The Beginning of the End

The end of the road is in sight. When I look back, the beginning is just a speck on the horizon.

Now seems like a good point to start a regular Novel Diary to document the closing stages in finishing a project that has taken up an extraordinary amount of my time over the last two years. Writing has always sapped my time, but when I first imagined bringing characters, events and a whole new world to life on such an epic scale, I never realised how much this creation could swing me from blissful happiness to grudging frustration. The very idea has been at the back of my mind throughout my Masters degree and seeds of it have been germinating ever since I started experimenting with words upon the page. All I can hope for is that by the end, come September 25^th 2012, the novel that I have planned and executed leaves me satisfied. Over the next few months I plan to document this end process in order to drive myself, share the experience with others and give myself something to look back on once the journey has finished.

For now, I’ll fill you in on where it’s at, or more correctly where I’m at.

After a few more searches online it became apparent that the title I had in mind had been worked with, be it as a published novel or an American writing counterpart tinkering with ideas. The mistake that I wont make now therefore, is to put the title out there until the last minute. For now, I will stick to referring to the novel title as ‘Sample’. Better to be safe than sorry.

Sample will be a crime story at its heart, but will also include aspects of adventure, sci-fi, speculation, elements of noir and character study. I’ve always loved how Tarantino films rely so heavily on the characters. By writing unforgettable dialogue and setting up intense scenes with strong interactions, you end up with a really fulfilling story. I also really enjoy speculative fiction (especially work from William Gibson and J.G. Ballard). What sets them apart from their peers is the fact that they see the characters as more important than the idea. An idea of a plot or setting could be phenomenal, but without intriguing characters to populate that plot or setting, you are left with a one-dimensional sketch, rather than a three-dimensional colour drawing.

The start of Sample is where I’ve spent the most time rewriting (typical for a lot of writers, I’ve heard), but I have now settled on a brief prologue to start it off. The reason for this is down to finally watching (all the way through I should add) 2001: A Space Odyssey, and in the first hour a realisation hit me. For a story that spans across a long period, it is important at the beginning to create an integral scene, in order to tie the beginning to the end, or to make it a complete story. It is like the knot in a piece of string. My prologue is there to cast a menacing shadow over the story, and details a mystery child making discoveries in early life, that will eventually help the reader glean an insight into a future antagonist in the novel. Whereas 2001 had prehistoric apes acting out various developments in human evolution (invention, control, war) that resonated with the audience, my prologue will hopefully give an insight into a specific character, and also highlight interesting aspects of human nature.

I have now named each main chapter in order to give myself a more solid structure. Again I won’t name them specifically until the final novel is realised, but I had the idea of taking various areas of my own version of Manchester (UK for all those international readers), and using them as the chapter names. To shed a very small amount of light on that, my version of Manchester is a speculation on its future, in that it has grown as a city does, into more of a vertical thing than horizontal. In that respect I have named different ‘Layers’ of the city to extrapolate the metropolis that the city has become. Originally I wanted my protagonist to climb these layers as the story progressed, but within events that occur, he actually goes up, then down, then back up again. Therefore, I have found it necessary to use these Layer names loosely, but title other chapters alongside important points in the story. If anything I now feel it is well-structured but these things can always change as the story is finished off.

In terms of what point I am up to in writing, I am filling in gaps that exist in the first three chapters with an aim to finish these by the end of May. With a total of eight chapters as well as a Prologue and possible epilogue, I have estimated I should finish by the middle of July, with time to spare for a rewrite, getting friends and family to read it, feedback and a final rewrite.

All in all there will be a lot to do, and it will be hard work but I am looking forward to the final result. Hopefully I’ll be able to update this blog as much as I can which will benefit me in tracking my progress, as well as share the experience with everyone else.

I’ll leave you with a link to a TED talk that helped inspire me this week, from the one and only JJ Abrams.

I've just entered the Guardian/Sony Futurescapes Short Story competition with a story entitled Signals. Here is a short extract below. Much Love.

Signals

Alex’s hand halted over his keyboard in the middle of typing a report. His eyes no longer scrolled over the screen but stared distantly out of the window to his left. The signals on the track opposite the back of the house glowed a twinkling red, the colour separated by rain droplets slipping on the exterior of the glass. Red turned to amber. Amber turned to green. Green disappeared behind a four second flash of metal and windows and faces and eyes. The 10:14 High Speed Rail Train was on time again.

“What’s wrong baby?” The smart-hub chirped up in the corner of the room. It was effectively a smooth grey ball on tripod legs with a blue neon line across the front to detect voice and movement. It was in the voice of Denise, his ex-wife. Alex ignored it.

“Alex, don’t shut me out! Talk to me.” The neon line blinked. The program installed on the OS was originally designed to record a person’s phrases, speech patterns and moods. It subsequently picked up speech or movement in the room and replied accordingly. It gave the overall effect of comfort for the owner if the voice belonged to someone long deceased, especially if they had died suddenly and the owner wasn’t ready to let go. Alex however, used it a little bit differently.

“Sorry love, I need to give the office a call, and the HSR always reminds me.” Alex looked up at the touchboard that displayed his reminder’s, calendar and notes. He still had deadlines for report completion but his on-site attendance and dropped dramatically. He counted the days he hadn’t been back into the city to his office. He lost count at fifty-three.

“Go on?” the smart-hub replied.

“How can I go in after all this time, they’ll think I’m a laughing stock. I just…” Alex couldn’t get his words out and put his head in his hands. The smart-hub stalled in replying for a second as it scanned its database for a possible retort. All it could muster was “Go on?”

“This is ridiculous Denise, I’m talking to a machine.”

The neon line blinked twice.

“Alex, don’t shut me out! Talk to me.”

If he shut his eyes it was as if she was in the room. Even without sight his hand found the bottle of whiskey on the desk and managed to pour a decent glass.

The next day Alex arose at the same time, ate a good breakfast of toast, scrambled eggs and beans, and got dressed for work in a pin striped suit and blue shirt. He wouldn’t let anything hold him back from doing his job anymore.

“You off out baby?”

“I certainly am Denise. I’m going out and leaving the past in the past. I’m never going to talk to you again, and I’m sending the smart-hub back. What do you think of that?”

It took a second for the smart-hub to find a reply.

“Remember to pick up bread! Love you too!”

“Yeah thought so.” He picked up a stylus off the desk and threw it at the smart-hub.

He was just about to climb into the exit cot when his phone vibrated. Alex stopped in his tracks. Not that it was unusual for a phone to go off, but his hadn’t gone off in two weeks. Picking it up, he noticed a message on the screen:

Friendfinder located Annabel! 10:12:36

Friendfinder disconnected from Annabel! 10:12:37

Alex stared at the message until the text on the touchscreen became blurry. He felt a bit sick. After a year of searching without luck, his phone had found his daughter in a second. He spent the rest of the day drinking.

After a few days of confined to the couch and the inevitable onslaught of daytime television due to being ‘ill’, which involved feeling sick, coughing a lot and moaning, I have realized it is time to restart the blog. I began Fresh Scribbles over a year ago off the back of writing reviews for Manchester Literature Festival events. The nice folk at the Lit Fest had kindly informed me if I wrote for them, they would put a link on their blog to my blog. Unfortunately I didn’t have one, so proceeded to make one up! So I did a couple of events, wrote a few interesting pieces (which can all be found here) and politely went on my way. After that, the blog kind of flopped, in a big way, in that I didn’t really have much to talk about apart from work and university, between which I rapidly raced to and fro. Now, I have finished University (The minor modules at least) so its at least one thing ticked off the list, meaning I have a lot more time for other projects, such as the new and improved Fresh Scribbles.

So in a nutshell, I’m going to cover three areas and perhaps a fourth on this lovely blank canvas. Firstly will be an area titled Talking, which is simply my thoughts, musings, feelings, interests or anything that tickles me.

Secondly will be Watching, which will funnily enough detail Films or trailers that I have seen, or are wanting to see since I am, what I would consider to be a film enthusiast (not expert people so don’t start testing me until the DVD wall with in built secret passageway is complete!).

And Thirdly will be of course, Reading, where I will offer opinions or thoughts on current literature of interest, or books I have missed the bandwagon on and am only just picking up.

Now I mentioned an optional fourth, which could quite possibly be Writing. I am by trade (or persuasion) a writer, and I do love to write in a creative manner so here and there I may share some tasty morsels of genius which will make you think ‘wow’, ‘huh?’ or ‘monster trucks’ depending on how receptive you are to my advances.

Hmmm. That wasn’t quite a nutshell.

Watch This Space…