Bryan Islip's Blog, page 60

Thus ends ...

They know some things we don't. 'They' being all species of life other than Man. (See - I even capitalised the Man without even thinking about it; we men are arrogant or what?)And what now do they know? It may be sub-zero outside but they know the time of year - and sure as hell they know that Spring is here.

We have just returned from a walk along the shore between a cultivated field and heathery tangle on the one hand and a low spring-tide sea on the other. A buzzard searched the edge of th...

Who's it for? Why?

'I've been thinking about writing a novel,' she said. 'I've got it all in my head.'

'Then just get on with it,' I said. 'Willy Nelson isn't the only one wondering about how time goes slip-sliding away! What kind of a novel?'

'Oh, one like that Dan Brown one,' she said. 'You know - spiritual, strong story?'

'Difficult. There's only one Da Vinci Code. Thank the good lord some might say.'

'I know.' She sounded annoyed.

'Who's going to read it? You have to think about your reader.'

'What was it, thirty...

Cold night, warm music

The Scottish Opera came to Gairloch last evening. The locals in this remote outpost of the Highlands turned out in force in spite of the continuing cold, (is this winter ever going to end? was the cry), and were well rewarded for so doing. A community centre full literally to overflowing applauded each and every operatic offering. I'm not going to pick out anything or any one of Miranda Sinani, Adrian Ward, Louise Collett, Robert Tucker for special mention. I'm not expert enough to be able to...

Too many people?

It was Paul Burgoyne's Mill Hill lecture, The rise in human infertility - tragedy or godsend? which I read on-line in 2002 and that helped crystallise the thinking behind the storyline of my novel. It is still worth a look …

http://www.nimr.mrc.ac.uk/MillHillEss...

Paul Burgoyne, Ph.D,F.Med.Sci is an MRC/National Institute of Medical Research Group Leader working in London on the link between sex chromosome anomalies and infertility. Extracts of his comment on Going with...

Footsteps in the night

Once before we've looked out of the bedroom window here in our new home on to a snow covered garden cross-crossed with the night tracks of animals.

Last night it happened again. (The snow and the tracks, that is.) This time there could be no mistaking the creator of those footsteps in the dark. A large stag, for sure, and looking for something to eat. The national and local news has of late picked up on the dire straits into which the red deer herds of the Highlands have fallen due to this mo...

One cold morning

I was born in London; spent most of my working life in and around that or similar Metropoli. Dr Johnson wrote, 'if a man is tired of London he is tired of life.' Really, Doctor? In his day the place was a disease ridden, crime ridden, vice ridden Hieronymus Bosch-like hell hole.

Take a look at the view from Kirkhill House this cold new morning ...




Of course this thing through which you and I can join with the rest of our species and the world at large does make a difference. A massive differenc...

Eating and reading Shortbread

I've written about the influence on me of Hemingway's novels but his short stories had an even greater impact. Perhaps they were the pattern for today's mantra, 'less is more'. In some mysterious way a mere incident, scenario or brief episode transmuted itself into an epic story. I recall the stories so well: a young soldier returning from the war, wounded in spirit, trekking the wilderness alone in search of a life gone by; long before On The Waterfront a washed up prize fighter awaiting his...

In the beginning (part 3)

To bring 'On Writing Going with Gabriel to a close.

Yesterday I told of how my first novel More Deaths Than One came into being to the sound of a fanfare heard mainly / only by a small population on the north west coast of Scotland. To continue ...


'However, one of the many, many avenues down which I had taken this first completed novel was a mutual appraisal website sponsored by the Arts Council of England called YouWriteOn.com. Dozens of aspirant writers had reviewed More Deaths and had liked...

In the beginning ... (part 2)

Yesterday I wrote of how my fixation on fiction was conceived and born, how life overtook writing but how the dream lived on. Then ...

'September 2001, Holiday Inn, Bahrain: phone rings. Dee calling from our Winchester home: "Quick, Bryan, turn on the telly; America's under attack!" I rush down to the bar and watch the big screen as bodies tumble lazily from high towers and young Saudis blow kisses at the screen. Later on I return Dee's call; "I'm coming home," I tell her. "We'll take a holida...

In The Beginning

I've been asked several times to explain how I came to write novels at such an 'advanced age'. Of course I dom't like even to acknowledge that my age is advanced or that it relates in any way to the product of my writing, but in these, our times, such things have an irrational importance they may not have had in times gone by. So anyway I decided to write a short account, and am going to publish it here on my blog in three parts; one each day ...


Bryan Islip: On writing Going with Gabriel

1955,...