And Again!

          I got an email yesterday from Robin Jones of Luath Press asking me to submit Remote Control after all. I've just looked up luath. It's Gaelic. I know a bit of the Gaelic. Youhodim analheiderim is Gaelic. I learned this from Barry Graham, who also told me that  I should stop being rude about  publishers or I'll never get published.
  
          It looks like they want a manuscript. I'll have to buy some paper and a big envelope. I'll write on the big envelope: You Gaelic folk asked for this to be submitted! And then it might go to the top of their giant slush pile, which must be bigger than Edinburgh Castle if they still want folk to send in paper submissions in this day and age. You'd probably get a really good view from the top of that!!

Remote Control Again!

          None of the publishers I contacted last week about Remote Control could be bothered getting back to me. I must say this was not a surprise. I was just going through  the motions. Apart from Sphere, who were very good and prompt I must say, the other publisher I sent it to couldn't even be bothered to email a rejection, though they did agree to read it about a year ago now. Like pissing into a black hole, so it is!

          I suppose all the publishers of printed books around the world are climbing on top of their unread slush piles, scanning the horizon for the great tidal wave of zeros and ones that is just about to sweep them into the dustbin of history. Can't say I'll miss them!!

Remote Control

             Today I used the webpage Everyone Who Is Anyone ... to email four or five publishers about my crime book/thriller Remote Control. Nobody wants to deal with authors anymore. You have to have an agent, I think.

             You won't find email addresses on publisher's webpages, but you can get at practically anyone through Everyone Who Is Anyone .... an invaluable resourse.

              I started writing Remote Control about thirty years ago and finished a final re-write a year ago last Christmas. Serpent's Tail, who published me before, have had it for ages, but it's been impossible to get anything out of them either way, so ..

              In 1989 Remote Control was adapted for the stage and had a very successful production at the Traverse under the title of Bomber. I re-wrote it at the time, but didn't send it out to many publishers because while the play was still running at the Traverse, I went to live in Australia for a year.

              I think I started writing it in 1979 and did so at the instigation of Ursula Mackenzie, who at the time was working as an agent with International Scripts. Now she's the CEO of Little Brown. I finally finished it last year. Using my previous connection with Ursula Mackenzie, my friend who's been helping me with agenting managed to get Dan Mallory of Sphere to have a look at it. He didn't want it, but here is what he said.

Hi, David –

Following up on Remote Control. Short version: I’m going to pass. Longer version: I do so fully aware that you’ve got a very talented author on your hands. The writing is crisp and clean, the dialogue distinctively edgy, and the plot very smoothly engineered. That said, I wasn’t especially taken with the protagonist, who seemed to me rather difficult to like, and I worry that some of the book’s more serrated edges would rub a broad readership the wrong way.

While I’m going to pass, I wish you much luck with the project, and I can’t wait to see where John lands. Thanks again very much for letting me take a look.

Yours    

Dan

          Although I expect all my unpublished books (eight of them!) to end up on Kindle, which is why I'm doing this blog, I think I'll have to make an effort with Remote Control. It's one of the few books I've written in a recognisable genre.

          The book I have on Kindle at present is Ancient Futures.

Ancient Futures and Rebel Inc

          Barry Graham came to see me. We must have drinking home brew because I was out of the room for a bit, probably visiting the bog. It was when I came back  that I think I found him reading a bit of Ancient Futures. At that time I used to give tons of used paper to my daughter for drawing on and it must have been on a bit of that. I thought Barry found the sheet on the back of something stuck to the fridge, but he says he found it lying on the table, and he'd know better.

          Barry must have prevailed on Kevin Williamson to publish that bit of the book for it appeared in the second issue. I don't know how many issues the mag lasted for, but I've only got the first two.

          Actually, I went to the launch. Barry hustled me along. I didn't know anything about anything as usual. Then all these writers are up there reading the stuff out they'd had published in the magazine. Brilliant readings!! I was much impressed. I think that was the first time I saw Irvine Welsh doing a reading. He couldn't read out loud to save himself, but what he was reading was fabulous.

The dream section from the novel was taken from a real dream I had when I was writing it. I only added a final incident.

CHAPTER SIX

          Ramiles found himself in an unfamiliar and frightening part of the city. It was kind of place where it seemed that nobody really belonged, the street wide and dirty, and empty apart from shadowy figures hanging around in doorways. It was daytime, but nobody was protected from the sun by cloaks, hoods, or veils. This didn't strike him as odd at the time. He could smell the ocean, but couldn't see it yet. He wanted off the street and was gritting his teeth, tense and worried, his anxiety worsening because Tetra, who was by his side, seemed oblivious to the dangers.

          An ugly, bulky woman dressed in raggedy, dirty clothes sidled out of a doorway in front of them, let them pass, then walked along just behind his shoulder. She smelt of urine and seemed to be offering him some kind of sexual service, but when he stared at her mouth, at the brown stumps of teeth, he couldn't hear her speak. Maybe she was mentally defective. He walked on, much faster now and left her in his wake. Other people began to move out of the shadows of doorways before them and after them, and he steeled himself to the threat, staring hard and waiting for the violence to suddenly break out all around him. But Tetra was laughing and carefree and telling him not to worry so.

          They hurried down some narrow stairs between tall, empty buildings and he could see the ocean then. There was a promenade and a sea wall fenced off from the beach by iron railings, and a small outdoor cafe with some tables in front. She stood at the counter and ordered them coffee. Five or six men, who were sitting singly at the tables, turned and stared at them. As one man, they looked at him, then they looked at her. Their faces seemed oddly familiar though flattened somehow and full of expression without having any kind of expression at all. They stared. He could feel the hate for him and the lust for her.

          As if coordinated by some unseen force, the men at the tables stood up simultaneously and approached him slowly. They came closer and closer and he backed off towards Tetra who was looking the other way and laughing at something with the man behind the counter. They looked at him and they looked at her. He felt very frightened. One of the men seemed to say something to him, but he couldn't hear any sounds.

          There was a large pot bellied bottle with a long stem on the table near his right hand. They slowly drew in closer and closer till they could have reached out and touched him easily. He grabbed the bottle and smashed it over one of their heads, then thrust the long jagged stem into the throat of another, twisting it. The face contorted and the eyes bulged out at him, but no one else seemed to be moving.

         Then Tetra was running scared in front of him. He rushed after her round a corner. Between two buildings higher than any he'd ever seen, ladders and scaffolding stretched up and disappeared behind a tarpaulin. She was climbing above him and they was frantically fleeing from the five or six men who were climbing below them.

          When he reached the top of the last ladder, he saw her running away over the flat rooftop. He turned and turned back and she'd disappeared. Then the head of one of the men appeared at the top of the ladder and Ramiles picked up a sword which was lying there. He started to push the sword into the mouth of this man and down his throat. The man was biting it into pieces and gnashing and gurgling up its length like a mad dog, still climbing till he was over the rim. Then he turned and rolled and jerked and yellow mucus and vomit came pouring out of his mouth.

          Then they were down at the promenade again. She was laughing at him and telling him not to worry as he looked around for any means of escape at all. An open carriage, drawn by four black horses, came along. He hailed it and they sat up with the driver. The wind was blowing in her hair. She was so happy. The wheatlands and the sunshine, pleasant and soft in a way it never was anymore, stretched out before them. They were leaving the city and he felt relief like held never felt it before. It flooded his whole being.

          Then he looked over his shoulder and the five or six men were sitting in the carriage behind him. They were just sitting there in a row, and staring, but he now recognised them as the guards he'd killed on Sackment Island. Then the driver turned his head and the side which he couldn't see before was a mass of billowing, yellow, spongy flesh.

          Then the commandant looked ahead and his face seemed normal from that side, and he kind of chuckled. The carriage wasn't taking them out of Migifa after all. They were heading back to the promenade, away from the daylight and into the darkness.

          Then they were on the promenade once more, and there was the cafe. He and Tetra were waiting to buy some coffee. It was pleasant and breezy down by the sea that evening, and a lot of people were around, most of them boisterous, all of them males. He had his back to Tetra and was keeping his eye on the five or six men who were sitting at the tables when someone asked him if he'd like to join in a gang bang in a room at the back of the cafe.

          He looked around for Tetra, but couldn't see her anywhere. Frantically, he raced round the counter and found himself in a corridor. There was always the noise of people shouting, whooping and yelling ahead of him as he ran and ran along corridor after corridor, up and down flights of stairs. Suddenly, he reached the room and saw a crowd of men surrounding the bed, jumping up and craning their necks to see. He couldn't tell who was on the bed, but he knew who it was. One of the men he'd killed turned round and handed him a baby they'd just ripped from her belly. The head was too large for such as a small body and he looked passed the mask of dripping blood and saw his own dead face.

ANCIENT FUTURES IS AVAILABLE ON KINDLE FOR 86p

Writing Record

          Though hardly comprehensive, this is what I give to folk as a writing resume!

JOHN McKENZIE’S

WRITING RESUME

THEATRE

BUSTED:       
National tour by Mandela Theatre Company (late Boilerhouse).

BUSTED:      
New version performed at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe by The Sieve and Shears Theatre Company.

CLOCKED OUT:     
Produced by Traverse as part of the Spinning a Line season.

BOMBED:             
Produced by Traverse as part of the Spinning a Line season.

RADIO PLAYS

THE MARIJUANA KID:     
Broadcast on Radio Scotland, twice on Radio Four and once on  the World Service.

CLOCKING OUT:      
Broadcast on Radio Scotland and then Radio Four.

CITY WHITELIGHT:        
Monday Night Theatre on Radio Four.

THE REAL McCOY:         
Monday Night Theatre on Radio Four.

NOVELS

CITY WHITELIGHT:
Published in hardback by Mainstream Publishing, Edinburgh and in paperback by Fontana, London.

ARE YOU BOYS CYCLISTS?      
Published by Serpents Tail Publishing Ltd., London.

Other Business

          I wrote a couple of plays for Educational Broadcasting, Radio Scotland and I’ve had chapters of novels published in Teaching English and Rebel Inc., Instant, etc. I’ve also received support from the Scottish Arts Council who gave me two writers’ bursaries.

          I have eight unpublished novels. I’ve had interested from a new Glasgow publisher about publishing these as ebooks with hard copies as requested, but I think at the end of the day they'll all appear on Amazon Kindle and other ebooks formats.

Ancient Futures

          I'm John McKenzie. I'm based in Edinburgh, Scotland, and I'm a writer. I've had two novels published, and some time ago when I wrote drama, I had eight plays produced by BBC Radio Scotland, Radio 4, Traverse Theatre and I had a play produced on the Fringe and one that toured all over Scotland.

          It seems that writing books and hustling publishers and agents is not enough these days. You have to advertise yourself on the net and tweet and pretend you are attractive to folk who should know better. So I have to start a blog!

          My main interest these days is actually in meditating and I'd much rather just do that and write in my spare time as I don't really have time for anything else. But ...

          Apart from the two published novels, I've got eight unpublished books which I expect will end up as ebooks over the next year or so. One of these is currently available on the Amazon Kindle. The title is Ancient Futures. It's available at the lowest price I was allowed to give it and is a complete bargain at 86p!

          In future posts I'll write about the wonderful writings and how things are going in that area of my life!