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BOOK REVIEW: Day Watch – Sergei Lukyanenko (Miramax Books)

biodagar — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 21:59:09 +0000

In the beginning of this book, having been so used to the primary protagonist of the previous novel, Anton Gorodetsky, it took me a little while to work out what was going on. I had no idea who this Alisa Donnikova was or why she was important. Or why this second book in the series was focusing so clearly on her. For a while I wondered if the novel was going to be a series of character-based short stories.

But it turned out that it was all just me being impatient. Gradually, one discerns why Alisa’s circumstances are so important; but interestingly, one does not really discover this until much, much later in the book.

It was not, in fact, until I was on the home-run of this book – the last twenty pages or so – that I properly understood the statements from each Watch in the in the front-matter of the book proper:

This text has been banned for distribution as injurious to the cause of the light. – Night Watch
This text has been banned for distribution as injurious to the cause of the darkness. – Day Watch

Day Watch is a far more interesting story than Night Watch. It proposes some interesting concepts to challenge your own notions of lightness and darkness, too. After taking so long to read Night Watch, I devoured Day Watch in a matter of weeks, and will hopefully finish the third book rather sooner than that.

Lukyanenko is an extremely talented writer. As an editor, and former publisher myself, I am a really tough audience. Yet I fall deeply into the spell of his fiction quite easily, and am happy to stay and wallow there. For me, there is no fight between enjoying the story and being aware of the text; this is really rare, and is probably why I enjoy his works so very much.

View all my reviews on Goodreads

Past posts you might dig:

The art of persuasion… for writers and readers (or consumers)

biodagar — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 05:50:41 +0000

Persuading people is an art. Anybody who has studied argument-writing knows this. And it is what amused me about logging into the ABC website and seeing this:

If you’re like me, and you don’t consume popular television at all (yeah yeah, oh the gasp, shock blah blah), then you could be forgiven for thinking – not knowing any better – that Leung’s Unbelievable is a serious show. Especially with that blurb beneath the title:

Lawrence presents a user’s guide to how we are manipulated, persuaded and deceived without us knowing it.

You will likely be drawn into this conclusion by the fact that it is the first thing on the ABC homepage, alongside the broadcaster’s top news stories. While this picture (above) depicts the popular puppet Gaga, the other headlines included things like carbon rorts, consumer confidence reports, Murdoch’s hacking allegations, and so on. Furthermore, given that the ABC occsasionally does post some entertaining and informative material – Gruen Transfer, anybody? – all the arrows point in the same direction.

The wrong direction. Leung’s show is not serious at all, and this episode about manipulation is what you would expect from white trash pulp: tarot readers, psychics, debunking the notion of alien life, and so on.

The one thing it did right was push me to write about the art of persuasion. And this just after I was moaning on Twitter the other day about how I never get blown away by teenagers’ ability to think critically any more. We had to, when I went to school, there were whole assignments based on the skill. How to critically analyse the media; how to critically analyse symbolism; and other such postmodern bits and bobs.

Then I hit uni and learned what critical thinking is really about, a million years ago in first year. I am amazed I remember any of it, because it was tough going when I was 19.

Let’s look at rhetoric

Regarding persuasion, the man with whom the buck stops is Aristotle.

Ever hear about our brothers ethos, logos, and pathos? No? Sit tight.

Originally pedalled as the three pillars of public speaking, these elements of Aristotle’s rhetoric tell us not only how to persuade people, but are also the tools that help us to determine the hows and whys of our own manipulation. People talk about using the three pillars in their fiction writing, in their public speaking, in journalism (surprise surprise), in essay writing… in just about any area of writing you can imagine. Rhetoric is, after all, the art of persuasion. And, as Wikipedia will also tell you, Aristotle’s Rhetoric is considered the most important work on this topic that you can find.

As an interesting aside, I’ll give you this to mull over:

…. Socrates, Plato and Aristotle saw rhetoric and poetry as tools that were too often used to manipulate others by trading on emotion and neglecting facts. They particularly accused the sophists, including Gorgias and Isocrates, of this. Plato, in particular, laid the blame for the arrest and death of Socrates at the feet of sophistical rhetoric. In stark contrast to the emotional rhetoric and poetry of the sophists was a rhetoric grounded in philosophy and the pursuit of knowledge or enlightenment. One of the most important contributions of Aristotle’s approach was that he identified rhetoric as one of the three key elements of philosophy, along with logic and dialectic. Indeed, the first line of the Rhetoric is “Rhetoric is the counterpoint of Dialectic.” Logic, to Aristotle, is the branch of philosophy concerned with reasoning to reach scientific certainty while dialectic and rhetoric are concerned with probability and thus are the branches of philosophy best suited to human affairs. Dialectic is a tool for philosophical debate; it is a means for skilled audiences to test probable knowledge in order to learn. Rhetoric is a tool for practical debate; it is a means for persuading a general audience using probable knowledge to resolve practical issues. Dialectic and rhetoric together create a partnership for a system of persuasion based on knowledge instead of manipulation of emotion.

~ taken from this wikipedia page

Out of all of that fun stuff, we find that Rhetoric was originally one branch of the discipline of philosophy, and that it was a ‘means for persuading a general audience using probable knowledge to resolve practical issues’.

Aristotle defined rhetoric as the ability to see the available means of persuasion.

I’m kind of going through these backwards, but following is a bit of a description of the three tools, ethos, logos, pathos.

Logos is reasoned argument, or ‘argument from reason’. It is reasoned discourse, the ability to speak with clarity, logic, and reasonableness. It is what makes you appear prepared, and knowledgeable. Logos may be data, facts, figures, or the construing of such. Whatever it is that logically makes you look like you know what you are saying.

Pathos is the appeal to your audience’s emotions; or, rather, to its sympathies and its imagination(s). Pathos is more refined that merely drawing an emotive response from your audience. It is the ability to tie that emotive response to your audience’s empathies, to engage them well enough to imagine themselves (or someone close to them) in a particular situation. By tying the pathos to your audience – each audience member in turn – your work has a far greater persuasive appeal.

Ethos is the most important of the three, which is why it is characteristically listed prior to the others. Ethos is an appeal to the honesty or authority of the speaker (or writer, or subject). While the persuader can provide a way into this, it is truly the audience that determines ethos. Drawing on ethos can be done in multiple ways:

By being a notable figure in the field in question, such as a college professor or an executive of a company whose business is that of the subject.

By having a vested interest in a matter, such as the person being related to the subject in question.

By using impressive logos that shows to the audience that the speaker is knowledgeable on the topic.

By appealing to a person’s ethics or character.

Apply rhetoric to your writing

If you’re a fiction writer, then right about now you are wondering how the bloody hell this applies to you. It’s actually not that difficult.

If you are a character writer, then the way that you speak with authority and clarity about your character makes you know what you are talking about (logos).

If you know what you are doing, then your audience will identify with your character, either positively or negatively, and will be more willing to suspend their disbelief and follow your story (pathos).

And if you do the other two correctly, your apparent honesty and authority will appeal to your audience, making you as the writer disappear into the background – thus enabling greater engagement with your character (ethos).

See? Simple. It’s merely putting strange words on what you already do.

When most people hear the word rhetoric spoken aloud, they do not think of its original meaning, of persuasion. What they think of is its second meaning: pompous, bombastic writing. Which, let’s be honest, if the person peddling persuasion does it not with artfulness but instead with a bag of shit, is what you get.

Use rhetoric to deconstruct the media

Knowing how to create something also teaches you how to deconstruct it. It is occasionally more tricky, it may involve a little more work of your grey matter, but you have the skill to do it. Once you know the three elements of persuasion, you can work out whether or not you are being manipulated (persuaded) into taking a particular point of view.

If you’re reading news articles, then you also have to look at lexical semantics (or the meanings of words and word relations) – and pay particular attention to timbre or the tone of the language used. By adding this fourth element, which you would naturally come to via pathos, then you’re well armed to tackle the onslaught of information thrown at you by the media. And by any friends, workmates, or family who are already persuaded, and are thus regurgitating what they’ve seen or read.

Let’s try this out

This screen-grab is from the ABC’s article ACCC Flying Squad to Combat Carbon Rorts. I chose it on purpose, because of its title. Have a read:

Firstly, let’s go with the title. What’s it bring to mind? War planes? Images of tough, trained professionals? Probably agile ones?

Moving into the body of the article, this image is reinforced by the use of language such as track down, punish, rort, false and misleading, force, laws… and so on. Already you’re feeling your pathos-strings pulled, aren’t you? It’s appealing to your sensibilities that companies who evade the law need to be dealt with, because at heart you’re an honest person. If you were being dishonest at such a level, you would expect to be dealt with… You see? Not only are your emotions engaged, but so is your imagination. Your sympathies are already siding with whatever argument this writer is proposing, and you’re not even thinking about it.

The logos in this article is in its structure, as it is in most persuasive texts. It has an introduction, it states some facts at the beginning, and it rolls on through other apparent facts that feed into the basic drive of the argument. When you get to the second and third paragraphs, however, do me a favour and pause. Now explain to me how misleading advertising and consumer laws are related to companies who flaunt carbon tax laws? You’re struggling, right? It seems ok, false and misleading claims appears to lead naturally into misleading advertising. The consumer laws appear to be related to carbon taxes. But, if we’re honest, it’s a really tenuous link.

This, then, is where the fact babble of logos can be used against an audience, to create a situation where the ‘facts’ persuade. But they needn’t be correct, or properly related, so long as it creates this effect in the audience’s mind.

There are a couple of reasons why you aren’t questioning the authority of the writer (ethos). The first is tone of the work. It is suitably journalistic, stitled, correct. Its short sentences are authoritative, and leave little room for questioning. But in the body of the piece it also draws on experts: it name-drops the ACCC, a body that all Australians aspire to complain to when companies don’t do their thing as they ought to. It pulls out a previous case, though tenuously related, against Optus (everybody has a beef against a telco, right?). It draws on some significant names: the deputy chair of the ACCC itself, and provision of quotes; and the Treasurer, Wayne Swan, and provision of quotes. So why would you question the authority of this work, or its honestly? It quoted high-up people, from significant organisations.

But the important thing is to work out the goal of this piece. Its goal is to get you to agree with the notion that the carbon tax is a good idea. And the best way to do that is to pitch you against the faceless ‘large corporations’ who so often appear to screw us blind.

Has it told you anything useful? Anything new? Has it given you any information to enable you to make an informed decision on your own? Even though this is only a snippet, the answer (based on what is provided) is a resounding no. All it tells you is what the potential fines are, and what the potential taskforce will be that will enable distribution of those finds: a group of 20 people.

Everything else is a tool of the rhetoric, designed to help you think in a particular way.

I hope you enjoyed this little excursion into the art of persuasion. Please drop a comment and let me know what you think!

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[Book Review] RealmShift, by Alan Baxter (independent)

biodagar — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 01:29:30 +0000

Kudos to Alan for an interesting and gripping dark fantasy. Nice work.

RealmShift is the first of Alan Baxter‘s novel-length works that I have read. Having previously published his short fiction, I knew first-hand how talented he is. RealmShift confirmed to me that his abilities in long fiction are equally tight.

Not generally a big fan of dark fantasy, I put all my prejudices aside and dived in. It was a gripping and interesting tale right from the beginning; and the construct was nicely delivered.

RealmShift tells the story of Isiah and Samuel Harrigan, in a race against time – and Satan! – to make sure that events occur as they should, to retain the ‘balance’ in the universe. I’m not going to write anything more about the story itself because you have to read the book for that; suffice it to say that other characters get drawn into the struggle, and that, for a while, you are not sure which way the story will fall.

Baxter handled the multiple storylines with aplomb, and brought them together in the ‘home run’ of the story admirably. Like many other great writers before him – like Le Carre and Iain Banks – the final portion of Alan’s book was the best part.

For me personally, I found, despite how good this book was, that Baxter’s grip on his characters was with a light touch, as though his ink wouldn’t render them as completely as I personally need to engage with them. They weren’t one-dimensional, but they were lightly sketched. It felt to me that Baxter had to work to portray them.

Except for the character of Samuel Harrigan, that is. Harrigan, in contrast, to the other cast, completely leapt off the page. I suggest that Baxter enjoyed writing this character far more. Harrigan had a density and dimensionality that the other characters lacked.

As an editor, some superficial glitches (of which there were a lot!) annoyed me: missing apostrophes, misused apostrophes, verb-noun sequences that didn’t agree. These could have been fixed with a solid copy edit. I *really* struggle with books that contain unnecessary errors, but with RealmShift I was able to overlook them and just enjoy the story. Kudos indeed!

This is a fabulous book, I’m sad it took me so long to find the time to read it (took me a year to finish it, thanks to other things – though I never had to go back and re-read passages, which is a feat in itself on the author’s behalf!!), and I’m sad it’s over.

Now. Where’s the next one, MageSign… I think I need another fix.

Past posts you might dig:

On corporate conversations: who is engaging whom? And how?

biodagar — Tue, 31 May 2011 22:37:17 +0000

What stories is your business or organisation telling? And who is telling it?

There were so damn many ways I could have moved on from the last post I wrote, that it took me a little while to get my head around it. Well, actually, not too long considering I wrote this the very next day; but it was a lot of thought. In that post I banged on about putting people into boxes, about how marketing can’t use its traditional methods, and (vaguely) about how if companies and organisations don’t change it will spell their deaths.

This time I’m going to focus on the conversation. Last time, I wrote:

If you own or run a business or organisation, are you connected to your ‘market’? Is your door (physical orvirtual) open? Do you encourage your employees to bare themselves online and chat about shit?

I doubt it. In fact, I bet you have policies against social networks and internet use in your workplace. I bet the wrath of god himself comes down on employees who engage in “inappropriate” use of technology. Well, pull your head out of your arse.

If you want your name to get around, let your employees engage. Encourage them to talk about the company, its staff, its goings on, its products, online. Draw the line at confidential stuff, obviously, don’t make me labour the point. But everything else? Fair game, baby.

And by “everything else”, I meant literally everything else. Your employees should be talking about the culture at work, their bosses and managers, how the place functions, everything! Managerial styles, dirty laundry, how people relate to each other. If they are encouraged to do this, they will also talk like mad about the positive things.

But you know what the best thing about this is?

It forces you, your organisation, and your full staff to be honest.

Honesty? Wow, there’s a novel notion huh! But I will tell you something: if an organisation and its staff (and management) are honest and open, the ‘market’ that it wants to have a conversation with will flock to it. A lack of openness and honesty comes back to top-down hierarchies that, I’m sorry to point this out to you if you’re a manager who likes your power, won’t be around for long.

Let’s go back to the Cluetrain Manifesto. I’ve stolen these theses from all over the shop, because they make sense when thrown together:

12. There are no secrets. The networked market knows more than companies do about their own products. And whether the news is good or bad, they tell everyone.

53. There are two conversations going on. One inside the company. One with the market.

54. In most cases, neither conversation is going very well. Almost invariably, the cause of failure can be traced to obsolete notions of command and control.

55. As policy, these notions are poisonous. As tools, they are broken. Command and control are met with hostility by intranetworked knowledge workers and generate distrust in internetworked markets.

56. These two conversations want to talk to each other. They are speaking the same language. They recognize each other’s voices.

57. Smart companies will get out of the way and help the inevitable to happen sooner.

Take the key points out of the five above. The first is that there are no secrets. Any information that comes out about a company, a product, a service, or an organisation has the potential to spread like wildfire. I wish Crushtor had already had his piece on Media Viruses done, because that article explains what I mean. Get things moving virally, you find yourself either celebrating or in serious damage-control mode.

The second point is that there are two conversations: one inside an organisation; one outside. The one outside the organisation is the one that the market sees. It is often controlled by media releases, by marketing, by careful publicity and strategy. The one inside the organisation is usually different. If you could hear the conversations inside the organisation I currently work for, it would shock the pants off you. In fact, if the organisation’s market could hear those conversations, that market might well keep its distance.

But guess what? The two conversations ought to be the same. If those notions of ‘command and control’ were dispensed with, the conversations both inside and outside of the market could interact. The openness and honesty that comes from baring everything to all is enormously beneficial.

Celebrities and bands have already discovered this. It is no coincidence that celebrities bare themselves in the most human way on Twitter, engaging with their audiences, telling us about their (often really fucking mundane) lives, sharing their fears and hopes and what really are potential PR disasters. But it works for them. Why? Because they are in an open conversation with their ‘markets’, and the two are ‘speaking the same language’.

Smart organisations, as we see above, get their organisational charts, notions of command and control, staid ways of managing, out of the way really fucking quickly. They let that conversation happen.

Let’s be honest: If you were working in an organisation where everybody, CEO downwards, was encouraged to talk about the company in as open a way as possible, your feelings of being valued, of being trusted, would skyrocket. These are key elements in keeping a workforce loyal and happy; and also of keeping the market open and happy. Engage your market, help it to engage with you and your employees, and throw the doors wide.

Companies and organisations struggle like mad with Gen X and Gen Me employees; but there is no need to. These guys know the real story, the one that you have been trying so damn hard to ignore; but if you continue to ignore it, it will bite you on the arse. What these guys want is conversation.

Past posts you might dig:

Let’s rethink marketing

On professional ethics

biodagar — Thu, 26 May 2011 02:31:46 +0000

An exploration of what professional ethics is and what happens when it’s corrupt.

The first issue we come to, is what is professional ethics, and how is it divorced from (or is it divorced from) morality.

The professional, in engaging in his or her work, does so within the bounds of certain ethical guidelines. As Wikipedia tells us:

In the workplace managers and supervisors should set the standard for using ethics by showing respect, being honest, and promoting trust. If the management team uses unethical forms of communication, the team and business can fail … Promoting ethics in the workplace gives employees a sense of worth and trust that can help the business and employees succeed (Joseph, Joshua, 2000).

A professional’s ‘set’ of ethics carries with it additional responsibilities. These are moral responsibilities, provided in addition to what you could call ‘standard’ societal responsibilities: by virtue of specialised knowledge and access to specialised information.

In the case of an organisation’s executive, the set of expanded morals that underlie professional ethics carry on outside the workplace. An employee is expected to uphold an organisations ethics whilst at work and, if a confidentiality agreement has been signed, to uphold that in accordance with its standing. A director, a CEO, or other executive, however, of standing in the community, is expected to uphold that organisation’s moral and ethical standing twenty-four hours a day, in any or all of his or her dealings. Any deviation from this can reflect negatively on the organisation, on the organisation’s staff, and on any reputation that that executive may have.

This is where Codes of Conduct and Codes of Practice come in. Let’s go back to Wikipedia:

Questions arise as to the ethical limits of the professional’s responsibility and how power and authority should be used in service to the client and society. Most professions have internally enforced codes of practice that members of the profession must follow, to prevent exploitation of the client and preserve the integrity of the profession … Disciplinary codes allow the profession to draw a standard of conduct and ensure that individual practitioners meet this standard, by disciplining them from the professional body if they do not practice accordingly. This allows those professionals who act with conscience to practice in the knowledge that they will not be undermined commercially by those who have less ethical qualms. It also maintains the public’s trust in the profession, meaning that the public will continue to seek their services.

The key points here are that a professional has power and authority that should be used in service to the client and to society. And also that it ‘maintains the public’s trust in the profession, meaning that the public will continue to seek their services’.

The problem with Codes of Ethics or Codes of Conduct is that they are often internally regulated. What this means is that it is difficult for people external to an organisation to monitor professional practice and professional conduct – which always leaves the possibility that a Code of Conduct could be set up improperly to look after the internal interests of an organisation.

In some cases, professionals contravene an ethical point of view. This is often taken as professional abuse, and covers such elements as taking advantage of clients’ trust, of exploiting clients’ vulnerabilities, of not acting in their clients’ or organisation’s best interests, and worst of all, failing to keep within professional boundaries.

Types of ethical responsibility vary according to type of company, type of organisation, or type of profession. In cases where an organisation is publicly funded (such as through grants in a not-for-profit sector), then a professional’s responsibilities do not involve responsibilities to shareholders and customers and are not limited to ensuring ethical profit-making. Instead, these professionals have a far broader set of responsibilities: including, but not limited to, ethical and moral conduct within the vision, goals and mission of an organisation, to governments, grant-providers, employees, and memberships, and their boards of governance should they exist.

As an example (from this Wiki page)

Computer Societies around the world such as the IEEE and national bodies in Australia, Singapore, the UK and other countries have on their websites professional codes of ethics to consider and adopt in the way professionals conduct themselves in and out of the work place. Things that are included are concepts like: professional respect, avoidance of dishonest or fraudulent activity such as plagiarism and the professional development of the individual. Another aspect of this is the enhancement of the profession and the industry within which the professional works. This concerns a professional’s conduct and behaviour while carrying out their professional work. This then, is work for the good of the community and mankind.

The question is, what happens if a professional contravenes his or her ethical responsibilities, knowingly? Could that professional be seen as being corrupt? Well yes, if money is involved. But is there such a thing as ethical corruption?

First, let’s look at what corruption actually is. It is:

1. the act of corrupting or state of being corrupt

2. moral perversion; depravity

3. dishonesty, esp bribery

4. putrefaction or decay

In business, it is defined as:

Wrongdoing on the part of an authority or powerful party through means that are illegitimate, immoral, or incompatible with ethical standards. Corruption often results from patronage and is associated with bribery.

So, wrongdoing that contravenes ethical standards is, by the latter definition, ethical corruption. Avoiding such a situation calls for a strong level of transparency.

Let’s say you have a lack of transparency – meaning, of course, a situation where a professional’s actions or decisions are not clear, are not communicated, are not candid. You wouldn’t make absolutely everything transparent, for example, when a managerial plan may be compromised by it. But once a plan is decided and put into action, that ought to be made available and clear to those who are affected by it.

Transparency also boils down to an openness and selflessness that negates secrecy; one that avoids the hiding of personal benefits that may accumulate due to position or power, and that may benefit friends or family members. A professional in a not-for-profit organisation, therefore, could not engage in nepotism in any regard, because the organisation is not that person’s business. A sole-trader, however, could freely employ nepotism because that person is a business owner, with sole responsibility of trade and governance.

Corruption we all know about: bribery, fraud, inappropriate financial dealings. You run into ethical corruption when you get into things like inappropriate interpersonal associations and transactions. Taking our not-for-profit example running through the essay, a professional in such a setting is, technically, a public servant. As this page notes,

It is a very predictable aspect of human nature to take advantage of the public trust and use it for one’s own personal advantage.

If, however, a public servant is dishonest in his or her dealings with their organisation, their members or their public; makes fraudulent claims; is morally depraved (as defined by the moral standards and codes by that person’s society, profession, or organisation)… that person is then, technically, ethically corrupt.

Limiting ethical corruption is difficult, but free participation is probably the easiest way to do so. This involves the hearing of suggestions, an appropriate complaints process that does not have a ceiling (and allows for complaints about all levels of an organisation, from administration to governance), and a process for those suggestions and complaints to be funnelled into an appropriate, effective improvement process.

Going back to the first quote, we found this:

Promoting ethics in the workplace gives employees a sense of worth and trust that can help the business and employees succeed.

If in any instance where ethics is shaky, what do you think happens to employees’ sense of worth and trust? That, too, starts to falter. In some cases, it can create immense levels of stress, and undermines an entire organisation’s effectiveness. An organisation or company is, after all, only as good as the people within it.

Transparency, in issues where ethical corruption may be at the forefront, is vital. What it does is that it shows to any funding bodies, customers, members of the public, clients, memberships, staff, governing bodies (and so on), that the organisation itself is morally and ethically accountable, honest, and open. It ensures that free participation is possible, and it helps to grow trust and good standing: which in any business is absolutely essential.

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Script Frenzy… I kinda failed

biodagar — Fri, 06 May 2011 06:59:22 +0000

Script Frenzy 2011 ended on 30 April. I got less than 25% done.

Well if you’d read this post, you’d know that I was part of this year’s Script Frenzy. My goal? To write 100 pages of Denim Avenger 3. It was a simple ask, 3.3 pages a day – not difficult, right? Um, yes.

I got 17 pages done. That’s 17%. Hardly even respectable in my books.

But you know, it was a good experience. The main thing it taught me – even though I knew it already – was that I had to write something every day. What I ended up doing is what I teach people not to do: agonising over the direction of my characters.

Hence, they stopped performing for me.

Still, it’s been enough to keep me excited about the project. And enough to keep the director and producer excited about the project. So that’s something.

Wish me luck on further development. In another 83 pages we’ll have a workable draft. Here’s hoping I can get it done before the next financial year, so we can apply for film development funding.

How did all you other Script Frenziers go?

Past posts you might dig:

April Script Frenzy… on your marks… get set…

Afflicted 20: Chapter 19

biodagar — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 00:00:51 +0000

Bevan didn’t hear from Jack, but he also didn’t hear from anybody else about him, so he didn’t worry. He figured that his mate was probably just wagging school and staying out of his mum’s way; he also figured that she was probably prone to exaggeration—all mums were. Especially Jack’s.

The rest of the week passed uneventfully, and on Friday Rick announced that his old man had bought him a new second-hand bike, and was fixing it up. Did he want to go fishing the next day?

In response, Bevan eyed his friend critically. He still didn’t look well enough to be riding down the river to go fishing. ‘Are you sure you’re up to it?’

Rick sighed impatiently.

Bevan changed his tack. ‘Let’s not ride, alright? We’ll walk. If we leave in the morning we’ll still get a good day’s fishing in.’

Rick sighed. ‘Fine.’

‘Besides,’ commented Bevan. ‘If your dad fucks up the brakes on this bike like he did the last one, the ride’ll kill you. If it doesn’t, you’ll barely be able to get out of that place in one piece.’

So it was that Bevan and Rick met up the next morning and walked down along the river. They hadn’t done it for what such a long time. They didn’t talk much. The beautiful sunshine was warm and with its cascading heat came silence, which walked with them for most of the way. Each was absorbed in his own thoughts, neither of them taking much notice of their surroundings, even though for both of them the river was easily the most wonderful place in the world. The two boys had been living in a fog for what seemed half their lives, a fog that had made them forget the simple pleasures in their lives.

The walk down around the river took them a good while. Their usual spot was a good five k’s or so along, and much of that was over rutted tracks, through pestilential weeds resplendent with thorns and other nasties that catch you unaware if you don’t pay attention. It took them an hour to get there sometimes. But Rick’s condition meant that it took them longer than usual; and the sun was so nice that it made them want to linger.

After a while they got to where they were going, to the big tree on the bend in the river. They stopped in their tracks at the same time, as if by telepathic consensus and, now hidden from the sun and in the strengthening breeze, they pulled out their jumpers with one accord and put them on. They also simultaneously looked up, sat down, and lit up a smoke. They smoked, and sat, and looked up into the tree, contemplatively. The sun filtering down through the leaves hit them in the face now and then, and highlighted how ill they looked.

Their worries about Jack had passed in the warmth of the morning. Neither of them had expected to see him swinging gently in the breeze, held aloft by a noose around his neck. Shortly after they’d sat down, Bevan’s phone started to ring. He jerked out of his reverie and pulled it out of his pocket to see who it was.

It was Jack’s mum.

Bevan sighed, stared at it with sadness, then shuddered and pitched his phone into the river.

‘I’m sorry, man,’ he whispered up at Jack. ‘Your mum’ll murder you when she finds out you’ve killed yourself.’

Fini.

Past posts you might dig:

April Script Frenzy… on your marks… get set…

biodagar — Sun, 20 Mar 2011 06:40:04 +0000

This coming April is, for stage- and screen-writers all over the world, Script Frenzy month. And like the crazy person I am, I’ve vowed to take part.

Script Frenzy is one of those prize-free writing challenges, like NaBloPoMo. Except, instead of writing one blog a day for a month, the challenge is to write 100 pages of script in 30 days.

Script Frenzy is an international writing event in which participants take on the challenge of writing 100 pages of scripted material in the month of April. As part of a donation-funded nonprofit, Script Frenzy charges no fee to participate; there are also no valuable prizes awarded or “best” scripts singled out. Every writer who completes the goal of 100 pages is victorious and awe-inspiring and will receive a handsome Script Frenzy Winner’s Certificate and web icon proclaiming this fact.

I love the fact that the sole prize of Script Frenzy is personal awesomeness. Well, that and a full script after just a month’s work. I figure it oughtn’t to be too hard. One hundred pages in 30 days is a mere 3.3 pages a day. That, with the right planning, is absolutely do-able.

Given that I’m at the beginning of writing two feature-length scripts at the moment: one an adaptation of a friend’s (very popular) novel, and the third Denim Avenger movie, Script Frenzy is coming along at just the ~~write~~ right time. And also given that DA3 is a collaborative effort, all of Script Frenzy this April will be dedicated to this awesome cause.

So right now, I’m in creative ideas and storyline-writing mode. Come 1st April, the challenge is on! Stay tuned for updates as April gets into gear.

Past posts you might dig:

CHALLENGE: 500 words a week

Afflicted 19: Chapter 18

biodagar — Sun, 20 Mar 2011 00:00:59 +0000

The next fortnight was weird. Jack didn’t turn up to school or anywhere, and it was strange, almost empty without his spirited temper around the place; but it was also peaceful. Rick didn’t turn up for the first week, deciding that it would be better to try and get over his injuries, a little bit at least, before attempting to carry his bag and walk the distance. Bevan had spent that first week feeling oddly empty and lonely. His smell didn’t bother him any more, but in a strange way he wished it did. It was the kind of persistent presence that he felt was missing in his life.

The week gave Bevan a chance to think about things a bit more clearly, and by Thursday he’d gathered up the courage to dig his fishing gear out of the back shed and go fishing. Not wanting to tempt fate, he pursued some nice spots in the other direction and got more redfin than he’d ever pulled in—including the day that he’d given most of his haul to Jack to take home. The time spent in meditation by the river was useful for Bevan. He worried about Jack not being around, and wondered if he ought to try and get in touch with him. The more rational Bevan—that is, he without the appalling stench—decided that although Jack had been better to him than usual, that it probably wouldn’t last, and didn’t want to push things. He figured Jack was man enough to take care of himself.

Bevan also started to get over his anger at Rick, but it didn’t stop him from thinking that his friend would probably turn out warped and, potentially dangerous if he was let loose on the world. Rick’s fascination with dead things disturbed him.

The following Monday, Rick walked unseeingly past Bevan on his way past the school gates, towards the back smoking rendezvous. Bevan fell into step behind Rick and, being better at silent walking than his friend was, managed to get all the way to the spot without being seen or heard.

Rick walked right up and over the ridge, and dumped his bag under a tree; he turned and leapt about a foot in the air when he saw Bevan grinning at him and holding out a smoke. Rick took it gratefully, and cautiously started to enjoy it. Bevan, meanwhile, was casting a critical eye over his friend, taking in the bruises that had spread and deepened.

He frowned, blowing smoke in the direction of the breeze. ‘What the fuck happened to you?’ He walked around Rick and lifted up his mate’s shirt to have a look at his ribs, on the off-chance that they’d be the same colour as his face. They were. Rick absently touched his nose, and rubbed the back of his neck.

‘Jack.’

For a moment this went past Bevan. ‘What do you mean J…’ his eyes widened as his brain caught up. ‘Fuck off.’

‘I’m not shitting you, man. Jack belted the crap out of me.’

Bevan nodded. ‘He sure fucken did!’

Rick looked around uneasily. ‘He’s not here is he?’

‘Nup,’ the butt-end of Bevan’s smoke sailed over Rick’s head and landed on a pile of sand amongst the long grass. ‘Haven’t seen him for over a week. Jesus you musta pissed him off.’

Rick cast his mind back to that afternoon at the river, and looked past his taunting of Jack over the dead girl. He looked past the injuries that he’d received from ditching his bike. His face assumed an innocent, wounded look. ‘Dunno what I did. Reckon he just went psycho.’

Bevan slowly shook his head in amazement. He’d always thought Jack was full of piss and wind, never thought he’d actually ever lay into anyone. He was full of admiration; maybe it’ll teach this arrogant twat a bit of a lesson.

‘Shit, eh?’

What else could a bloke say?

When they parted ways, Bevan pulled out his phone and sent Jack a text message. He didn’t expect to get a reply, but he did think that if he’d belted the fuck out of Rick then something serious must be going on in that dude’s head, otherwise Rick was lying through his teeth. Bevan thought it was probably a little bit of both. He always took what Rick said with a bit of salt.As he walked through the courtyard at the front of the school, he saw Jack’s mum emerge from the front door, looking pensive.

‘Hello,’ thought Bevan. ‘One of the boys has done something.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Two past nine. Shit, they don’t waste any time. ’ He yelled out to her and gave her a wave.

Jack’s mum didn’t smile at him or wave back, but she did head immediately in his direction. She was frowning, but Bevan could see that she was far more preoccupied than she was angry. Her eyes were dim and looked past him. She didn’t greet him when he caught up with him.

‘Bevan! Have you seen Jack?’

He was taken aback, and shook his head. ‘Nah, sorry, I haven’t. I thought he was at home.’

She gestured to his phone. ‘Have you heard from him? When was the last time you saw him?’

Bevan looked at her warily and pocketed his phone. ‘Why? Is he in trouble?’ He didn’t want to get his mate any more in the shit than he had to, because he knew what a cow Jack’s mum was to him, usually when he didn’t deserve it. She was the Disciplinarian Extraordinaire.

Jack’s mum breathed out and her countenance lost a bit of its tension. Her eyes focused on Bevan a bit better, and she smiled at his loyalty. ‘No. I’m just worried about him, I haven’t seen hide nor hair of him for three days. Last time I did see him he was kind of weird; real nice to me. Little shit’s never really nice to me. Makes me wonder what he’s done. And he looked so tired, Bevan.’

Bevan grinned at her description of Jack as a little shit. He wondered briefly what she’d call him if she saw Rick. He could tell that Jack’s mum was really worried about her son: her face was lined and her skin looked papery. He promised he’d let her know the instant he heard from his friend. She gave him her mobile number and told him that even a text message would do.

‘Thanks mate, I appreciate it.’ She gave him a hug, which Bevan uneasily returned, hoping that somebody would rescue him from this unwonted display of affection from one of his mate’s mums; and then she left, wrapped up in her own world again.

Past posts you might dig: