Stuart Aken's Blog, page 246

Excellent Women, by Barbara Pym, Reviewed.

I read the Folio Society edition of this novel, illustrated rather charmingly and with considerable insight, by Debra McFarlane. There’s something essentially apt about reading a book from the early 50s in the form of a hardback with appropriate plates. Set in the period just following World War II, and written in the first person by one of the ‘excellent women’ of the title, it should really be entirely of its time. The simple brilliance of the writing, the wonderful characterisation and the gently comic surface of a story bursting with subterranean passion, angst, desperation and injustice elevates the novel to the status of a minor classic.
There’s no violence, no sex, no foul language; yet all of humanity is here amongst the weary, caring, superficial, flirting, thoughtless, considerate, courageous, resigned and loving people that inhabit the pages. Church, though neither spirituality nor real faith, plays a significant part in the lives of the protagonists who attend the edifice but appear devoid of any passion for their religion, frequently gently mocking their membership of the club.
Miss Mildred Lathbury, who describes herself in the fourth paragraph of the first chapter as an unmarried clergyman’s daughter just over thirty and living alone without apparent ties, is far from the dull spinster we might expect. The gentle humour that suffuses the whole book often hides a deep pathos as the excellent women of the title go about their daily lives without hope of fulfilment in marriage, career or society in general. Being busy, showing and dealing with concern for their fellow human beings, whilst living grey, unnoticed lives, these are the women who make life easier, sometimes even possible, for those surrounding them.
The unexpressed intelligence, the unacknowledged charity, the unspoken desire, the unrecognised hopes and dreams of these single women is so exquisitely drawn that the reader feels every nuance of the subtle insults that surround them. Taken for granted, patronised, ignored, relied upon and rejected without thought, these women take on all those tasks that others find either boring or irrelevant until the jobs are neglected; only then are the quiet duties seen for the social glue they truly are, but not for very long, of course.
The society in which this novel takes place has largely disappeared, but the people and the circumstances remain. I laughed out loud many times whilst reading the book but always, under the surface, was a recognition that the humour sprang from deep inequalities of both gender and income. I was reminded of the best of British sitcoms where humour is mingled with pathos, each quality emphasising the other in a balance that works so well to entertain whilst putting across a message.

This is a story in which nothing of any significance to anyone outside the narrow confines of the small neighbourhood takes place. There are no earth-shattering events, no crime, nothing crude, nothing erotic. But it depicts lives lived in quiet, courageous desperation and does so with a deep affection for those described. I enjoyed it, and I suspect Mildred will live with me for a long time. Those who enjoy action and adventure will find this hard to read, but I thoroughly recommend it to all those who love romance in its best form, those who enjoy books with real characters, and those who find enjoyment in gentle humour.Related articles Review: Excellent Women by Barbara Pym A Few Good Tidbits from Barbara Pym Marvelous Spinster Barbara Pym At 100 Barbara Pym

May Was a Maybe Month.

It was supposed to be the start, the beginning of the full time writing life. But life has a way of getting in the way of ambition, doesn’t it? Retirement exposes all those domestic tasks that you intended to complete one day. And I’ve been doing some of those. Coupled with the freedom to do what I want when I like, comes some good weather at long last and I felt unequal to allowing the gardens to become even more like jungles for lack of opportunity to care for them. Hedges, bushes and lawns all trimmed and no longer capable of secreting tigers or bears. One of the things I’d decided some time ago was to replace the car when I retired. So, I’ve prepared the old one for my daughter as her first vehicle; she learned to drive in it, so it seems sensible to let her see it through its final few years until she has a job and can afford to replace it. I tend to do a fair bit of research before I go out spending any reasonable quantity of money and, let’s face it, a car is hardly a small purchase, even if it is a used model. So I’ve spent quite a few hours online discovering the most reliable, economic and efficient models before making a selection. I pick up the replacement car on Tuesday.
All the foregoing is, of course, by way of an excuse for not having done much in the way of writing.  I’ve managed to write and post 7 pieces on here. Read and reviewed 3 books, and reviewed on TripAdvisor the hotel, restaurants and holiday cottage we visited whilst away for the week of my birthday.  Posted an album of edited photos of the holiday on Facebook as well. Four times I’ve researched and updated the Writing Contests page. I’ve prepared and published Heir to Death’s Folly on Smashwords, so it’s now available for any ebook format you care to select for it. It’s a good horror read, by the way. It was previously only available on Amazon’s Kindleplatform, as an experiment to see whether or not concentration on that outlet would make any difference to sales. It didn’t.
Setting up and getting used to the iMac took some time, of course; in fact, I’m still learning as I go along. And I had to suspend the touch-typing lessons, as the software I had wasn’t suitable for the Mac. (I’ve subsequently sold that, and much of the old PC stuff, on eBay – another time-consuming process). I’ve managed to return to the touch-typing just this week and caught up with where I was when I abandoned it, so that’s a positive. Oh, and I did manage to edit a short story in time to submit it for a contest, so not a complete failure.
The chart of time spent, as you’ll notice, is no longer in the form of a pie – too tempting when you’re trying to lose weight. No, actually, I thought the bar chart gave a better idea of the real differences, except I notice that I've managed to include a label in the graphic. Sorry, no time to undo that now. Also, adding up the percentages seems to make the sum rather greater than 100%! Clearly, I'll have to examine the new Excel in Office 2011 that I bought for the Mac and see where I'm going wrong! Oh good, more distractions!
The chart, explained: 'Writing' - initial creation of stories, blog posts, reviews and longer works.'Editing' - polishing of all written work to make it suitable for readers.'Research' - discovery of info for story content, market research, contests and blog posts.'Reading' - books and writing magazines.'Networking' - emails, Twitter, Pinterest, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+activity.
'Admin' - story submission, blog posting, marketing, organisation, learning to touch-type, and general admin tasks.Related articles Why is Success in Writing so Elusive? Survivorship bias: why 90% of the advice about writing is bullshit right now

25 Random Facts About me that You May Not Know.

I was recently invited to take part in a ‘chain’ event on Facebook. It looked harmless enough, except to the paranoid types. Basically, the idea was to list 25 random facts about yourself; things that people wouldn’t necessarily know. A bit of fun, provided the subjects don’t provide info of use to those intent on identity fraud, of course.Trouble was, in order to partake, it was necessary to take a particular route through the FB labyrinth. And it turned out that, for reasons known only to FB, my route wasn’t so much blocked as lacking a starting point. So, unwilling to be defeated, and being pressed for some participation, I thought I’d do it here instead and provide a link to the post on FB.
So, here goes.
25 Things you probably don’t know about me (and, just as likely, didn’t want to!):
1.     I was once told off by the Queen Mother, via her Aide de Camp, a General.2.     I didn’t learn to swim until I was 16 and in the RAF.3.     Jake Thackray, the folk singer, once bought me a beer in The Red Lion, Colchester.4.     I had to be escorted from a factory via the back way after delivering unwanted news to a large bunch of 5.     On a school trip, I had to run back 3 miles to retrieve a piece of photographic equipment I’d left on rock on the North York Moors.6.     My real father died 3 weeks before I was born.7.     I was chased off the racetrack at Brands Hatch by stewards when they discovered I had no press pass.8.     My first published photograph was a front cover on the professional British Journal of Photography.9.     I had to be stomach pumped at the age of 17 after a particularly heavy pre-Xmas drinking bout with my brother, Barry.10.  I fell into the boating lake at East Park in Hull when I was 5, watching a water ride.11.  I spent some of my childhood living in a converted railway wagon, still on its wheels, on the cliff top near Hornsea.12.  I photographed my first wedding during a blizzard at a church in Leconfield when I was 19.13.  Tom Stoppard described my radio play as picaresque during an interview at the BBC and I had no idea what he meant.14.  Striking dockers threatened to chuck me in the River Crouch at Colchester after a slight misunderstanding.15.  A colleague and I were chased through the streets of Armagh in Northern Ireland after we took photographs at an ‘anti internment’ meeting.16.  Riding round the wall of the boating lake in Pearson Park in Hull, I fell into the water and had to be dried by the fire in the first aid hut.17.  Asked to take a bird into school to mount its skeleton for a biology lesson, I was refused my request to take a dead swan I’d found on the banks of the River Humber.18.  Morecombe and Wise posed for photographs for me on 4 occasions.19.  I caused our French teacher to burst into tears and upset the boys in the class as she was very pretty and we were then taught by a stern German man instead.20.  I enjoy listening to Shirley Bassey.21.  Rod Stewart once bowed and raised his multi-coloured top hat at me backstage at a pop festival and I failed to take a photograph of him as I didn’t know who he was!22.  I read every book in the camp library at RAF Lyneham.23.  I was once given a lift by 3 nuns.24.  I once stole a keyring with a tiny penknife attached but felt so bad I had to go back and replace it. I was about 12.25.  The Railway Children, with Jenny Agutter as Bobbie, always makes me cry when she meets her father at the station.
So, there you have it. A few things to reinforce your opinion that I’m…well, whatever you thought I was before you read this lot.

I hope I’ve entertained you with this absolutely factual list. Please feel free to comment.

Disclosure, by Michael Crichton, Reviewed

First published in 1994, Disclosure by Michael Crichton, is one of those novels based on actual events, though this is not made clear until the end of the book, in an ‘afterword’. Whether that information would have made any difference to my reading is an unknown. It reads like fiction, so I read it in that spirit.
The stated theme is that of sexual harassment and its potentially corrosive effects on both corporations and society in general. Written at a time when such complaints were increasingly being made by men against female employers, it examines the subject in detail, without ever making it into a treatise. The facts and ideas emerge naturally as part of the plot, as guided by the characters. So, it’s a cleverly constructed work. There was, for me, another underlying theme, though I’m not certain the author presented it consciously: I hope he did. That other idea concerns the corrupt foundation that underpins many commercial ideas and actions. The presentation of many characters as ruthless, uncaringly ambitious and utterly devoid of any moral compass creates an atmosphere in which even a flawed hero can appear almost saintly by comparison.
There were times, early in the book, when I was unsure whether I would read to the end. For reasons that have nothing to do with the story, I had to read it in a number of small bites. Only the last third of the 450 pages was I able read in anything like uninterrupted form, which was just as well, since the denouement starts early and builds very well over these last pages. But the reason for my initial hesitation was twofold. There’s a deal of inconsequential detail; the sort of thing that apprentice writers are warned against: what someone had for breakfast, the processes of domestic living, etc. The second barrier was the amount of technical information given in the form of either business or product-specific jargon, often without sufficient explanation. Having been involved in both business and computers during my lengthy employment, I was able to interpret enough of this to make it at least comprehensible. But I suspect many could be thoroughly confused by it, and I doubt it was essential to the story; less technical descriptions could have been given instead.
However, I’m glad I persevered. The story grew more engaging as I learned more about the main characters and came to care what happened to them; both good and bad. It’s an absolutely essential aspect of the story for me: without at least one character I can empathise with, I’m unlikely to finish a novel. Fortunately, due to good writing, there were many well-written and engaging characters in this tale.
Lauded as ‘The thriller that opened a new chapter on the sex wars’, this is a book that allows the modern reader to more thoroughly understand the mechanisms, philosophies, emotions and ambitions that drive some of the sexual harassment cases that continue to be made by both genders.

Is it a good read? The curate’s egg comes to mind, but, once over the unnecessary detail and jargon, I found the book illuminating, interesting and even engaging. So, for me, this turned out to be a good read in spite of its flaws. And I’d recommend it to those who have some knowledge of business and the world of computing. For others, it may be sensible to have a dictionary of business terms and another of computer jargon to guide them through the sometimes cryptic language.Related articles Prey by Michael Crichton How Michael Crichton Gave Birth to the Movie Pixel Good Crichton vs. Bad Crichton Was Michael Crichton right about a link between epilepsy and violence?

I Before E, Except After C?

English: So many words to keep track of!. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)If ever a writing rule was overstated, it must be this one. Once it becomes evident that there are more exceptions than examples following a rule, the rule becomes seriously unhelpful; redundant at best.
We all know about receipt, receive, ceiling, etc. But there are actually more words used in English that have the ‘ei’ construction than those using ‘ie’.
Don’t believe me? I offer a mere handful:Heir, weir, Eire, weird, being, deific, leisure, meiosis, neighbour, eisegesis, neither, peignoir, reiki, seismic, vein, weigh, zein, either, feign, height, rein, reiterate, seine, seize, teise, veil, zeitgeist, eight, deign, deity, eider, feint, heifer, heinous, Leicester, peise, reign, feisty, geisha. Have a think: I’m sure you’ll find hundreds more.
Okay, I accept that some of these are ‘foreign’ words, but English is a conglomerate language, made up of words and expressions stolen from invaders and the victims of Britain’s ancient and extensive empire. Modern English is said to contain over 1,000,000 different words, exceeding any other language.

So, to return to the rule: forget it. Your English teacher was wrong. Most schools in Britain have stopped preaching this erroneous rule now, so you can allow yourself to ditch it as well. Go on, you know you’d love to. It’s not helpful.      Related articles Grammar vs. style: ignorance in The Times Our crazy language History of English Language? Introduction

The iMac Has Landed

Núverandi 2007 Intel iMac. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
For years I’ve wanted to use a Mac instead of a PC for my writing. I decided I would treat myself on my retirement from employment and, last Monday, I made the purchase.
As is invariably the case with technology, the process of getting up and running wasn’t straightforward. It never ceases to amaze me that the systems purported to make our lives easier, in fact, make them more difficult. The Mac is a wonderfully intuitive machine but, like all technological items, it has its shortcomings. One aspect that is singularly noticeable is that ‘intuitive’ is clearly a selective quality. The machine itself comes with no written instructions of any real use. And the DVD Drive, which is a superb piece of engineering and design, comes with even less.
One of the aspects I, as customer and user, like to experience is some level of confidence that what I’m doing and what the machines I’ve invested in are doing is actually what I intended. The information around this fairly basic need is poor or non-existent.
I discovered, almost by accident, a process intended to transfer my old files from the PC to the Mac. On the face of it, this looked fairly simple. After following the instructions and first suffering a failure of the software (on my PC) I wasted 8 hours, waiting for the transfer to complete. I gave up and went to bed. The next day, I stripped all the old programs from the PC and rationalised some of the files. Now, I’m a writer and a photographer, so I have a good deal of stuff on file. It worked out, after some re-organisation and some deletion, that I had 10,309 text files and 10,176 photo files. The size of the transferable batch of information was around 62 GB. I assumed the transfer from PC to Mac would take some time and set the program off again. It was still running some 7 hours later, with no indication of when or even if it would ever complete. I went to bed again.
The next day, I transferred music and photos manually, using a 4GB USB memory stick. It was time-consuming, but slowly the files built up on the Mac and I felt I was getting somewhere at last. Once transferred, I deleted the files from the old PC, leaving only the text files and personal information to be transferred by Apple’s ‘File Migration’ software. I gave it one last chance, but it still was searching for information after 5 hours and I gave it up as a bad job, transferred the text files manually and decided I’d simply have to re-set all the personal info stuff as I used the Mac.
I’m up and running again now. I do love the Mac and I enjoy the way it works. But I continue to wonder at the failure of an entire industry to make its products straightforward and user-friendly for its customers. Clearly, the designers of software and hardware have no concept of the level of knowledge held by the average user. So, I make a public plea, which I expect to be ignored, for those in the IT industry to always ask a panel of normal members of the public to test and evaluate all their products before releasing them. That way we might all be much happier and more able to get on with our lives.
Moan over. iMac in use. I might now be able to get some writing done, at last!

I had hoped to include a picture of myself at the iMac, but I haven't yet figured out how to do that!

Okay, So Where's the Usual Post?

Sorry folks. Today's my 65th birthday. In UK that makes me officially a pensioner, an old age pensioner (OAP), a label we use to identify the decrepit and discarded. I'll happily accept the concessions and small benefits that come with the label, but I'm not accepting the mindset that too often accompanies the coming of age.
But, it's a special day and I intend to spend it in a special way. So, see you all next week.
Cheers.

The Call of the Wild, by Jack London, Reviewed.

I come late to this classic, which I gather is intended as a children’s story. Mind you, I suspect a few of the modern generation might have difficulty with some of the language and sentence structure. Be that as it may, the story is rightly a classic: the language is beautiful, the ideas, which are wide-ranging, are wonderfully expressed with little sign of authorial intrusion.
The central theme, of the reversion of the civilised into the primitive, is cleverly illustrated as Buck slowly learns from experience that, when it comes to simple survival, many of the trappings of civilisation are just that. There is no room for sentimentality in the extremes of the wild.
I don’t generally enjoy books that rely on anthropomorphism (the obvious exception is Orwell’s Animal Farm) but this is a story that works in spite of the humanisation of the central canine character. It says something about the writing skills of the author that the presentation of the dog as a creature capable of human reasoning is barely noticeable for most of the story. The tale itself dashes along at a pace that matches that of the husky teams it follows. There is nothing wasted, everything we are told is germane to the story.
One of my quibbles relates to the characters.  This is a male-centred story and several archetypal males are represented, giving a sense of balance to the way men are depicted. Unfortunately, only one woman finds a place in the tale and she is stereotypical, insubstantial and without any real personality. A story intended for children needs to express the positive and negative aspects of both genders in equal measure. Any child reading this book will glean an impression of women as feeble, insecure, troublesome and hysterical. No examples of strong women, no honour or nobility here for the female of the species. It is, of course, of its time. But I do wonder to what extent it has been responsible for imposing a general prejudice against women in the psyche of some American males.
One other negative aspect that troubles me relates to the depiction of killing (albeit as a method of obtaining food) as something both desirable and admirable, rather than as a necessary evil. I suspect this may have had some effect on the hunting fraternity in the States, giving them permission to enter the wild and shoot animals for trophies. For Buck, the act of killing is an essential for survival. For the modern hunter, it is reduced to the element of ‘sport’; though how any rational being can associate the use of a gun against a wild animal  with sport I cannot comprehend.
All that said, I enjoyed this book. I’d certainly recommend it to any adult reader who has not had the pleasure. But I’d caution against the exposure of children to the story.
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What Rules Do You Hate as a Writer?

Typographic quotation marks (top) versus straight quotation marks, or "dumb quotes" (bottom). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
They’re there, everywhere you look, on blogs, in books, on websites – those unbreakable rules for writers. Some are concerned with language itself; grammar, syntax, spelling. Others are to do with style; repetition, viewpoint, backstory, vocabulary. Then there are the rules surrounding presentation; font, paragraphs, spacing, quotations, dialogue. Of course, the gurus and mentors have their own sets of rules: you must do this or that if you’re to succeed as a writer. These latter rules come in the form of exhortations to build an author platform, participate in forums, network, join groups, create a bog, a website, become a member of any of dozens of professional organisations. And so it goes on.
Do you ever get the feeling you’re being bamboozled, perhaps being patronised, maybe being groomed as a cash cow for some organisation or individual? There are lots of wolves out there, seeking out those ignorant, naïve or inexperienced enough to become the victims of the many scams aimed specifically at writers. And all of them have their rules. Those laws that you must obey if you’re ever to become a writer, ever to make a name for yourself, ever to make your fortune. Assuming that’s what you’re after.
I, of course, have special rules that I hate. Some of these have been exposed as irrelevant or simply wrong as a result of experience. Some have been pointed out by other writers. Some were clearly not right from the word go.
Let’s have look at some of those I have problems with. Well, there’s one for a start: never finish a sentence with a preposition. Rubbish. We do it all the time. Writers have been breaking this rule ever since they first picked up a chisel to mark the first slab of rock. It’s idiotic. To obey this rule, my initial sentence would have to be reconstructed as, ‘Let’s have a look at some of those with which I have problems.’ Clumsy, at best. No one speaks like this and we shouldn’t be required to write this way. Only the Grammar Police will ever find fault with the use of a preposition at the end of your sentences. So, if it sounds right, use it.
Another: build an author platform. No agent or publisher will look at you these days unless you have a decent following on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, YouTube, LinkedIn etc, etc. Two points with this one: do you want an agent or a publisher, bearing in mind the way they rip off writers these days? And, far more importantly, this rule is designed to stop you writing and to make you spend all your time making contacts online. I tried it last year, as a way of discovering the validity of this exhortation to build a following. Did it have any measurable effect on my book sales? With the possible exception of Twitter, none whatsoever. I’ve increased my ‘presence’ across the various networks I belong to (there goes that preposition at the end of a sentence again!). But, whilst this has amplified requests for my help for other writers (something I’m happy to do when I’m able), has resulted in numerous requests for the endorsement of work I’ve no experience of (there it goes again; another preposition in danger of ending a sentence!), has brought many requests for me to review books written by other authors (as if my increased visibility has somehow had a similar effect on my time available for reading), it has had no measurable effect on shifting my books off the shelves. This rule, so beloved of agents and publishers, is unlikely to get you what you actually want; i.e. more readers.
One more: use curly quotes, use straight quotes, use double quotes, use single quotes…etc. The only rule with any validity regarding such stylistic matters is the one that guides the publication to which you’re submitting your work (there; I stuck this preposition in place for the purists). Seriously, if a publication you want to publish your work uses single, curly quotes, then have the common sense to follow their house style. Otherwise, the choice is yours. Same with fonts (but do make the size and typeface easy to read, and you can use any colour as long as it’s black. On your website or blog you have the freedom to make your font and background colours the same, violently different, or traditional black on white, but bear in mind that people are going to be trying to read that text).
I must, of course, remind you of George Orwell’s rules for writers. These are, if taken with an intelligent pinch of common sense in interpretation, very sensible. The last one, naturally, is the most important:
1.      Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print. (see my piece on clichés)
2.      Never use a long word where a short one will do.  (dip a toe in the hydrotherapeutic fluid and see whether the pool will suffice)
3.      If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out. (surgical excision, scalpel at the ready, is essential to the prevention of purple prose)
4.      Never use the passive where you can use the active. (always better to be the one doing the doing than having the doing done to you)
5.      Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent. (using obscurum per obscurius is simply employing obfuscation for the sake of it)
6.      Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous. (up with this I will never put)
And I’d apply that last rule to all the various rules of writing.
Finally, from me at any rate, remember you’re a writer. Writers write. That’s their purpose, their raison d’être (oops, Orwell’s 5th rule broken!).
So, that’s my piece said. Are there any writing rules you abhor? Let’s have a comment with your reasons; see if we can help each other here, shall we?
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Miss Marple Stories, by Agatha Christie, Reviewed

Iconic, much adapted for film and TV, these tales have been around a while and many people have taken pleasure from them in this form. But, until now, I’d not read a single one. This collection both introduces and develops the character (I met one of the original actors, Joan Hickson, whilst working on an article with her son, Nick, when she lived in Wivenhoe. Very private and reserved lady.) Joan Hickson (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
What I hadn’t appreciated was that the written stories actually distance Miss Marple from most of the events and take the form of tales told at her house. She then interprets the facts from what she’s been told and develops her theories from there. The adaptations generally set her amongst the action, sometime even placing her in danger, but the written stories tend not to do that at all.
The tales are written in Christies no-nonsense, straightforward style. There are no pretentions to literary greatness here, just mysteries set out in simple terms. Very much of their time, they reveal the contemporary prejudices and values of the protagonists. The village setting could have been claustrophobic, but Christie’s ability to connect the locality with the wider world enables the reader to see the ubiquity of human nature.  And it is human nature that most features in these tales.
A gentle and undemanding read. Something to while away a few hours in a country house hotel or on a day at the beach, sitting in a deck chair and drinking tea. Very comfortable.
I enjoyed the read and recommend it to those who’ve seen the better adaptations and enjoyed their mix of gentle humour and cosy crime. Worth dipping into, I think.
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