Christopher Fowler's Blog, page 108

First Line, First Page

It’s the fear you hear from many writers. ‘I don’t know how to start’. But getting it right as you set out is important because the opening sets the tone for what follows. You can’t load a momentous or shocking opening into the first sentence very easily without it looking overly melodramatic. The first line […]

What’s Your Style?

Can you tell if a writer has a particular style? I didn’t think I had one until my agent pointed it out. I’d always assumed that most writers don’t have just one style but an infinite number ready for use. Good writers can pastiche and mimic. Great ones perform miracles of assimilation that make you believe […]

Bryant & May: Heading Into Trouble

It’s about time we had an update. So, Bryant & May Vol 16, ‘Hall of Mirrors’, is still in hardback, and the first LK Fox novel, ‘Little Boy Found’, is still an e-book. I’ve just finished touring the hardback of ‘The Book of Forgotten Authors’ and will shortly be working on the paperback release. As […]

‘A Good Idea Has A Thousand Fathers’

How often have you read a book and become convinced that you’ve read it somewhere before? Sometimes a particular scene will resonate and I’ll go searching for another version of it. In his immense volume ‘The Seven Basic Plots’ Christopher Booker argued that  there are only seven archetypal themes which recur throughout every kind of […]

The Friday Song Is On Tuesday

‘The Scottsboro Boys’ was angry and contentious when it appeared in 2010 – shockingly so as the real-life miscarriage of justice that wrecked (and indeed, took) the lives of nine young black men falsely accused of rape was one of the last collaborations between John Kander and Fred Ebb before the latter’s death. The Scottsboro […]

An Interesting Question

  On Saturday I appeared at the Stratford-Upon-Avon Literary Festival. I haven’t been to Stratford for a while (not that it’s very far away; I’m just lazy) and the only thing that has changed is the number of Japanese tourists delightedly visiting the Bard’s home town. The event had a terrific lineup of guests, and […]

What You’re Reading: Results

Well, yesterday’s exercise has proven to be a fascinating experience, both here and on Twitter. The heartening news is that we all seem to be reading far above the national average (perhaps it’s just readers on this site and similar book sites). But I’m more interested in the quite extraordinary range of reading. There’s very […]

How Much Are You Reading?

Are the British the only people who read walking along the street? I’m surrounded by people who do so, and indeed I’m one of them. The perils (lampposts, light bruising, other people thoughtlessly getting in the way, rude cyclists, buses, those low metal boxes randomly placed along the pavement by electrical companies) are outweighed by […]

London In Six Sculptures

London has so many statues that no-one notices two-thirds of them. Putting up a public figure always courts controversy, which is why we ended up with the Princess Diana Drainage Ditch of Doom (so-called because children kept falling over in it). The design ‘aims to reflect Diana’s life’; it feels almost embarrassed to be there. […]

Creativity Versus Fish

It happened again last week. Someone threw the example of the fishing industry at me in their argument for Brexit. Passion always overrides the facts; they had passion. I had facts. I knew I would lose, because nobody wants facts thrown at them. They only confuse people; look at Mr Trump. So, a few facts. […]