Birds, books and conspiracies

Have spent a glorious day in Blashford Lakes in Hampshire today, and thank you hugely to Peter & Sue for the tip – much appreciated. The wonderful news is I saw my first Lesser Redpoll there – well, quite a few of them actually – so that was grand. Other birds spotted for this year included bramblings, a linnet and goosanders. We also got a great view of a bittern standing amongst reeds very close by, plus siskins, nuthatches, a black-necked grebe, some goldeneye and all the usual suspects. We also attempted to spot firecrest, crossbills and hawfinches, but to no avail alas. They’re obviously somewhere else at the moment. But it’s a great place to go if you’re keen on birds – honestly the woods were alive with them. Which is astonishing as normally when Lord H and I go birdspotting in woodland, we see absolutely nothing and the trees are as silent as winter. Which as it is winter is hardly surprising, but really, my dears, I can’t be expected to find the perfect simile every time. Even Homer nods …

I’ve finished an utterly excellent collection of short stories – Conspiracies by John Kinsella and Tracy Ryan. It’s fabulous and I have so many favourites I don’t know where to begin. First off, Kinsella’s Family (a snapshot of a very split family) is great – and all the more so as I was astonished to see a sharp short story which is told from multiple viewpoints. I hadn’t realised that could be done or even work. I found it quite inspirational and am mulling over whether I might try one like that too. I just have to think about it for a while. Also Ryan’s Ghosting is a punchy tale about two best friends and the secrets they don’t share; Kinsella’s The Glass Table takes an item of furniture and makes it alter a relationship beyond any hope of return; Ryan’s The Ring takes the theme of different languages and cultures to show us a budding relationship that doesn’t quite get there; Kinsella’s Stain is a powerful and subtle ghost story with a kick-ass ending; another Kinsella tale, The Play, is my utter favourite in the collection and is a dark sharp story about a piece of play-acting in a pub that goes terribly, terribly wrong. Frankly it’s perfect. I couldn’t fault it. I could probably read it over and over again and still get something more out of it – it’s that good. Again, Kinsella’s Vermin! is a gripping snapshot of a boy who doesn’t fit into his family (and Lordy we’ve probably all been there, eh …) but the ending is surprisingly positive and holds out something like hope; finally, Ryan’s Nurture is a sting-in-the-tale look at becoming a lesbian. All in all, I probably preferred Kinsella’s offerings, but it’s a close-run thing and there are more of his tales included so he possibly has an unfair advantage. That said, I do think Kinsella’s The Chain Letter is very over-described to the point of description-pornography (and it’s not to do with sex – well not until the end anyway …) and I personally don’t think should have been included here, but I appreciate that’s a personal take on the story. Others may like what happens with the lice, but I found it rather gross! Anyway, apart from that this collection is fabulous and I highly recommend it.

Meanwhile tonight we have Chinese takeaway from Waitrose and ice cream – bliss! I can’t wait. It rounds off the day perfectly.

Today’s nice things:

1. Birds

2. Books

3. Chinese takeaway & ice cream.

Anne Brooke

Wing mirrors, backs and booky wooks

Quite a productive day today, all things considered. And I feel unusually calm. Good Lord, do you think Lord H has finally resorted to putting things in my tea? Can’t say I blame him however …

Anyway this morning, Marian and I have played a stonkingly good game of golf and I even got a par on the 9th, hurrah. Not that I deserved it though – as on the 8th I was so overcome by her wonderful off-green putt which was heading straight to the hole that I forgot to remove the flag where I was holding it just in case, and the dang ball rebounded off the pole and spun back onto the green. Goddammit. It’s astonishing she didn’t slit my throat there and then. Really If I had any kind of golfing honour at all, I would have gone quietly behind the clubhouse and beaten myself to death with my own clubs. But, as you can see, I’m still here. As Marian said, thank goodness we’re not playing for cash … And indeed I was already on a dubious footing to start with as I was five minutes late for our tee time. I would have been on time but today I am driving Lord H’s supercharged new car and I couldn’t work out how to make the wing mirrors go out and resume their normal positions, as when he parks he presses some kind of magic button that puts them to bed. As it were. Could I find that button??? No, I could not. So in the end I had to resort to phoning him at work from the mobile (our flat is 32 steps up and I couldn’t be arsed to go back for a real phone …) – which I couldn’t do in the car as it was parked in a no signal zone, so I had to leave the car running and then trot like a crazed animal up and down the road waving my mobile until I could get a signal. Lordy, what will the neighbours think?? Anyway, Lord H solved the problem for me so at least Marian and I managed to play. I couldn’t possibly drive anywhere without wing mirrors. Why was I driving his car? I hear you cry … Well, my dears, this is Surrey after all, and the good people at the golf club have decided to offer a valeted car cleaning service while you play. Because of course the leisured classes couldn’t possibly wield their own sponges. And it’s brilliant value for a great clean – last time I had my car done and this time it’s Lord H’s turn. No doubt once the neighbours cotton on to this exciting new slave trade, I will be driving all sorts of vehicles all over the place and getting them nice and clean. Should I draft a business plan, I wonder?…

Meanwhile, once back at the ranch, I’ve been puzzling away at Ralph’s predicament (the mountain dogs! the magic well! the women! the old family emeralds! Where will it all end?? Hell, don’t ask me …) in Hallsfoot’s Battle and I’ve now raised my word total to over 85,000, so that’s something anyway. I’m enjoying Ralph at the moment. It’s the rest of the gang that are giving me grief.

Anyway, inspired by that and also by author Clare London, I’ve submitted The Bones of Summer to another gay fiction publisher as well. Just in case it’s the sort of book they might like. Thanks for the tip, Clare – much appreciated! I’ll have to wait and see what they say though …

Talking of writing, here’s this morning’s meditation. It’s true too.

Meditation 61

The purification
of women
is a puzzle

men have always pondered.
Odd how
a daughter’s birth

made a woman
twice as impure
as a son’s.

I think slowly
of my own mother’s
purification rite

in a small southern church
only forty-four years ago
and understand how

some things never change.

I’ve also had my third Alexander Technique lesson. The tutor is very good. I think it’s helping my back and shoulder problems. And at a mental level too. Funny how what she says about “the importance of filling my space” somehow makes sense. I spend 99% of my life feeling pressed down and somehow trapped, as if I’m apologising in a physical way just for existing – you know: head down and slightly hunched in the hope that nobody will notice I’m there. But if I think instead about filling my own space (and it’s not easy after 44 years to alter familiar habits, believe me …) and let my shoulders and back relax outward into where perhaps they should be, then I do feel taller. It’s a quite liberating sensation indeed.

I’ve finished reading Russell Brand’s My Booky Wook. I have to admit he’s not a man I greatly warm to, particularly after recent disasters, but there are moments in the book where I laughed out loud and it is written with a rather endearing honesty. There’s something essentially Byronic about the bloke, in my opinion. And in some ways the book has made me like him better. But the astonishing thing – and the reason you must consider it as one for your reading list – is that it absolutely has the best last two pages I have ever read in any biography. Or any work of non-fiction indeed. And the utter best last line. It’s stunning and it left me (a) in tears and (b) hugely impressed. If the bugger can write like that with such piercing clarity and depth, then more please and soon.

Today’s nice things:

1. Feeling calm
2. Golf
3. Writing Hallsfoot
4. Submitting Bones
5. Poetry
6. The AT lesson
7. Books.

Anne Brooke
Anne’s website – keeping its wing mirrors out …

Hallsfoot, puzzles and story thoughts

Have most of the day working away on Hallsfoot’s Battle - the writing seems slightly easier when I’m with Ralph. Possibly because he has more exciting action-hero type stuff to do, rather than the Gathandrians, who have to puzzle over their battle plans and worry about the mind-executioner’s next move. As well as wondering where the hell Simon is. Then again, Ralph is first and foremost a soldier, so he’s used to a bit of derring-do. He’s best when he doesn’t have to think, you know … So, I’m now at over 84,000 words and I have plans for the Lammas Lord (AKA Ralph, for those of you not quite keeping up at the back – which probably includes me these days too …), so there’ll be something to write about tomorrow when I come to it again. I hope.

And this morning’s meditation poem is:

Meditation 60

I’m pleased that camel,
rock-badger and rabbit

escape the call
of the cooking pot,

but I’m not too worried
about moles, rats

or mice.
Hurry through the dark streets,

usher the poor, the blind
and the lame

to a feast
they have not looked for.

I’ve also managed to pick up a copy of next week’s Radio Times today. This time, all the good TV (or most of it anyway) appears to be on Monday. In fact there are four programmes I want to watch then, all on at the same time, deep sigh … How I long for a more sensible viewing policy so more than one day a week gets the chance of some good stuff. Hmm, I won’t hold my breath then. However the joyful, utterly amazing thing is that I solved the Radio Times anagram puzzle in only one second!!! Double hurrahs and crack open the champers indeed. The word simply leapt out at me, my dears, and I was so excited that I jumped up and down in the flat yelling and congratulating myself. Good job no-one was here then – I trust that my impending lunacy is a secret you will not divulge … Maybe I need to get out more? Or possibly less. Anyway, that effort must surely beat Lord H this week, as to my shame he usually gets the word first. He comes from a long line of expert, highly trained anagram-solvers, so it’s in the genes, you know.

There’s also a plot and a character for a short story chasing themselves around my mind at the moment, courtesy of something Lord H said yesterday. They are even now pecking at the inside of my head and I will have to let them out at some stage before they become too irritating. But I don’t want to get too carried away and do too much so I end up in a sobbing heap. Patience is all – so they say.

And talking of short stories, I’ve just finished the I Do Anthology – in support of gay marriage equality in eBook version. A nice mix of stories, some erotic and some not, though I do think that the first one in the collection, The Lindorm’s Twin, is rather weak and shouldn’t have been included at all, let alone be in pride of place. It rather put me off and I was desperately skipping it. However, that said, the collection picks up again once you get to the second story and from there on it’s fine. Particular favourites include Outed by Clare London (a witty tale of an unexpected coming out moment which includes a brother/sister conversation that made me laugh out loud. It’s my joint favourite and a classy read), Lust in Translation by Storm Grant (where a hooker isn’t entirely what he seems and a cop gets rather more than he bargained for), Making Memory by Lisabet Sarai (a moving encounter between two very different women) and Code of Honour by Marquesate (my other joint favourite in the collection – a short story with considerable depth set in the Foreign Legion with two very strong leads. I couldn’t put it down, in a virtual sense). And special mention has to go to gay fiction stalwarts, Alex Beecroft, Sharon Maria Bidwell, Fiona Glass and Erastes (whose story of grief relived actually had me crying at the start), all of whom can always be relied on to produce a good solid tale well told. Worth a read for sure and of course it’s a very good cause.

Today’s nice things:

1. Getting on, slowly, with Hallsfoot
2. Poetry
3. Being a brilliant solver of anagrams – at last!
4. Short story ponderings
5. The anthology.

Anne Brooke
Anne’s website – not averse to a spot of derring-do herself

Extra holiday, a monster of a book and poetry success

An extra day off today, hurrah! No particular reason, except that I never use my full quota of holiday during the year so I always end up having to use it before I lose it. I’m allowed to take 5 days over into the next holiday year (which starts in April), so I still have two more of these to go before March is over. Not that I’m complaining – extra short working weeks are always welcome, naturally.

Here’s this morning’s meditation:

Meditation 59

You hold your grief
in silence,

letting only the dying fire
speak.

Sometimes words
say nothing,

cannot match
the heart.

Imprison the truth
in your mouth’s bitterness

and taste it
to the full.

For most of the day, I’ve been struggling with Hallsfoot’s Battle. Lordy but it’s been a huge effort, I can tell you. Each ruddy word dragged out with the aid of only a rather raggedy rope and a lot of grunting. Hmm, not much change there then. Why is writing sometimes so bloody hard??? My dears, it’s quite exhausting. Anyway, I’ve managed to drag myself, kicking and screaming, to 83,000 words, and I’ve got to the end of a scene. Thank the Lord. I think tomorrow I’ll return to see what Ralph is doing. At least I might possibly have some ideas for him. But let’s not count on it yet, eh …

Mind you, my own particular writing battle has driven me to fit in a totally delicious late afternoon nap, so at least that’s one good thing. And it’s meant that the slow grumbling headache that’s been nagging at me all day has faded away, so that’s a relief for sure.

Talking of monsters of books (which we were, sort of), I’ve just finished Christopher Rush’s mammoth tome, Will. That’s been something of a struggle too, even though it’s a fascinating book. Which doesn’t quite succeed, in my opinion. Still, it’s a brave effort and Rush certainly needs points for courage. It’s supposed to be about Shakespeare’s retelling of his life story on his deathbed to his lawyer. A wonderful premise for sure, and the writing is very poetic on occasion. But maybe that premise is where the trouble starts. First off, there’s no real plot, as such. It’s simply one man telling another about his life, and you’re never allowed to forget that fact. This means that the action and emotion is unfortunately very distanced from the reader and you’re told everything rather than being directly shown it through the text. It would have been much better if you’d had a prologue setting up the scene and an epilogue drawing it back again, with the rest of the book being allowed to sing unaccompanied. In a strange way also, it’s slightly easier to read if you try to forget it’s supposed to be a novel at all, and take it as a long – very long! – prose poem. Slightly easier anyway. It would definitely be interesting to see what Rush’s poetry is like. I must also admit that the man Shakespeare as portrayed here rapidly became very wearisome and my sympathies were for those poor unfortunates he rubbed up against, such as Anne Hathaway and the long-suffering lawyer (just let the poor man eat his pie without carping on about it, for goodness sake!). So, as I imagine the real Shakespeare must have been quite fascinating, I suppose in making me dislike him so, Rush must at least be performing some kind of literary miracle. In a negative way. That said, the historical details are very vibrant and obviously well researched. Perhaps it would be better rewritten as a non-fiction study of the age? And it certainly needs an editor who’s not afraid to cut – it outstays its welcome hugely in terms of length. So, a brave attempt at something different by an author who can obviously write (but needs much much tighter control), but in the end a magnificent failure, I fear.

On a far more minimalist front, I’m pleased to say that Faith Hope and Fiction webzine has been kind enough to accept three of my meditation poems for publication in March. Hurrah! And the lovely Tricia (thanks, Tricia!) must surely get a special prize for sending me the acceptance email only a few minutes after I submitted the work. I’ve never had such a speedy response! The good news (bearing in mind today’s book review) is all together the three poems only come to 113 words, so nobody can accuse me of wordiness …

Tonight, there’s not much on TV so it looks like the sudoku pile calls to Lord H and myself. And ah I see he’s left the tough killer one blank. Dammit. Cover your ears, people – there will probably be screaming …

Today’s nice things:

1. Holiday
2. Poetry
3. Getting to the end of a difficult writing session
4. Napping
5. Doing battle with an interpretation of Shakespeare (strangely …)
6. More poetry success.

Anne Brooke
Anne’s website – having monster-like tendencies itself