followed downstairs, stopping halfway. He looked back at her silence. Light dawned in her eyes and fell from her tongue.

   “My hat.”