'Concept Art' for novel

(In Which Our Hero Finds Another Excuse to Muck About in Photoshop)

All photos used here were taken during the recent trip to Barcelona.

I laugh at the stupidest things

I imagine a Catalan private dick named 'Oliver Detectius'. As Sara said, "his destiny was pretty much decided from birth". A long and proud line of private investigators...

Look, you don't have to find it funny. I do. That's enough.

More pictures from Barcelona soon. I'd write about it further but I'm feeling a little drained at the moment, oddly enough. Think it's the pressure of all the assignments and my dissertation hanging over my head, plus the thought of what the hell I'm going to do when the time comes to seek gainful employment. The funny thing about crossing bridges when you come to them: sometimes when you get close enough you realise that there isn't actually a bridge in the first place, and the water's running quite fast...

Miéville signing tomorrow in London

See here (cheers to Mark Newton for the tipoff: there'll also be a similar event for his own novel at the same place in June).

Here's the info cut&pasted:

"China Mieville - The City & The City: EXCLUSIVE pre-release event!
Thursday 30, April, 6:00PM - 7:00PM
Forbidden Planet London Megastore,
179 Shaftesbury Avenue, London, WC2H 8JR

RRP: £17.99

Our Price: £15.99

Forbidden Planet is pleased to announce an exclusive pre-release event for China Miéville’s The City & The City. Join China for a signing and reading at the Forbidden Planet Megastore, 179 Shaftesbury Avenue, London, WC2H 8JR, on Thursday 30th April 6 – 7pm. "

Will I be there? YEP! Amongst other things I thought I'd have to wait until the middle of next month to read this one, so it's a pleasant surprise that I'll hopefully be able to bag a copy in time to read on the plane and on the beach.

My experiences of these events are fairly limited: I haven't been to one in years although I vaguely remember being taken to a Dr Who related book signing by a friend in my early teen years and so I'm not sure about the etiquette: is it OK or severely cheeky if I bring along all my other hardbacks to be signed? It's not as if I'm intending to flog them on Ebay to the highest bidder - perish the thought! Not sure what's worse: being a nuisance or coming across as a total geek/fanboy. Wondering if I've got space in my bag for 'Perdido Street Station', 'The Scar', 'Iron Council', 'Looking for Jake' and 'Un Lun Dun' anyway to be honest.

Life continues regardless

Well...

Recently handed in my submission: 'The Man Who Lived in a House of Mirrors'. I love Metafiction. Stories about stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories within stories...

Still smoking too many cigarettes. Still enjoying the weekends perhaps a little too much. Still breathing and so on.

Going to start work again on a short story with the working title 'Bottling Sunlight'. Bouncing ideas around my head during the idle moments, trying to form a narrative from them. Now comes the writing.

Also got another idea: 'Unwritten Letters' / 'People I Used To Know'. Stay tuned.

Yep.

Plots summarised a little differently...

I've been lolling at this on and off all day. Here's one in particular that grabbed me:

"NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR: Authorities contain terrorist threat."

Pitch black, utterly fitting, and very funny.

I've been thinking of some ones related to Sci-Fi & Fantasy literature, for example:

CHINA MIEVILLE - 'PERDIDO STREET STATION': A purportedly Liberal academic wreaks havoc through irresponsible animal testing, resulting in many deaths and much work for beleaguered authorities.

BORGES - 'THE SOUTH': Medical and social services fail a mentally ill old man who is a danger to himself and those around him.

JEFF VANDERMEER - 'VENISS UNDERGROUND': A man who can't get over his ex girlfriend does her douchebag brother a favour and loses his job because of it.

MARK Z. DANIELEWSKI - 'HOUSE OF LEAVES': A couple buy a home but neglect to hire a surveyor first. They realise their new property is structurally unsound and the resultant strain is too much for their marriage to bear.

ITALO CALVINO: 'IF ON A WINTER'S NIGHT A TRAVELLER': "You" eventually come to realise that quality control in Italian publishing/printing during the 1970s must have been shockingly bad.

H.P. LOVECRAFT: 'THE THING ON THE DOORSTEP': The protagonist and a friend drift apart after the latter marries ("bros before hoes, dude!") and finds that his father in law becomes increasingly controlling.

CLARK ASHTON SMITH: 'THE DARK EIDOLON': Animosity flares up between new neighbours. Property values plummet.

PHILIP K. DICK: 'THE THREE STIGMATA OF PALMER ELDRITCH': A philanthropic entrepreneur returns from a lengthy sabbatical with fresh thinking that could really make a difference. His contemporaries are ungrateful and unenthusiastic.

WILLIAM GIBSON: 'COUNT ZERO': A wayward lad spends too much time on the Internet, resulting in his mother's house burning down and a lot of problems for everyone.

NEIL GAIMAN: 'NEVERWHERE': London's street people take time out from their busy schedule of Special Brew drinking to take a man on a sightseeing tour.

MICHAEL MOORCOCK: 'DANCERS AT THE END OF TIME': A woman plays hard to get and spends all her time worrying about 'what her friends would say'.

The man who lived in a house of mirrors

An old photo I've been messing around with in Photoshop lately. Tentatively entitled 'Another Life'

Well, I've been doing little recently except reading, working out, and watching movies. A bit of writing too. The deadline for this year's uni Creative Writing Competition & Anthology approaches and so far I've got one poem I need to finish up and edit, one rather short prose piece that I'm considerably less confident about than when I wrote it, and a rather longer one (it'll be around 2000 words I think) that I started today and quite like so far. The working title is 'The Man Who Lived in a House of Mirrors' and it has a sort of parable-ish vibe to it. It's all about how we use art to reflect the cluttered junkyards that are our inner selves, which can be cathartic and can also be like wandering purposefully into a maze from which we may never really return. It's been fun to write and I think it'll probably be the one I submit

Sci-Fi London Festival - 2nd to the 4th of May

I was made aware of this event today by a post on Mark Newton's blog. It looks interesting from what I can see on the website and I really wish I could make it - problem is, I'll be out of the country during that period. Since I doubt I'll be able to perfect the mystical art of Astral Travelling during the next month and will therefore have no way of being in two places at the same time, I guess I'll just have to write this one off as Lady Fortune Having It In For Me. I'm very much looking forward to my pre-existing commitment though, so this is both bah and yay at the same time. Maybe next year...