Songs and Planning

Planning, yes, champing at the bit to get going.  Of course, still torn.

Also, I am beset by music and the idea, germinating in my head, to take about 15 tracks and use these to organise my writing.  That would imply approximately 3k words per track, and still be below target, as well as suggesting that each track would take about a chapter.

So, take the album Fundamental by the Pet Shop Boys and the film Hitler: the Rise of Evil and you pretty much have my autistic man becomes dictator and nastiness happens novel plot in a nutshell.  The trick will be to cover the early life in such a way that I can edit the order afterward and still make it interesting.  In films they often use isolated vignettes and time-lapse to cover aspects like this and most books I read don't actually bother with this sort of thing.  Those that do tend to be the more monstrous novels, those with huge doorstop plots (like Shogun) and they deal with the passge of time by, well, covering all of it.

I don't want to do that.  I'm not sure I enough sub-plot to make that sort of thing interesting and to advance characterisation and plot.  I'm toying with the idea of giving my MC a few more foibles to flesh it all out, such as maybe going for a homosexual angle.  Now, I'm anxious that my generally dysfunctional and slightly amoral autistic MC doesn't misrepresent minorities, so I don't think he'll actually be homosexual, but he doesn't know that and I figure he'll try.

I'm also moving more toward creating an independent world in which this plot can take place.  Why?  Well, partly laziness, there's a whole bunch of stuff that I would need to know inside out in order to make a political rise to power style of novel accurate and convincing in modern society.  To do it in a historical manner would necessarily invoke Godwin's Law and I would have a hard time escaping the allusions, however deliberate, to Hitler and the NSDAP - which would possibly make me look like I endorse their methods or their ideology.  That's a no-no.  But, if I do create a new world, then I will have to contextualise it enough without going overboard so that the reader feels at home enough there to make sense of it but not so at home that they make assumptions where they shouldn't.  They need to recognise that it is not our world but I shouldn't be hammering that home to the reader - they should be figuring that out for themselves and feeling clever!

Heck, at this rate, I could just publish my babbling and hit the target...

To prologue or not to prologue?

Time gathers pace and so my idea-sleet continues - of course.  I can't just have one idea for NaNo, I must have loads and then find that none of them are developed enough to actually manage to write and finish a novel or even a plotline!

Anyway, in amongst all of this there is a question to be asked.  Should one prologue?  I mean, with my autism-politics plotline I thought a prologue would be a good way to show how the end goes down in such a way that draws a reader in.  However, I also remembered that there are plenty of people and readers whose opinions I respect that say that they never even read prologues.  Which makes sense.

So, should I bother writing one or should I cheat and make it chapter one?  Or, horror, should I just not open and instead rely on the early life of my autistic future revolutionary to grab the reader?

Then there's the Aftermath plotline that keeps pootling around my head.  I originally cheated and added it to the end of the plotline that appears on this blog as Bradford Interchange but... I dunno, I have a soft-spot for the idea of a non-linear plot but for the fact that I would have to write it linearly to begin with - that would be hard for me to do.  In that sense it would be the perfect candidate for NaNo because I would be forced to write it and get it all done - and I may even edit it - but in another I worry that I would destroy it and get bored and then abandon it.

NaNo plot

Okay, so, this is going to be the home of my attempt on the north face of NaNoWriMo this year.  I guess that means it's as good a place as any to be doing some plotting and planning.

At this stage I'm looking at writing a political thriller with a main character who has high-functioning Asperger's and will end up taking over a country.  Think the rise of Hitler, with a smattering of French Revolution, and a great deal of using albums I like to suggest how the plot will unfold.  I'm thinking to start with the ending, follow it with the story of the main character's early life - where he shall have an affir and gravate towards the big cities and the different style of life there.  Somehow I'm thinking he will fall in with a group plotting their own government take over and, by dint of being autistic and single-mided, he'll end up in charge.

Yeah, it's like the Rise of Evil but... I dunno.  I hope it's interesting and I hope I can write it.

That... or something involving time travel and multiple dimensions.  That will end up with a large section in a Middle Ages area with a dragon.  Singular, small part.  Knight in shining armour that is not all they seem will rescue a damsel.

Babbling.

NaNoWriMo

If you haven't heard of this, it's worth a peak.  I'm intending to try again this year, first time in a while, and, as part of the challenge, I'm intending to post up here anything that I write on a given day.  That is, without revisions, and I shall publish all of the entries at the end of the month on a date in the past for the blog (so that I don't clog this place up with needless verbiage).

In other news, has anyone else had an idea for a story based on an album?  I mean, I know I am a bit of a freak with my zeal for the Pet Shop Boys, but I always feel like there are stories lurking in their music - especially using Fundamental as a skeleton and adding things like It's a Sin and Try It to give chapters and extra plotlines...

Okay, so first post here since MAY and I'm babbling as always.

Eyes Open

An explosion of noise followed by the shower of stones jerked eyes open that hadn’t even been aware they were shut. Somewhere beyond the ethereal white of the night’s fog a new morning threatened and was held at bay by the pitiful pile of sandbags making up their parapet. There was a coffee cup resting near the periscope somewhere but he couldn’t make his eyes focus clearly.

A flick, a spark, inhale, burn. It hadn’t been as long this time but splashes of mud and shocks of flame made no heroes of the sentries supposed to be out in strength but, in reality, cowering from the fury from above in fox-holes clawed into frosty earth. Shrapnel buzzed over his head and was acknowledged with a nonchalant nod of his unshaven face. He didn’t look over the lip to the scene beyond, it would be lost to the smoke and flame of a preparatory bombardment like the sounds of birds and rats had been lost to the express train roar. Soil bounced off his helmet from a nearby gout of force and his breath curled in tortured air. They had one more day left and that cold hope had been chilled further by the knowledge that they were coming this time rather than simply giving them something to think about.

Another close-call and he sighs, retreating to the Stygian gloom of his own officer’s foxhole surrounded by wooden planking and protected by another low beam of sandbags. All soldiers believed in luck, any that said different were lying, and he felt he was pushing his luck too far for the moment.

“Sorry about that, mate. Beans always give me gas.” Smiler greeted him with forced levity and an actual smile.

His nerves were too taut. “It wasn’t funny the first time,” clipped and angry for no reason, “And it’s not funny now!”

“Lay off, Sarge,” plaintively; not his actual rank but his nickname after the duties that he carried out for the section, “We’re all tired.” The complaint of the dead.

“Shut up. Just shut up, you bastards.” The real sergeant of the band sat alone and aloof in the corner. He was a veteran, a man who had seen everything before and the oldest irritable member of the section. He was at least twenty-two. “He’s coming.” Smoke billowed from his nostrils as he focussed his watery eyes on some ephemeral fixed point beyond the supported earth of the wall. The last time, two months previously, it had been a concrete wall, a safe haven in the maelstrom; now it was wood and chalk and mud. Before there had been a stove, electric lighting and even a heater; now there were rats, bad drainage, candles and winter wet. No one rightly knew what the sergeant saw in that steady gaze of his, just that it allowed him to act as oracle.

“Misty.” The returned sentry announced it as if it explained the constant dull rumble outside. It reminded them all uncomfortably of the first week all over again, conditions were similar, but it had only been a day so far. “Wet.” Despite being used to the noise it was still enough to reduce communication to the lowest common denominator.

“This sodden place is always misty. He’ll still come.” His stare never left that point beyond the wall, ignoring the rodent eyes peeking back. Did he see the end of all things in the mud and filth or else the firm compost from which all growth sprung? Hope or depression? Reality or illusion?

“It’ll be a week again. They always move slowly. One more day and the uplanders will be in, let them get it up their backsides for a change.” The latrines caved in at the first salvo, no one had bothered to replace them nor dig for the Captain. His hand made for an interesting centre piece on the planks of wood that stood for a table.

“Aw, just put a sock in it you whining piece of shit, he’s coming soon. He switched to shrapnel an hour ago, next it’ll be smoke or, if the wind picks up, gas.”

His instincts, never failed, the section trusted them before and would trust them again. Maybe he saw them in the layers of earth before him.

Glow, inhale, breathe out; ignore the dull noise echoing in ears, punching lungs and heating the back of the throat with dry dust. A decision no one makes and swearing on the inside. Despairing look at what remains of the cheap tobacco rolled in thin paper, discard it with barely disguised contempt and drag on the arid heat and the mist. Drill took forty seconds to set up the shrouded centrepiece of the section and be ready. “How long?” So much for university education.

“Half an hour.” Conviction. Not a good thing.

“Time for tea?”

“Supplies are late.”

Supplies are always late. Constant bombardment somewhere on the line, phone lines always cut, movement dangerous. Sappers routinely sent home. Food late, cooks aren’t heroes either.

“There’s a slab of Kelly on the plate, knock yourself out. Coffee in the usual.”

Shrug, remember the coffee outside, sit and stuff the slab half heartedly into the saliva. Silence. Alliteration, refuge of the ravenous. Hold out part of it to Smiler as he sits playing with the last six of his playing cards. Grunt, wordless now in anticipation, uniform scratching the skin at the neck, nothing to do but wait, try focussing beyond the latest shift of dust. It was smoke now. He declines.

“How can you eat at a time like this, Sarge? We’ve only got a day and then it’s all someone else’s problem. Aren’t you the least bit excited?”

Pointless prattling. His section went on the first day, joined this one afterward to replace Badger, filling large shoes. No liked him then and no one does; faux happiness, uneducated, delusion and whines too much. Played with his cards too much. His face ripe for smashing in, fists clenching in readiness but they are fought back down. He’s easier than what lies beyond the mist and flame and smoke and shockwaves because he is within reach.

On that first day there had been nothing to see, feed the thirst of the muzzle, feel the bounce of metal from metal, a world reduced to the staccato bark of a mechanical master. A summer dawn, quiet of a morning with clear blue and birdsong, listening to the steel rain, sheets of death washing over and drum behind as the set up had been completed. They had walked, disbelief and ashen faced, they just walked but could not be seen. Spared that. Eight hours and the ammunition did not run out but the light did. “Half an hour you say?”

“Maybe sooner.”

“How can you talk like this? Come on! One more day! Surely they’ll give us one more day!”

“Shut up!”

Silence then, stretches across the foxhole like no-man’s-land after the shells have fallen, all sides drawing breath. Time to think, if it weren’t for the maddening rumble just loud enough to be grating but quiet enough to keep ears working. The slab of Kelly over, cards flipping once more. Always watching, waiting, listening to the tone and then the realisation that the rhythm has changed. Check inventory: postcard from home, the last; lucky coins; spare ammunition clips; grenade; bayonet; chocolate liberated from a farmhouse, only a small amount left; and nothing that was wanted would be left behind. Kipper stows his book, Mutch fingers his enemy pistol without bullets like a man possessed, Smiler runs the joker in and out of his palm softly.

“Who’s out there?” Meaning who was supposed to be out.

“Me.” Sarcastically deliver, no hint of humour, war breeds cowards.

A grunt. “Go check, let us know if you see anything.”

Two days after that slaughter they had changed their tactics to rushes and the Brass had adopted a policy of focussed withdrawals and ambush style counter-attacks to draw them in. Within a day we had been pulled out.

Spent time in a local village with local girls and local law, common enough for men pushed to the edge. Found one with flame red hair and a body that did not display too much of the ravages caused by her business. A tactical withdrawal from the inn, to the darkness of her room, with the darkness of her touch, in the darkness of the situation. Emotions over-ridden by suppressed instinct, proximity to death brings proximity to lust. Smell, lick, bite. Panting a secret language never heard by lovers, cut and thrust of the war beneath the sheets. Breakthrough and reserves brought up to exploit the gap. Emotionless groping, mutual meaningless mental masturbation. Flesh on flesh and virginity liberated by the invaders from another land. Some of them were willing but were better when they resisted.

He was right, no shower of soil as a greeting, almost calm across the unearthly scene lit by the first rays of dawn. Bruised blue around the cloud nestled in shell craters and abandoned sapping lines, confident enough to maintain strength on watch above, frustrating attempts to peer through the gloom. Ringed by red and purple dimming to cold blue above. Nothing. A cock of the head, there really was nothing: no rumble, no gunfire, no noise but birdsong. Again. They are coming.

“Section make ready! Time to get up and at ‘em.” The last uttered in a bored undertone, another eight hours? See nothing, feed the monster. Binoculars fished from webbing, raised up and scanning the close horizon carefully. Flurry of activity close, metallic clinks and clanks as a reception is prepared for the visitors from beyond the veil drawn across the front.

“Gun up Sarge!” his complaining over, Smiler is overcome by business and drill precision. Kipper brought ammunition and Mutch the tripod. Forty-eight seconds, not really the very best but it would do for now. Our Sergeant remained out of sight, quietly ensconced with his own demons inside but no one said anything. They never did, our Sergeant was a dead man, a charm against the enemy, an innocent from the salient years before: ineffable. He pulled a knife in the village, devil of a time explaining him out of that.

Water brought closer, cold stabbing through cheap winter wool, fingers red raw and shaking with leaking shoes. Cursing, low and guttural. Anticipation and squinting to see further.

Squeaking, a spring-like release; chugging of a petrol driven engine and the first tell-tale rattle of gunfire – their machine guns; much slower and louder than our own dogs of war in response.

“Steady, wait for the targets.” Senselessly wasting ammunition is not an option. Supplies are late.

“Sarge.” Simple and immediate confirmation. To the drill.

Return to vigil, that noise getting closer, along with the rattling of metal, the chattering of fire; how were they getting their guns closer?

A black form emerges from the funeral shroud, rolls forward shouldering aside banks of roiling white as it waddles over cuts, gulleys and listening posts. A most ungainly beast seemingly balanced and alive. Spews black fumes from top and side as if all the fires of Hell burn brightly within. Without waiting a gun opens fire from the specially constructed sandbag nest. An odd response, metal ricocheting from metal, the zing and plink of bullets a swarm of hornets in an orchard. Yet the beast is unperturbed and spits its own flame lit retort from deathly black muzzles peeking from front and sides. Involuntary flinch, vision replaced with blackness then the wood of the duck board. Hissing through clenched jaw. The gun belches its answer once more to the glockenspiel medley of the mocking ignorance of the beast and war breeds no heroes.

A scramble, a fountain that erupts all over all at once then moves so that Kipper is screaming for his mother. Hands all over his jacket, spurting pulses from holes that let the light through, gurgling as he falls. Ammunition spills with blood across the trench and another recruit joins the army of Heaven. Smiler keeps firing, five minutes ago he refused to contemplate another day, now he keeps pulling the trigger long after there’s nothing left for the firing pin to strike home.

A new smell, that of fear, in nostrils made alive by acrid cordite, new warmth on thighs and crotch, a weight dribbling down the back of gooseflesh buttocks to dare to lift eyes above the parapet once more. The beast, undaunted, reaches the end of the wire with its awful mass, still it rolls onward, inhuman, fell and clanking like father’s suit of armour in childhood games.

A tread on the lip, a rotating foot pulls the bulk in, a snout into the trough to feed on the young men served as swill inside. The machine gun is still clicking as the metal form claws and grasps the far wall, lifting up and out of our home beyond, to the green fields miles behind? Why is the gun still clicking?

The answers arrive and shoot him cleanly with rifles, one in field grey tunic and winter coat readies a grenade before hurling into the hole we just left. No sign of the Sergeant. Wicked bayonet points flash with moisture in the cold sun. “I surrender!” He’s from number four section, our left flank, his hands raised in supplication to the intruders.

One of them cups his ear as if he doesn’t understand or can’t hear and it’s been done before. Tales that when the devils reached the lines after eight hours of butchery there were no prisoners taken, that they are lusting for blood and only death will satisfy. Inhuman animals, baying and cawing.

“I surrender!” He repeats his plea, clutching to last ember to light his day.

A sneer, a shot, a perfectly executed bayonet thrust, a laugh, they leave. I look at Smiler, his arm draped over the cooling gun barrel, his head blown open and leaking over the carefully arranged sandbags and his body slumped beneath. Empty eyes staring into the beyond, like the Sergeant. Nothing left in the dugout that will be missed, but there is, the Sergeant was a talisman, a guarantee now lost and all that can be done is wait, and wonder. I saw the elephant, a thick metal hide and dark eyes malevolent in the bright dawn.

Bradford Interchange

It's a bit of an odd one this.  Just a random extract.  I would welcome any and all commentary on this - evisceration in particular!  I want this one to work.

       It was about three in the afternoon by the time he reached Bradford City Interchange: the Plod would be on their way and he was wearing a simple white blouse over a blue satin camisole with a clerical grey skirt. He was the only running and his actual innocence meant nothing in the heavy commuter traffic. At least the boots had low heels. With a disregard borne of panic he boarded the nearest shuttle clutching the satchel and tried to look nonchalant as he took a seat in the plain compartment.

       Everything he owned was now in that simple green canvas bag, worn around the edges and with frayed stitching, which was a strange enough thought without considered how he was dressed in public. The wig helped detract attention from the fact that he hadn’t had time to shave properly but there was no chance that he would pass under anything more than a cursory glance. With no sign of his pursuers on the platform, Ben heaved a grateful sigh as the train shunted into motion.

       “So,” and the word destroyed his self-congratulation, “Do you always dress like that?”

       “Ah...” he looked across that the woman to see her smirking. “No. This is... an unusual situation,” he finished lamely. A glance confirmed that there were no other surprises in the form of missed fellow passengers.

       “I see.” Her face was suddenly serious but something around her eyes remained playful. “Are you some kind of queer then?”

       At first he was taken aback, then horrified at the realisation that a deep-seated fear was being voiced and then he felt strangely in control and at peace. “No. No, quite the opposite.” He was even smiling. “I don’t suppose you’d care to find out how much?” Great, he thought, I’m on the run, cross-dressed and now I decide I’m a latter-day Casanova?

       “Sorry, cat, you aren’t quite my type.”

       “Pity,” he found himself replying, “You are rather pretty.” Oh come on! “I guess that makes you my type.”

       “You often speak in clichés from the flicks, sweetheart?” Her head was cocked, her eyebrows raised, something was drawing her in.

       “Only when the situation calls for it.” Maybe it was the clothes, the wig, or the fact that he’d clambered down a concrete block of flats already but something made the ridiculous situation not only bearable but almost comfortable. “What about you?”

       “Don’t get me wrong,” she smiled again, it was a pretty one, “You’re still not my type, but I think you’re going to like me.”

       “Pardon me?” He was fairly certain that this wasn’t how these sorts of conversations were supposed to go. “Aren’t you going to like me?”

       “Should I?”

       “Isn’t that how-?”

       “You didn’t answer my question, chicken,” she assumed a more business-like air, “But maybe I should have made myself more clear. Why is someone who isn’t a queer dressed like that?”

       “I’m...” He considered lying but nothing plausible came to him. “I’m on the run from the Plod.”

       “Really? Well that-”

       She was interrupted by the door to the compartment sliding open. A blue-uniformed ticket inspector entered, looking intently at his counter. “Tickets and ID, please.” His eyes flashed once on the woman but seemed to fix on Ben.

       “Here,” began the woman, a little forcefully, “It should all be in order.”

       He took her proffered documents, “There’s no-”

       “No, I know,” she waved he outstretched hand at him. “Does this cover it?”

       Dubiously, he took the coins, “I-”

       “I don’t need any change, he’s with me.”

       Ben opened his mouth to speak, as the ticket inspector grumbled to himself and rolled off the small paper chits, but the woman shushed him with a look. “Two singles.” They were pointedly handed directly to the woman without another glance at Ben. “Good day.” And the door slid shut again.

       A moment passed.

       “What did you do that for?” Ben was incredulous.

       “Did he check your ID?”

       “No, but he knows that I’m dressed in drag like some circus freak!”

       “You’re on the run from the Plod, right?”

       Uncertainly: “Uh, yes.”

       “So they’ll be looking for you,” she stared directly at him, “And that means checking for any sign of you on any public transport. That means asking people if they remember your ID papers. It won’t hold them up for long,” she smiled with genuine amusement, “but it will make their lives that little bit more difficult.”

       He didn’t like it, but Ben had to concede her logic worked.

       “Now, here’s your ticket, Princess,” she handed him the red card chit as if explaining to a child, “You’ll need it to get off the platform.”

       A moment’s hesitation before Ben was able to move and take it. He was rewarded with another smile. “Thank you.”

       “Oh, you’ll pay me back, this isn’t a free ride.” Crossing her arms, she sat back in the seat.

       “No, not for the ticket.” His hands shook as he fumbled in his bag for change, “Just... thank you.”

       She took the two five pence coins offered. “I didn’t mean for the ticket.” There was something almost predatory about her as she placed them in her purse. “Don’t go on about it.” The train began to slow down on the approach to the platform. “Have you somewhere to stay?”

       “I’ve never been to Leeds before,” turning back from the window he caught her eye again, “And I think you’ve done enough for me. Thank you, but you’re going to be in enough trouble as it is.”

       “And?” Unimpressed. “You don’t know anything about me.” She looked back out of the window. “Look, stay with me tonight, at the very least I can fix your wardrobe.”

       “I can buy my own shirt and trou-”

       “They’re looking for a man travelling alone, right? And I’m guessing they don’t know about your little fetish. So let’s use this to our advantage and make it that little bit harder for them, no?” A mischievous grin crawled across her face as she fixed him with a stare again. “Name’s Iris, sweetness, you?”

       “Ben-” He stopped and looked down. “That’s not going to work. Rebecca?”

       “Oh yes, let’s go with that one! Bex it is.”

       “Do I get a choice in shortening it?” The train juddered to a halt.

       “No. Should you?”

       “I assume you’re not called Iris either.”

            They stood and Iris reached the door first, “Clever girl,” opened the window and reached out to pull the handle for the door. “Ladies first.”

Murderer

"So why did you contact me?"

"You were on the run, seemed everyone is looking for you."

"Why should I trust you?"

"Oh, you shouldn't.  That would be as bad as me trusting you.  I mean, I can say that I'm not going to call the police or anything but you have absolutely no reason to believe me when I do.  I guess all you have is faith."

"You one of those religious nuts?  I saw plenty of those in prison."

"I believe in God."

"I could kill you now, and no one would ever find the body."

"I know.  You absolutely could.  I wouldn't expect God to pop down and stop you either, if that's what you'd be trying to disprove."

"So what's to stop me?"

"Nothing, and that's what makes this so delicious.  I can add another inducement: I have food, shelter and a safe place.  But I've ditched my phone.  You're right: no one knows that I'm here or that I contacted you or that you are here.  Of course, you could choose to disbelieve everything that I've just said."

"I'm not innocent, I killed them.  All of them."

"I know.  Who said I thought you didn't?"

"So why help me?"

"I haven't helped you yet.  But, in answer to your question, why not?  Do you need the help?  Do you want me to help?  Should I offer some assistance?  Does it matter who you are?"