Guillermo Stitch's Blog, page 6
May 19, 2018
May 11, 2018
The view from Belfast
"What a fascinating book. What a strange and mad thing to have birthed into the world. 'Literature®' is a book about being intoxicated by language. Billy Stringer, our hero, is often intoxicated by whiskey too: this is a hardboiled, hat-wearing world: a neon neo-noir where people are fuelled on a diet of eggs and coffee and nobody sleeps. But words are his drug of choice, his secret obsession. Sadly for him he lives in a philistine age where literature has been re-purposed as fuel. It is the dream of every conservative politician: finally a practical use for the arts! Here 'the road is the page' and the motorist’s brain fizzing on fiction (it has to be fiction – it just doesn’t work with a sporting memoir) powers the car.
This is great news – the world of 'The Second Enlightenment' can finally manage and rationalise these dangerous and seditious objects, these books. And when you’re up against the literary terrorist cell 'Gilgamesh' that can only be a good thing. After all suppressing ideas never works, but finding a way to use books for the betterment of society – by getting people to work – robs Gilgamesh of their power. What’s so great about literature if it’s everywhere, fuelling your school run? It is simultaneously elevated and debased.
This book is a sustained howl of outrage at our dumbed-down society. Stitch sees a world where the best-selling books are memoirs by 15 years old You-tube influencers, where emojis and text-speak proliferate like germs at a sewage outlet, treading water with their mouths open. This is satire in a grand tradition: Fahrenheit 451 but with better jokes.
Stitch’s world is reversed engineered out of a dazzling armoury of tooth-rattling puns – a vehicle that resembles a steel armadillo is known as a 'Car-A-Pace' and follows the tale with its tail. Stitch can throw in these puns and get away with them too, because his tone is so deadpan and pedantic: he builds a fully functioning world about these little linguistic ruptures: he means it, man. And of course he doesn’t mean it at all.
In the novel Billy’s gateway drug is Harry Harrison’s 'The Stainless Steel Rat': James Bolivar diGriz is a fast talking, cigar chomping wise guy super-thief. Our Billy is somewhat less glamorous than his literary hero: badly dressed, recently dumped and living with his drunken mother. What’s worse he is now being followed all over town by the gigantic and cheerfully malevolent Alphonse, who has a big knife and a yen to use it. Never get involved with literature – that stuff can kill you!
This is a beautifully realised book and Stitch a clever and precise writer; there is restraint and coolness here, at odds with the subject matter. And there is love here, a genuine love for the magic and mystery of the imagination. As for Billy’s ultimate fate, well that’s about love too: there is an inversion of Rilke’s dictum that 'Beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror'. His terror behind him Billy is about to become the beautiful.
This is an excellent book. Read it. While they still let you."
John Patrick Higgins, Every Day I Wake Up Hopeful.
This is great news – the world of 'The Second Enlightenment' can finally manage and rationalise these dangerous and seditious objects, these books. And when you’re up against the literary terrorist cell 'Gilgamesh' that can only be a good thing. After all suppressing ideas never works, but finding a way to use books for the betterment of society – by getting people to work – robs Gilgamesh of their power. What’s so great about literature if it’s everywhere, fuelling your school run? It is simultaneously elevated and debased.
This book is a sustained howl of outrage at our dumbed-down society. Stitch sees a world where the best-selling books are memoirs by 15 years old You-tube influencers, where emojis and text-speak proliferate like germs at a sewage outlet, treading water with their mouths open. This is satire in a grand tradition: Fahrenheit 451 but with better jokes.
Stitch’s world is reversed engineered out of a dazzling armoury of tooth-rattling puns – a vehicle that resembles a steel armadillo is known as a 'Car-A-Pace' and follows the tale with its tail. Stitch can throw in these puns and get away with them too, because his tone is so deadpan and pedantic: he builds a fully functioning world about these little linguistic ruptures: he means it, man. And of course he doesn’t mean it at all.
In the novel Billy’s gateway drug is Harry Harrison’s 'The Stainless Steel Rat': James Bolivar diGriz is a fast talking, cigar chomping wise guy super-thief. Our Billy is somewhat less glamorous than his literary hero: badly dressed, recently dumped and living with his drunken mother. What’s worse he is now being followed all over town by the gigantic and cheerfully malevolent Alphonse, who has a big knife and a yen to use it. Never get involved with literature – that stuff can kill you!
This is a beautifully realised book and Stitch a clever and precise writer; there is restraint and coolness here, at odds with the subject matter. And there is love here, a genuine love for the magic and mystery of the imagination. As for Billy’s ultimate fate, well that’s about love too: there is an inversion of Rilke’s dictum that 'Beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror'. His terror behind him Billy is about to become the beautiful.
This is an excellent book. Read it. While they still let you."
John Patrick Higgins, Every Day I Wake Up Hopeful.
May 9, 2018
Just in from E.O.Higgins
E.O. Higgins (Penguin/Unbound) says this:
"A wonderfully-written novella charting the course of a single chaotic day in the life of the protagonist – Billy Stringer – in a strange, noirish world where fiction novels have been outlawed.
The intricate story unfolds quickly; and, as Stringer swiftly succumbs to the sauce, a sudden – and fairly unexpected – love story rapidly bubbles to the surface.
Literature® is a beautifully-rendered story, mixing the cynicism and moral ambiguity of classic noir fiction with startling flashes of humour and some disarmingly tender moments.
A thoroughly recommended debut."
Immense gratitude, E.O.
"A wonderfully-written novella charting the course of a single chaotic day in the life of the protagonist – Billy Stringer – in a strange, noirish world where fiction novels have been outlawed.
The intricate story unfolds quickly; and, as Stringer swiftly succumbs to the sauce, a sudden – and fairly unexpected – love story rapidly bubbles to the surface.
Literature® is a beautifully-rendered story, mixing the cynicism and moral ambiguity of classic noir fiction with startling flashes of humour and some disarmingly tender moments.
A thoroughly recommended debut."
Immense gratitude, E.O.
May 7, 2018
Another review
Deep thanks to Katherine Graham at Theatre Re for this:
"Right from the opening chapter Literature® pulls its reader into a strange and compelling world in which fiction has been outlawed and reading has become an act of terrorism. This is a world in which a large – and, of course, somewhat sinister – corporation sets out to apply the power of story to the ‘wider human project’; keeping traffic moving and getting people to work. This industrialisation of the otherwise prohibited materials uses only the most ‘functional’ of stories and pushes anything experimental or literary deep underground.
Taking place over the course of a single, action packed day in the life of its protagonist, Billy Stringer, the narrative zips along at a thrilling pace. Appropriately named, Stringer is a sports correspondent for a newspaper who is recruited to join the production line churning out acceptable literature for the roads. This offer sets in motion a frenzy of activity for Stringer who has to sweat and squirm his way through the menacing recruitment process while trying to dispose of some compromising material of his own. As well as zipping forward in plot, the narrative also takes us back to happier times, as the trope of an absent girlfriend is turned into a rather touching love story.
A clever interweaving of speculative fiction, dystopian vision, and classic noir, what’s most striking about Literature® is the quality of the writing. The prose is lean and spare with moments of beauty fizzing through showing just enough of the ‘literary bent’ so dangerous to our hero. It is also very funny.
Literature® is a highly engaging and entertaining read – thoroughly recommended, especially for those of us who like to read on our commutes."
"Right from the opening chapter Literature® pulls its reader into a strange and compelling world in which fiction has been outlawed and reading has become an act of terrorism. This is a world in which a large – and, of course, somewhat sinister – corporation sets out to apply the power of story to the ‘wider human project’; keeping traffic moving and getting people to work. This industrialisation of the otherwise prohibited materials uses only the most ‘functional’ of stories and pushes anything experimental or literary deep underground.
Taking place over the course of a single, action packed day in the life of its protagonist, Billy Stringer, the narrative zips along at a thrilling pace. Appropriately named, Stringer is a sports correspondent for a newspaper who is recruited to join the production line churning out acceptable literature for the roads. This offer sets in motion a frenzy of activity for Stringer who has to sweat and squirm his way through the menacing recruitment process while trying to dispose of some compromising material of his own. As well as zipping forward in plot, the narrative also takes us back to happier times, as the trope of an absent girlfriend is turned into a rather touching love story.
A clever interweaving of speculative fiction, dystopian vision, and classic noir, what’s most striking about Literature® is the quality of the writing. The prose is lean and spare with moments of beauty fizzing through showing just enough of the ‘literary bent’ so dangerous to our hero. It is also very funny.
Literature® is a highly engaging and entertaining read – thoroughly recommended, especially for those of us who like to read on our commutes."
May 4, 2018
Reviews
First reviews are in...
"Literature®" is one of the most entertaining books I've had the pleasure to read, anywhere, at any time."
"The joke that hovers over the whole thing is that 'Literature®' is itself literature of a darkish noir shade. If you like exceptional writing and a rattling good fast-paced story with plenty of mystery and romance, you'll love 'Literature®'."
- William Spencer
"I found the book fast-paced and full of surprises. The prose is very lean and hard-boiled, sometimes beautiful and often funny and the story manages, in the end, to be a touching one.
Thoroughly recommended."
- Katja S
Deep thanks.
"Literature®" is one of the most entertaining books I've had the pleasure to read, anywhere, at any time."
"The joke that hovers over the whole thing is that 'Literature®' is itself literature of a darkish noir shade. If you like exceptional writing and a rattling good fast-paced story with plenty of mystery and romance, you'll love 'Literature®'."
- William Spencer
"I found the book fast-paced and full of surprises. The prose is very lean and hard-boiled, sometimes beautiful and often funny and the story manages, in the end, to be a touching one.
Thoroughly recommended."
- Katja S
Deep thanks.
