Archives

The Jump

Jul6

“The chute should have shot out immediately, but nothing.”

The creative writing tutor here at Wakefield went through a period of setting us a check list of things to write about a while back. Each story had to include all five things on the list and the list would change week on week. The only thing that was on the list each week was expert knowledge which actually isn’t true. You can see that in a few of my stories now. It’s in The Forcefield. It’s in Dumb Luck. And it’s in The Jump too.

With this story I really wanted it to be a simple stream of consciousness, told in real time. I wanted to see if that would draw the reader in and add a sense of emergency.

Why not have a read of it in my Prose section and let me know what you think?

Dumb Luck

Jun6

“This guy’s like the Angel of Death. He’s big time. The End.”

I wrote Dumb Luck as a sort of modern retelling of an old religious story I heard about a man who sees the Angel of Death in Jerusalem and fears he is going to die so he flees all the way to Damascus in an attempt to cheat death. The only problem is, death doesn’t just work by chance. Does he?

You can read my story in my Prose section.

Seasonal Revelations

May25

“Only hope stays above ground.”

I very rarely plan to write poetry in a particular form. I usually just start and the form either finds itself or it all becomes a piece of free verse. That’s something I hope to change this year. I want to write in as many different forms as possible. To experiment. To see what I like.

Seasonal Revelations are a set of Haiku (or Haiku No Renga), based upon the biblical nature of the seasons and the year. I originally wrote them for a creative writing class at HMP Frankland and I must admit that I don’t like the form all that much, but they still hold meaning for me as each year blurs into the next and time leaves me behind.

You can have a read of the full set in my Poetry section.

The Forcefield

May4

“The wrench collided with the weightless sandwich.”

I rarely try to write comedy. I think it is the most pressured kind of writing to attempt. It can be very easy to fail at it, and when you do fail, it is very obvious that you have. In fact, The Forcefield is the first piece of writing I have ever put out for public consumption which has a deliberate comedic element.

Check it out in my Prose section and let me know how far from the mark you think it falls!

The Fire and the Sea

Apr4

“Nothing mattered more to him than the woman’s happiness, and he would gladly embrace any pain or sorrow if he could save her from the same.”

The Fire and the Sea has actually been on this site since I first set up. It is not a new story. But what I never expected was for the person I wrote it about to find it and, on this very day last year, to write her own second part to it and attach that as a comment (yes, it is a true story – albeit one that is told through symbolism). I was over the moon that she had found me, and that she made contact in this way, and I soon wrote a third part as a comment myself.

No more was added, although much happened in the lives of the woman with eyes of fire and the man from the sea, and today seems like the perfect day to post part four as another comment, updating the story and sending my own song out upon the wind.

Whether or not this is the end of the story is not my decision. I can only hope that there is more yet to come.

You can read all four parts of The Fire and the Sea in my Prose Section.

It Means Peace

Aug4

One of my favourite books (and also one of my favourite films) is K-Pax. It’s the first of a trilogy of books and it resonates with me very deeply. Recently I remembered one part of it where the main character (perhaps a mental patient or perhaps a genuine alien from the planet K-Pax) tells his psychiatrist that the whole foundation of the justice system on Earth is universally thought of as being completely insane. How could a system that is constructed around the idea of an eye for an eye ever make sense as justice? In fact, how could it ever make sense as anything other than revenge?

I don’t completely agree with the point, but I do understand it and it resonates with me because it reminds me that we used to burn witches at the stake – but then we grew up. We used to hang, draw and quarter people – but we grew out of that too. We hanged people for murder right into the middle of the twentieth century – but we did outgrow it. Our perceptions of what is a humane demonstration of justice are fluid and generally, they are improving. Maturing even. And that’s important to me for one very big reason. The general public don’t seem to understand just how much being in prison without a concrete release date can affect a person. My hope is, the years will slowly teach them. And one day, maybe we’ll see just how inhumane that can be too, and we’ll find a better way to administer justice.

Oh, and what does ‘K-Pax’ really mean anyway? Well look Pax up in a Latin dictionary. To me, that’s a great place to start.