After a nanowrimo fail in November mainly ascribable to a long weekend in Cornwall, I am now 1850m up a French mountain working on the 17500 words of a new novel. It’s interesting writing about sailing off the east coast of Africa when you are surrounded by snow!

Pulitzer Prize winning humour columnist legend, new novel ‘Lunatics’ out in January, quoted in the first draft of my new novel and talking about the Twilight saga, the film of the fourth of which I had the misfortune to sit through yesterday…

Ah, t’interweb is a wonderful thing – I just got a Facebook friend request from an old University chum although I was ‘recommended’ as his friend via an acquaintance made at a writing conference I found out about on Twitter. He’s just had his first book published and here’s the trailer:

I’ll be nanowrimoing in November, that is writing a 50,000 word draft of my third novel and so, there won’t be much activity on here. See you in December!

In all honesty it doesn’t look much like the book which I read today, in a blinding frenzy of jealousy, although they have mostly the right animals in there… but I’ll still be seeing it as soon as it’s out.

Including Janet Evanovich’s ‘One for the Money’ which, if you’ve been keeping track you’ll know I have read along with the other sixteen in the series, although when I just checked what number we were up to on amazon I was very excited to find that there is an eighteenth coming out in November. We only usually get a new one in the summer and already had this year’s so I am on the tipping brink and hit the pre-order immediately. The one I will be reading is, unsurprisingly, ‘We Bought a Zoo’. One-clicked. Didn’t even add it to my wishlist. Click on the cover for the full story.

Still writing at 91, PD James has recently announced a crime sequel to Pride & Prejudice, much to Jon Pinnock’s chagrin.

Here she is talking about her career and work on her 90th birthday:

From the very beautiful, if somewhat melancholy, ‘A Fine Balance’ by Rohinton Mistry (A World Book Night giveaway from Pretty Scruffy – my new favourite place for excellent presents for special people):

“‘Let’s have masala wada today,’ proposed Ishvar. ‘Rajaram’s recipe.’
‘I don’t know how to make that.’
‘That’s okay, I can do it, Dinabai, you relax today.’ He took charge, sending Om and Maneck to buy a fresh half-coconut, green chillies, mint leaves and a small bunch of coriander. The remaining ingredients: dry red chillies, cumin seed, and tamarind were in the spice cabinet. ‘Now you two hurry back,’ he said. ‘There’s more work for you.’
‘Shall I do something?’ asked Dina.
‘We need one cup of gram dal.’
She measured out the pulse and immersed it in water, the put the pot on the stove. ‘If we had soaked it overnight it wouldn’t need boiling,’ he said. ‘But this is fine too.’
When the boys returned, he assigned Om to grate the coconut and Maneck to slice two onions while he chopped four green and six red chillies, the coriander, and the mint leaves.
‘These onions are hot, yaar,’ said Maneck, sniffing and wiping his eyes on his sleeve.
‘It’s good practice for you,’ said Ishvar. ‘Everyone has to cry at some time in life.’ He glanced across the table and saw the fat white rings falling from the knife. ‘Hoi-hoi, slice it thinner.’
The dal was ready. He drained the water and emptied the pot into the mortar. He added half a teaspoon of cumin seed and the chopped chillies, then began mashing it all together. The drumming pestle prompted Maneck to add cymbals with his knife upon the pot.
‘Aray bandmaster, are your onions ready?’ said Ishvar. The medley in the mortar was turning into a rough paste, yellow with specks of green and red and brown. He mixed in the remaining ingredients and raised a bit to his nose, sampling the aroma. ‘Perfect. Now it’s time to make the frying pan sing. While I do the wadas, Om will make the chutney. Come on, grind the remaining copra and kothmeer-mirchi.’
The frying pan hissed and sizzled as Ishvar gently slid ping-pong sized balls into the glistening oil. He pushed them around with a spoon, keeping them swimming for an even colour. Meanwhile, Om dragged the round masala stone back and forth across the flat slab. Maneck took over after a while. Drop by precious drop, the green chutney emerged from their effort.
Dina stood savouring the fragrance of the wadas that were slowly turning mouth-watering brown in bubbling oil. She watched as the cleanup commenced with laughter and teasing, Ishvar warning the boys that if the grinding stone was not spotless he would make them lick it clean, like cats. What a change, she thought – from the saddest, dingiest room in the flat, the kitchen was transformed into a bright place of mirth and energy.
Thirty minutes later the treat was ready. ‘Let’s eat while it’s hot,’ said Ishvar. ‘Come on, Om, get water for us.’
Everyone took a wada apiece and spread chutney over it. Ishvar waited for the verdict, beaming proudly.
‘Superb!’ said Maneck

Once upon a time, a book group in the provincial city of Chichester, so close to the South coast of England you can hear the seagulls, attracted the attention of two rival novelists when they noticed on amazon that their, very different, books were being purchased together – as a result of being featured in subsequent meetings of the Chichester Readers. A gauntlet was laid down in a not-so-gentlemanly manner on Twitter…

And so we bring you the Bower-Pinnock Bake-Off, where these rival novelists will fight to knockout to explain why their book is better.

In the red corner: Jonathan Pinnock with his debut novel ‘Mrs Darcy Against the Aliens’ published 1^st September 2011.

In the blue corner: Gavin James Bower with his second novel ‘Made in Britain’ published 29^th September 2011.

Q: What are the premises of your books guys, and why is yours the more compelling reading?

JP: It’s a sequel to “Pride and Prejudice” with aliens. Covers all the bases. Romance, drugs, rock’n'roll and tentacles. I mean, what more do you want in a novel? It’s also the only book in the world featuring a pigeon called Colin. Probably.

GJB: My book’s a coming of age story set in the post-industrial North, following the lives of three very different sixteen-year-olds in the summer of their GCSEs. Jon’s is a parody of a book you study for GCSE.

JP: “Coming of age story”. Like we need another one of them. Ah well, I’m sure there will be plenty of frustrated teens who’ll lap it up. And dear oh dear, parody? Keep up, Bower. It’s a sequel. But I like the symmetry of the GCSE thing. I wonder if he writes poetry.

Q: What kind of person do you think should be reading your book?

GJB: My book falls between adult and YA fiction – and I think it’s as much for young people, perhaps growing up in a small town, as it is for an adult with a bit of distance from that time in their life. Everyone can relate to growing up and feeling like you don’t fit in, though. Jon’s, on the other hand, relies on you being nauseatingly familiar with the work of Jane Austen – so I suppose A-Level English Literature teachers can form an orderly queue…

JP: Essentially my readership is drawn from four main groups: people who hate Jane Austen, people who love Jane Austen but hate Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, people who love Jane Austen and also love Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, and everyone else. In a nutshell, my target market is anyone who can read.

GJB: If you’d read mine, which clearly you haven’t, then you’d know that rules out me.

Q: Have you read each other’s books? If so, what did you like most? If not, what’s most likely to put you off reading it?

JP: No. Well, look at that graffiti scrawl on the cover. I don’t think I really want to be seen reading that sort of thing. You can tell there’s going to be bad language in it.

GJB: No – and I’d say, admittedly in advance of seeing Jon’s answers, this interview.

JP: Well, he can fuck right off.

Q: You’ll both be Skyping with the group on a Friday night (Jon first in October followed by Gavin in November). What’s your plan to make the evening memorable for the readers?

GJB: I’ll be naked, trying not to think about Jon naked. It most definitely won’t be hard. As it were.

JP: I’ll obviously avoid anything obvious, like doing it naked. I may however decide to answer questions through the medium of mime.

GJB: (I’m naked right now, too.)

Q: What’s your ultimate ambition as an author and how do you think this compares with your rival’s?

JP: To combine critical acclaim with humungous sales. I imagine Gavin’s will be more limited and a bit macho – probably along the lines of wanting to win duels with other authors. Am I right?

GJB: My ambition’s to be the winner of this and every duel; the difference between us being, I actually have a shot.

JP: Yeah, but I can read your mind.

Q: What’s the question you most want to hear one of your readers ask?

GJB: ‘What’s the deal with that Jon Pinnock dude?’ To which I reply, ‘It’s John, actually. With a ‘h’…’

JP: Why is your book so much better than Gavin’s?

GJB: BOOM!

Well, sort of, and in nine character fragments – read the story here.

What’s challenging my brain slightly is that they are working with 9 character strings of which there are apparently 5.5 trillion combinations – there are 2572 words in ‘The Lover’s Complaint’ so if we were to say each word averaged six characters that’s 15432 characters in the string (excluding spaces)… how many trillion of combinations would that be?

Here’s the poem:

‘The Lover’s Complaint’ by William Shakespeare

From off a hill whose concave womb reworded
A plaintful story from a sist’ring vale,
My spirits t’attend this double voice accorded,
And down I laid to list the sad-tuned tale,
Ere long espied a fickle maid full pale,
Tearing of papers, breaking rings atwain,
Storming her world with sorrow’s wind and rain.
Upon her head a platted hive of straw,
Which fortified her visage from the sun,
Whereon the thought might think sometime it saw
The carcase of a beauty spent and done.
Time had not scythed all that youth begun,
Nor youth all quit, but spite of heaven’s fell rage
Some beauty peeped through lattice of seared age.

Oft did she heave her napkin to her eyne,
Which on it had conceited characters,
Laund’ring the silken figures in the brine
That seasoned woe had pelleted in tears,
And often reading what contents it bears;
As often shrieking undistinguished woe
In clamours of all size, both high and low.

Sometimes her levelled eyes their carriage ride
As they did batt’ry to the spheres intend;
Sometime diverted their poor balls are tied
To th’orbed earth; sometimes they do extend
Their view right on; anon their gazes lend
To every place at once, and nowhere fixed,
The mind and sight distractedly commixed.

Her hair, nor loose nor tied in formal plait,
Proclaimed in her a careless hand of pride;
For some, untucked, descended her sheaved hat,
Hanging her pale and pined cheek beside;
Some in her threaden fillet still did bide,
And, true to bondage, would not break from thence,
Though slackly braided in loose negligence.

A thousand favours from a maund she drew
Of amber, crystal, and of beaded jet,
Which one by one she in a river threw,
Upon whose weeping margent she was set;
Like usury applying wet to wet,
Or monarch’s hands that lets not bounty fall
Where want cries some, but where excess begs all.

Of folded schedules had she many a one,
Which she perused, sighed, tore, and gave the flood;
Cracked many a ring of posied gold and bone,
Bidding them find their sepulchres in mud;
Found yet moe letters sadly penned in blood,
With sleided silk feat and affectedly
Enswathed and sealed to curious secrecy.

These often bathed she in her fluxive eyes,
And often kissed, and often ‘gan to tear;
Cried “O false blood, thou register of lies,
What unapproved witness dost thou bear!
Ink would have seemed more black and damned here!”
This said, in top of rage the lines she rents,
Big discontent so breaking their contents.

A reverend man that grazed his cattle nigh,
Sometime a blusterer that the ruffle knew
Of court, of city, and had let go by
The swiftest hours observed as they flew,
Towards this afflicted fancy fastly drew,
And, privileged by age, desires to know
In brief the grounds and motives of her woe.

So slides he down upon his grained bat,
And comely distant sits he by her side,
When he again desires her, being sat,
Her grievance with his hearing to divide.
If that from him there may be aught applied
Which may her suffering ecstasy assuage,
‘Tis promised in the charity of age.

“Father,” she says “though in me you behold
The injury of many a blasting hour,
Let it not tell your judgement I am old:
Not age, but sorrow over me hath power.
I might as yet have been a spreading flower,
Fresh to myself, if I had self-applied
Love to myself, and to no love beside.

“But, woe is me! too early I attended
A youthful suit -it was to gain my grace -
O, one by nature’s outwards so commended
That maidens’ eyes stuck over all his face.
Love lacked a dwelling and made him her place;
And when in his fair parts she did abide
She was new-lodged and newly deified.

“His browny locks did hang in crooked curls,
And every light occasion of the wind
Upon his lips their silken parcels hurls.
What’s sweet to do, to do will aptly find:
Each eye that saw him did enchant the mind,
For on his visage was in little drawn
What largeness thinks in Paradise was sawn.

“Small show of man was yet upon his chin;
His phoenix down began but to appear,
Like unshorn velvet, on that termless skin,
Whose bare outbragged the web it seemed to wear;
Yet showed his visage by that cost more dear,
And nice affections wavering stood in doubt
If best were as it was, or best without.

“His qualities were beauteous as his form,
For maiden-tongued he was, and thereof free;
Yet, if men moved him, was he such a storm
As oft twixt May and April is to see,
When winds breathe sweet, unruly though they be.
His rudeness so with his authorized youth
Did livery falseness in a pride of truth.

“Well could he ride, and often men would say
`That horse his mettle from his rider takes:
Proud of subjection, noble by the sway,
What rounds, what bounds, what course, what stop he makes!’
And controversy hence a question takes,
Whether the horse by him became his deed,
Or he his manage by th’ well-doing steed.

“But quickly on this side the verdict went:
His real habitude gave life and grace
To appertainings and to ornament,
Accomplished in himself, not in his case.
All aids, themselves made fairer by their place,
Came for additions; yet their purposed trim
Pieced not his grace, but were all graced by him.

“So on the tip of his subduing tongue
All kind of arguments and question deep,
All replication prompt, and reason strong,
For his advantage still did wake and sleep.
To make the weeper laugh, the laugher weep,
He had the dialect and different skill,
Catching all passions in his craft of will,

“That he did in the general bosom reign
Of young, of old, and sexes both enchanted,
To dwell with him in thoughts, or to remain
In personal duty, following where he haunted.
Consents bewitched, ere he desire, have granted,
And dialogued for him what he would say,
Asked their own wills, and made their wills obey.

“Many there were that did his picture get
To serve their eyes, and in it put their mind;
Like fools that in th’imagination set
The goodly objects which abroad they find
Of lands and mansions, theirs in thought assigned,
And labour in moe pleasures to bestow them
Than the true gouty landlord which doth owe them.

“So many have, that never touched his hand,
Sweetly supposed them mistress of his heart.
My woeful self, that did in freedom stand,
And was my own fee-simple, not in part,
What with his art in youth, and youth in art,
Threw my affections in his charmed power,
Reserved the stalk and gave him all my flower.

“Yet did I not, as some my equals did,
Demand of him, nor being desired yielded;
Finding myself in honour so forbid,
With safest distance I mine honour shielded.
Experience for me many bulwarks builded
Of proofs new-bleeding, which remained the foil
Of this false jewel and his amorous spoil.

“But ah, who ever shunned by precedent
The destined ill she must herself assay?
Or forced examples ‘gainst her own content
To put the by-past perils in her way?
Counsel may stop awhile what will not stay,
For when we rage, advice is often seen
By blunting us to make our wills more keen.

“Nor gives it satisfaction to our blood
That we must curb it upon others’ proof,
To be forbod the sweets that seems so good
For fear of harms that preach in our behoof.
O appetite, from judgement stand aloof!
The one a palate hath that needs will taste,
Though reason weep, and cry `It is thy last’.

“For further I could say this man’s untrue,
And knew the patterns of his foul beguiling;
Heard where his plants in others’ orchards grew;
Saw how deceits were gilded in his smiling;
Knew vows were ever brokers to defiling;
Thought characters and words merely but art,
And bastards of his foul adulterate heart.

“And long upon these terms I held my city,
Till thus he ‘gan besiege me: `Gentle maid,
Have of my suffering youth some feeling pity,
And be not of my holy vows afraid.
That’s to ye sworn to none was ever said;
For feasts of love I have been called unto,
Till now did ne’er invite nor never woo.

” `All my offences that abroad you see
Are errors of the blood, none of the mind;
Love made them not; with acture they may be,
Where neither party is nor true nor kind.
They sought their shame that so their shame did find;
And so much less of shame in me remains
By how much of me their reproach contains.

” `Among the many that mine eyes have seen,
Not one whose flame my heart so much as warmed,
Or my affection put to th’ smallest teen,
Or any of my leisures ever charmed.
Harm have I done to them, but ne’er was harmed;
Kept hearts in liveries, but mine own was free,
And reigned commanding in his monarchy.

” `Look here what tributes wounded fancies sent me
Of pallid pearls and rubies red as blood,
Figuring that they their passions likewise lent me
Of grief and blushes, aptly understood
In bloodless white and the encrimsoned mood -
Effects of terror and dear modesty,
Encamped in hearts, but fighting outwardly.

” `And lo, behold these talents of their hair,
With twisted metal amorously impleached,
I have received from many a several fair,
Their kind acceptance weepingly beseeched,
With the annexions of fair gems enriched,
And deep-brained sonnets that did amplify
Each stone’s dear nature, worth, and quality.

” `The diamond? -why, ’twas beautiful and hard,
Whereto his invised properties did tend;
The deep-green em’rald, in whose fresh regard
Weak sights their sickly radiance do amend;
The heaven-hued sapphire and the opal blend
With objects manifold: each several stone,
With wit well blazoned, smiled or made some moan.
” `Lo, all these trophies of affections hot,
Of pensived and subdued desires the tender,
Nature hath charged me that I hoard them not,
But yield them up where I myself must render -
That is to you, my origin and ender;
For these, of force, must your oblations be,
Since I their altar, you enpatron me.

” `O then advance of yours that phraseless hand,
Whose white weighs down the airy scale of praise.
Take all these similes to your own command,
Hallowed with sighs that burning lungs did raise.
What me your minister, for you obeys,
Works under you, and to your audit comes
Their distract parcels in combined sums.

” `Lo, this device was sent me from a nun,
A sister sanctified, of holiest note,
Which late her noble suit in court did shun,
Whose rarest havings made the blossoms dote;
For she was sought by spirits of richest coat,
But kept cold distance, and did thence remove
To spend her living in eternal love.

” `But, O my sweet, what labour is’t to leave
The thing we have not, mast’ring what not strives,
Planing the place which did no form receive,
Playing patient sports in unconstrained gyves!
She that her fame so to herself contrives,
The scars of battle scapeth by the flight,
And makes her absence valiant, not her might.

” `O pardon me, in that my boast is true!
The accident which brought me to her eye
Upon the moment did her force subdue,
And now she would the caged cloister fly:
Religious love put out religion’s eye.
Not to be tempted, would she be immured,
And now to tempt, all liberty procured.

” `How mighty then you are, O hear me tell!
The broken bosoms that to me belong
Have emptied all their fountains in my well,
And mine I pour your ocean all among.
I strong o’er them, and you o’er me being strong,
Must for your victory us all congest,
As compound love to physic your cold breast.

” `My parts had power to charm a sacred nun,
Who, disciplined, ay, dieted in grace,
Believed her eyes when they t’assail begun,
All vows and consecrations giving place.
O most potential love! -vow, bond, nor space,
In thee hath neither sting, knot, nor confine,
For thou art all, and all things else are thine.

” `When thou impressest, what are precepts worth
Of stale example? When thou wilt inflame,
How coldly those impediments stand forth,
Of wealth, of filial fear, law, kindred, fame!
Love’s arms are peace, ‘gainst rule, ‘gainst sense, ‘gainst shame;
And sweetens, in the suff’ring pangs it bears,
The aloes of all forces, shocks, and fears.

” `Now all these hearts that do on mine depend,
Feeling it break, with bleeding groans they pine,
And supplicant their sighs to you extend,
To leave the batt’ry that you make ‘gainst mine,
Lending soft audience to my sweet design,
And credent soul to that strong-bonded oath
That shall prefer and undertake my troth.’

“This said, his wat’ry eyes he did dismount,
whose sights till then were levelled on my face;
Each cheek a river running from a fount
With brinish current downward flowed apace.
O how the channel to the stream gave grace!
Who glazed with crystal gate the glowing roses
That flame through water which their hue encloses.

“O father, what a hell of witchcraft lies
In the small orb of one particular tear!
But with the inundation of the eyes
What rocky heart to water will not wear?
What breast so cold that is not warmed here?
O cleft effect! Cold modesty, hot wrath,
Both fire from hence and chill extincture hath.

“For lo, his passion, but an art of craft,
Even there resolved my reason into tears;
There my white stole of chastity I daffed,
Shook off my sober guards and civil fears;
Appear to him as he to me appears,
All melting; though our drops this diff’rence bore:
His poisoned me, and mine did him restore.

“In him a plenitude of subtle matter,
Applied to cautels, all strange forms receives,
Of burning blushes or of weeping water,
Or swooning paleness; and he takes and leaves,
In either’s aptness, as it best deceives,
To blush at speeches rank, to weep at woes,
Or to turn white and swoon at tragic shows,

“That not a heart which in his level came
Could scape the hail of his all-hurting aim,
Showing fair nature is both kind and tame;
And, veiled in them, did win whom he would maim.
Against the thing he sought he would exclaim;
When he most burned in heart-wished luxury
He preached pure maid and praised cold chastity.

“Thus merely with the garment of a grace
The naked and concealed fiend he covered,
That th’unexperient gave the tempter place,
Which like a cherubin above them hovered.
Who, young and simple, would not be so lovered?
Ay me, I fell; and yet do question make
What I should do again for such a sake.

“O, that infected moisture of his eye,
O, that false fire which in his cheek so glowed,
O, that forced thunder from his heart did fly,
O, that sad breath his spongy lungs bestowed,
O, all that borrowed motion, seeming owed,
Would yet again betray the fore-betrayed,
And new pervert a reconciled maid.”

OMG it’s really on its way!!!

I’m reading this at the moment and have been laughing all day!

How long is a piece of a string? When does a boat become a ship? When I tell people I am a writer, following the “Are you published?” question and the obligatory comment about JKR, often comes the question, “How long is a novel anyway?” Standard answer: “An average sized paperback is around 80,000 words, but many are longer.” My first novel hit the 80K mark, my new one’s pushing 125K. 80k works out at around 250 pages at around 300 words per page. I’m currently reading (and struggling with) Patrick White, Nobel Prize for Literature winner’s ‘The Vivisector’, a big one at 560 pages (depending on the typesetting I estimate at 170k words plus (interesting that when you report your book to a literary agent you do it in words, when a publisher broadcasts the work to potential readers it’s done in pages)). Why am I struggling with ‘The Vivisector’? It’s not so much the size, it’s the pace. And it’s not that the writing isn’t beautiful, it is, but there’s not an awful lot happening. You don’t win the Nobel Prize for Literature, I understand, for a book, but for an oeuvre, and I’ve no idea where this book figured in the choice to award this author the most prestigious acknowledgement for awesome, mind-altering, political game-changing creative endeavours, but it’s about a guy from a poor background, given some opportunities, becoming a struggling painter, having a relationship with a whore called Nancy. Maybe I’m missing something, but, if I’m honest, I don’t think it’ll be long before I pick something more interesting up instead. I can’t even remember why I bought it.

At the other end of the scale is something called Flash Fiction. It’s a bit like Twitter and a bit more than a Haiku. Tell a story in 100 – 500 words. Less than a short story (1000 – 5000 words?) but something it takes less than, say five minutes to read. I posted a cartoon about short stories not long ago, and the sentiment was that nobody is really that interested in short stories anymore and too, I don’t think Flash Fiction has much currency these days. It was a phase, a fashion, a ‘flash’ in the pan. Short stories used to be popular in magazines and some of the more content (rather than music) driven radio shows. Like poetry, a dying breed. For a writer, useful; I think I have described it before as a ‘cranial starjump’ – a reminder of how to tightly tie characterisation, plot and action together, with a sprinkling of concise description of setting and time. A good exercise when you are spending 1-2 years (or more!) writing a full length novel.

When you buy a book, do you think you are getting more value if you get more pages? More paper? More words? Pret a Manger recently introduced calorie counts to their sandwiches and salads on the shelves. To promote healthy eating and help people understand the nutritional values of their consumption. After our initial shock that the Parma ham baguette we particularly relish had over 600 calories in it (and thinking of our figures), I then experienced some reverse logic in my head. Suddenly, I wanted as much fuel for my buck as I could get. Why would I fork out nearly £4 for a salad when for less than that I could buy twice the amount of calories? This is the classic quality over quantity argument. Do you want lots of crap or a little bit of excellent? The Twilight series, a massively successful global phenomenon obvs, has four very bulky books in the series and is the one piece of writing that, although I never had any trouble reading, is the only example I can give you where I have enjoyed the film versions more. Why? Because there’s a lot of pulp in that fiction, an enormous amount of emotional inner dialogue that, when dispensed with, leaves you with a feisty, bolshy heroine, Bella, that you can really get behind, instead of a girl who, frankly, is a bit whiny.

And then there is the novella. Generally accepted to be 60,000 words (200 pages) or less. Not many people publish novellas these days. The most popular I can think of is Ian McEwan’s totally fantastic ‘On Chesil Beach’ (166 pages). A must read. If you haven’t read any McEwan, skip ‘Solar’ and read that. ‘The Cement Garden’, the first I read of his, is also a novella at a mere 144 pages. And also amazing, if rather disturbing.

Gavin James Bower has written two books, the first of which, ‘Dazed and Aroused’ was a very readable perhaps homage to his literary hero and inspiration, the enormous, Bret Easton Ellis. His second, ‘Made in Britain’ is available now and is an extremely engaging and original piece of work. Gavin tells each chapter in snippets from three narrators and the moving, intertwining POVs work excellently. The narrators are teenagers, living in the north and we have the good, the bad, and the not ugly at all, but certainly inexperienced and naive. It’s kind of a love triangle, set in an underprivileged underclass. Almost the opposite to his first. Drugs are still rampant, but here more necessary than recreational. This is a book about survival, not decadence. And so had much more resonance for me. This is not about an endless whirl of parties but a breathless scampering to what their futures will hold, given the promise of their roots. Both of Gavin’s books come in at 200 pages or less so strictly speaking are novellas but, possibly partly because Gavin is an professional editor as well as a professional writer, they contain more substance than many much longer novels. There’s no waffle here, the work is streamlined, the storytelling tight, action fast paced. It makes them easy to read in a single sitting and so much more satisfying than a short story. This is a triumph of quality over quantity and highly recommended.

Titters, sympathetically. Click on the bomb.

Looks like a lovely book. And has a bear for a narrator. On the to read list…