Quintessence of Dust

Change of Blog

2008-06-13T17:29:00.001-07:00

My new Blog can be visited at:
http://www.cchumphreys.com/Site_3/Craft_and_Graft.html

See you there!

New Blog

2008-02-23T15:10:00.000-08:00

Hello! Anyone reading this... and wanting to read more about Chris or C.C. Humphreys - then please visit my new blog at my website: www.cchumphreys.com

See you there!

Vendetta

2007-08-16T20:32:00.000-07:00

I really am falling behind. Between the debauchery of visiting English people and the need to write a treatment for a new Teen Novel, I am failing to note things of, well, note. Such as the publication of my seventh novel this week.

'Vendetta' is now out there. It is Book Two in The Runestone Saga. Sequel to 'The Fetch'. Sky goes to Corsica and encounters the Mazzeri - the Dream Hunters of Death. It is an even darker ride than its predecessor. I also think its one of my tightest novels to date, action and structure marrying well.

But that's for you to decide.

Vlad waits. I put him on hold for afore-mentioned partying and treatment writing. But I think I have about a week left before I complete a very very rough first draft. Novel Nine. How'd that happen?

Impaled

2007-07-27T21:27:00.000-07:00

Yes, still here. Been busy impaling people, hence the lack of blog. It really is a messy business and seeing as this is the first draft I am probably putting in an excess of detail. Further drafts shall probably see it reduced. I mean, how many impalings does one wish to hear about? (Quiet in the back there!)

I have been writing like one possessed. All long hand, the first time I’ve done that. I am usually up at 6.30 a.m. and writing by 7.15. Then its straight through till 1, with a swift lunch and some more writing till 3 ish. For those who have written, you’ll know that, when you are making it all up, that’s quite the go. For those who haven’t… try it sometime. I also don’t labour, Hemingway like, over a sentence, declare my day’s work done after a few mots juste and a bottle of Pouilly Fume. I bang it out. This draft, more than any before, has taught me perseverance. I bite my lip, ignore my ineptitude, and keep going.

In three weeks or so I am going to have a very rough first draft. I feel the rewrite will be more complex than ever before. But I broke this week to copy edit the final version of ‘Possession’ - Book Three of the Runestone Saga. I have completed a saga.

What’s a little impalement after that?

"His Name is Death and Hell follows with him."

2007-07-04T22:07:00.000-07:00

That title, a quote from Revelations, is on my writing board and meant to be for Dracula.
But really, it’s for me.
Writing is Hell! There are various circles. Second draft decision making. Editor’s notes to be implemented. Then there is the one I am stuck in now... First draft hell.
There’s one canto in Dante’s Inferno where the travellers walk across a frozen pond with heads poking up through the ice. Dante gives one a good kick.
I am the kicker and the kicked. Frozen and free, alternating.
I look back at journals and notice that I am often in pain. I tend to forget that in the joy of a finished draft, the further delight of an actual edition. But this of Dracula… a real pain in the neck! (You see! Even my jokes are poor!)
I am forging ahead, regardless. I am writing this first draft longhand to try to get the flow. But I am also letting a lot of stuff pass I would otherwise be tempted to fix and correct.
I have to trust the process, keep reminding myself that my only goal here is to find out what the story is. Writing is re-writing, I truly believe. But, eight novels under my belt or no, I still get the jitters, the critics’ carping voice sounds. “You’re writing rubbish!”
The subject is hard hard hard. I still haven’t quite worked out where Vlad Tepes falls in the scale of great slaughterers. I don’t believe he was a psychopath. But where does that leave him?
So sorry, all – and thanks Rachel for the prompt. Won’t promise to blog more but I will try. If that damn Impaler will let me!

The Return

2007-05-28T23:02:00.000-07:00

Look, I know, I've been back two weeks and have failed to blog. Truth is, I had a scramble on to get the third book of the trilogy done and dusted and back to my wonderful editor in New York, Nancy Siscoe. (It's called 'Possession' now, as Knopf felt 'Ragnarok' was just a bit too Norse Saga-like). Then, with barely a day to say hallo to wife and bairn, I plunged into the actual writing of The Last Confession aka The True History of Dracula.
Romania truly inspired me. I will find time to tell more of my trip - and, of course, you can still catch up with the PODCASTS below.
I'll share this as well. I have decided to write the first draft in longhand. I always do quite a bit of writing with my pen. Fill notebooks in fact. But I have always written the drafts straight into the computer. This one just feels different. I want to blast it out, feel that old brain/hand transfer. There's a time element too - I want to deliver by Christmas. Mainly, though, I think this tale will be shaped by how its written as much as by what the story is. So I have my notebooks, my Waterman fountain pen. So far, knock wood, all is going well.

London Revisited

2007-05-03T01:20:00.000-07:00

So, I am back in London. What a trip! I hope you are able to follow the podcasts - just click to the right there on 'Podcasts', wait till the dial moves across and click the arrow. My friend Gerald has done amazing stuff, finding photos and sounds. I'll try to do some more literary notes at some stage for those who prefer to read. But Romania followed by that jewel Istanbul... I am going to need some time to digest it all.

Bucharest

2007-04-27T03:57:00.000-07:00

Made it! Despite some very hairy roads. Romanians drive like Italians. This is not good.
A brief entry as I am already late for a date with Vlad at the History Museum. But I believe my first podcasts will be up soon. Watch... this space!

Greetings from Transylvania

2007-04-25T05:00:00.000-07:00

How wonderful to be able to write that! Alas, I am not able to podcast it as promised. I have made several recordings. But - and I don't mean to disparage the Romanians who are wonderful, hospitable people - but in the land where the bullock cart is still a common form of transport, broadband was always going to be hard to find!
So I'll content myself with the written word... and keep that brief for now, as I am not sure how long this will take to upload.
Romania is wonderful, a series of highlights. My first nights were spent in a homestay in the village of Arefu at the Tomescus, where Maria fed me from her yard - all families here keep a few pigs, cows, chickens, ducks and grow vegetables for pickling. Meat heavy, delicious and heady when washed down with tuica, the home made plum brandy. Bizarrely, I spoke more Romanian than they spoke English, my few words gleaned from my Berlitz book on the flight down.
I then climbed the 1400 steps to the ruins of Vlad's castle at Poenari and had it to myself for five hours essentially. A magnificent position, surprisingly small, it could be held by fifty men - which I am sure is all he could trust.
And last night I drank a dark beer in the house in Sighisoara -Transylvania proper - where Dracula was born in 1431.
It's curious - what does an author hope to gain from these trips? A few facts, sure. Yet things are obviously different now than 500 hundred years ago - no internet cafe, for a start. But there is an atmosphere, in a house, a ruined tower, a stand of beech. I sit, make the odd note, then close my eyes for a while. The writing will come later. But images are lodging, many subliminal, to be conjured later at my desk in Vancouver.
Enough for now. I hope this works. And that I can add my podcasts from Bucharest. Though I may have to wait till Istanbul.
Glorious sentence to write! I pinch myself, and hit 'post'.

PODCASTING THE JOURNEY

2007-04-18T10:44:00.000-07:00

Yes, I have truly entered the 21st Century. And I will use the skills to take you with me to the 15th. Thanks to the technical wizardry of Gerald Vanderwoude, I am going to podcast from my travels to Romania and Istanbul as I go in search of the historical Dracula. He is the subject of my next novel.

So feel free to join me! Click the PODCASTS link down right there… go on, you know you want to!... and hear my introductory podcast.

And thank you so very much, Gerald, for the ipod, the very slowly explained instructions, and the friendship.

Abandonment

2007-04-12T22:46:00.000-07:00

I used to say, when I was writing plays, (as I hope to do again), that a play is never finished, its abandoned. (I may well have stolen that quote!)

It’s the same with novels. There’s always something else to add, polish, change. A different word, metaphor. An excessive adverb cut out. A misprunt. Occasionally whole plot lines! (The proof nightmare!)

Having said all that, I finished the final draft of my third Runestone Saga novel today. My editor’s brilliant notes as usual inspired me to improve. I rewrote a fair bit – the whole last chapter for example. Oh, and I have bowed to wiser heads who think that the title ‘Ragnarok’ will make people think its about the Norse Gods (which it is but only peripherally) (By the way, have you noticed I am using brackets quite a lot?).

So, you heard it here first, a blog exclusive. The new book will be called…

‘POSSESSION’

Yes, I know there’s the AS Byatt book. But its years old and a very different genre. Plus, titles reoccur. (I notice my Canadian publisher has brought out a contemporary novel entitled ‘Blood Ties’ – my second novel.) (Damn! Another bracket!)

So, tweaks and polish aside, the novel is done. I will read it over the next few days then send it off. I have cleared my decks. Wednesday I leave for Bucharest via London – and a whole new literary mountain to climb – Vlad the Impaler!

(On what date will I abandon him?)

Masterclass

2007-04-08T22:08:00.000-07:00

I realise I didn’t comment on the Masterclass I delivered in Halifax (apart from registering a degree of surprise that I should be delivering said class.)

I enjoyed it. It mainly consisted of me speaking of passion – for subject, character, place, period. Passion for what you write will make you do one of the hardest things – sit down and write every day. I quoted what used to be above my desk (and is engraven on heart and posterior): ‘The Art of writing is the Art of putting the bottom in the chair.’ I also emphasised the necessity of the first draft being strictly for oneself. ‘Its only a first draft’ is another CC mantra. If its for yourself, you can write rubbish, fail miserably, misspell, be ungrammatical…anything, because no one is going to see it. It leaves you free then to concentrate on what you should be concentrating on in the first draft: finding your characters, letting them tell you their stories, playing with voice and form. No one sees my first draft. It gives me enormous freedom.

Heh! I’ve blogged twice in a week! I must be getting into it. And I am contemplating a big step forward. A tech wizard friend is trying to set me up with an ipod I can record on. He will then give me a site I can upload to which people can access from my blog. So I am thinking of podcasting from Romania.

Imagine… “So here I am, sitting in the ruins of Dracula’s castle at Poenari. I am alone. Entirely alone… except! No! No! Stay away from me. Stay….!”
Hmm! Could be fun!

Mea culpa, mea culpa...

2007-04-02T21:28:00.000-07:00

Mea maxima culpa...

Yupp, guilty again. I seem to start each blog with an apology, vow to do better, then fail.
‘Fail again. Fail better,’ Samuel Beckett wrote. I’ll try.

So, progress report. I got the notes back for the third Fetch book. Once again my editor, Nancy Siscoe, has done a bang up job. She reassures me about how much she likes it – then makes me yearn to improve it with her sharp observations. Its often about clarification – something she, the ideal reader, doesn’t get. Or a failing of logic, sense, or both. Occasionally she’ll suggest some character stuff, usually pretty acute. Occasionally a plot switch. I balk at these, grumble… then find she’s right nine out of ten. But finally, if I disagree on that tenth, she lets me have my way.
The Dream editor indeed! Now comes my favourite bit – the red ink pen, the final polish. My last real chance to shape.

I am excited. The third book of the Runestone Saga is a worthy finale, an epic conclusion. Don’t want to give too much away – after all, the second one, the equally exciting ‘Vendetta’ is not out till the summer – but Sky’s journey takes him about as far as a boy can go…

Went to Eastern Canada last week – Ottawa to see my brother, Toronto to see my publishers (I love that plural!). Finally Halifax, Nova Scotia, to appear at their Writers Festival. I loved Halifax. Many stone buildings, sunshine, the harbour, history a-plenty. And they pull beer with hand pumps, something to gladden this Englishman’s heart and taste buds. Saw my niece who is at Dalhousie and I forced her to play tourist. We drove to the delightful Peggy’s Cove. The whole area reminded me of Southern Norway – fjords, fishing villages, rocky shores, painted houses. Gladdened this Norwegian’s eye.
I also thought the people were delightful, warm, welcoming and fun. And was it the fact of the sun and that its been raining in Vancouver for three months straight, or was everything just plain old sexier there?

And now, the countdown for the next adventure: Romania in under three weeks. In Search of Vlad. I’ll try to blog from there. A whiz is trying to set me up so I can even podcast. That’d be something. From the poorest of bloggers to the high tech king. Well see!

Decision

2007-03-06T20:22:00.000-08:00

Just to say - I've relieved myself of the responsibility of writing Vlad right now. Got up to page 50 of a very rough draft and that's fine. I am getting the manuscript of 'Ragnarok' back next week, so I will have plenty to work on. Plus I have to come up with the ideas for my Masterclass in Halifax on the 31st March. I am also teasing out an idea about another Teen novel, since my editor at Knopf mentioned she wanted to know what I am going to write for her next. Hooray!
No, I keep getting this strange feeling that Vlad will really come to me in his homeland. I have started booking places to stay in Romania; a car; making plans. I am heading straight for his ruined castle. Not the one touted as Dracula's Castle at Bran which, supposedly, he barely visited, but the one at Poenari that he forced his father's and brother's murderers to build. Where his wife hurled herself from the battlements rather than let the Turks take her.
Think I might pick up some vibes there. 1400 steps up, apparently. My knees feel it already.

Still here

2007-02-21T20:26:00.000-08:00

Yes, I am. In writing hell right now. I think I have just junked three weeks work. Don't want to say too much in case my editor reads my blog. He'll know soon enough - heh heh heh. I'm not much of a tosser (quiet in the back there, my English friends!). But what I was writing didn't feel right and the switch...does. Heh ho, we'll see. Early days yet. But I think one of the reasons I've been a bit down about writing lately is the speed of turnover. I've just finished polishing 'Ragnarok', honing a sentence here, doing a small rewrite there. Now I am faced with the blank page each morning, constant invention. Its harder... and I am so very, very tired. (Last said in a sort of fading, upper class voice!)

Well, as my friend Jack Absolute would say: 'Bollocks!' I get paid to do this so I better just get down to it. To be honest, I think the junking and restarting may have turned a corner for me. I can see the story again which I'd lost amid all sorts of debris. I'd danced around it but not worked out what the story itself was.

I know I keep saying this but I will start to blog more. Especially as my friend and fellow Historical novelist Simon Scarrow has started blogging on Blogger too. Yesterday. Check him out. He's a fine writer and even busier than me.

Turmoil

2007-02-05T19:36:00.000-08:00

Appalling time lapses, I know. Still, here I am, ever apologetic. Wish I could blame it on brain overload.
Actually, I think I will! My brain is overloading. I am in that hell-land just before starting to write the first draft of a novel when I am convinced that a) I can’t write b) if I ever could, I’ve forgotten how its done and c) why, oh why, did I allow agents and editors to talk me into this ridiculous venture?
I am fairly sure I always think this for a while. Trouble is, it feels new each time. I then lurch between a fanatical desire to just start writing any old bollocks just to commit myself to paper, and the equally pressing urge to…er, not. Not ever. Certainly not tomorrow, or even this week, month, season…
Today I excused myself hard labour by the pressing need to get a sense of Dracula as presented on film. So I rented Bram Stoker’s Dracula, as perceived by Francis Ford Coppola. Some wonderful moments, some shockers. What was Keanu Reeves on? How was Gary Oldman so brilliant, sexy and horrible all at once?
Another pressure I am putting on myself – make my Vlad sexy. But how do I meld one of history’s great slaughterers with sex appeal? I am sure it can be done. Can’t it?
Now, if only I could remember how to begin a bloody novel!

Nomination

2007-01-19T20:43:00.000-08:00

In the 'blowing my own trumpet' area... I learnt today that my novel ABSOLUTE HONOUR has made the ten book shortlist for the OLA Evergreen Award. That's the Ontario Library Association, and the books will now be promoted through libraries there. Its readers who vote, not librarians. Don't know much else yet, but will let you all know as and when.

Oh, and for readers in the Maritimes... I will be at the Halifax Writers Festival March 29th through April 1st. Will confirm what I am doing where and when. I know I've had to write a web blurb for a Masterclass on Historical Fiction. Bit unnerving. I still think of myself as the New Kid in town. And here I am going to be a... Master! (You have to pronounce that last word with a heavy jaw while thinking of aged cognac. Go on, try it!)

Resolution

2007-01-09T22:51:00.000-08:00

I wanted to start 2007 with relentless blogging. A resolution to be here every night, sharing my thoughts, analysing the process, pondering the mystery.
And here I am, for the first time, on January 9th.
I will try to be better, truly. I have some interesting things to share, honest! For a start, I’d like to keep track of the new novel, from its very early stages through to… well, it seems premature to say the end when I’ve barely begun. Some weird fear of jinxing it. I mean, this is the strange time. New notebooks, endless white aching for ink; electronic folders waiting to be created to hold… what?
I have begun… again. Because I came up with a treatment, even a chapter, back in March. I have that to work with. But treatments and sample chapters can be misleading. The ultimate goal of them is to entice a publisher to give you a contract. They are not the book. I almost don’t think of them now. I need to go back to the first flare of the spark that made me want to write the story. I need to learn who my characters are. They are waiting to be discovered. They lie in… in their coffins perhaps? The Undead. Not alive yet. Waiting for me to breathe life back into them.
Hmm, a little creepy that. Not what I sat down to write here tonight. But quite apropos, considering that the character I seek most is Vlad Tepes – the real Dracula.
I am trying to track down the definitive biography. Meantime I am reading background. The 15th century world. The Balkans, as troubled as ever. The advance of Islam through the cultured, vicious Ottomans. Their less cultured, equally vicious Christian opponents.
I am also reading about Evil. Trying to get to grips with what horrors man is capable. Trying to find a reason for them. Or not.
I need to get on with it. I have booked tickets to go to Romania to walk the ground in April and I have to have an idea what I am looking at. I have to deliver the novel, appropriately enough, by October 31st. And it is already appearing on websites. Not a word written and the book is out there to be ordered.
‘The Last Confession’ its called. For now. For July 2008. No pressure or anything.

I’ll try to let you know how it goes more regularly. Honest!

Glimmerings

2006-12-20T22:42:00.000-08:00

So I am in a rare pause, when I am not actively writing anything.

And yet… does a writer’s mind ever switch off entirely? Not mine, not really. I was at a concert last night – Holly Cole, a jazz singer, not my usual stuff but very good – and I suddenly saw part of a scene in the next novel I plan to write. Plus another scene in a modern day thriller that I may write, a screenplay about runes. Then, walking today, I started organising the ideas a little more in my head.

I have to start work on Novel Number Nine soon after Christmas. I have to deliver it in about a year, and this is a biggie. Have I blogged about it yet? Well, I have been commissioned to write a novel based on the ‘real’ Dracula – Vlad Tepes of Romania. Vlad the Impaler as he was not so fondly known due to his delight in killing people by impalement. I won’t go into the details, don’t want to keep any of you up late. But this is one of history’s great slaughterers. And yet the brief is to make him… fascinating. Mysterious. Probably sexy. A man of the night. The originator of all that Dracula, the Vampire Count, certainly can be.

I have already begun, in one way. I wrote a treatment for my publisher earlier this year to win the commission. But that was a mere sketch. Now I must paint the picture.

I fantasise that I could use six months pure musing. I dream of time without pressure. Yet, my first uncommissioned novel aside, I have always written under pressure. Maybe its absence would stall me? Deadlines annoy – but they do draw me inexorably toward them. People say, You must be very disciplined. I suppose I am. But my reply is always the same: I have to be; no one is going to write my books for me.

So, this is the early stage. I am not really sure yet what kind of story I am going to write. I am not sure what kind of man I am going to portray. I also have a heap of research to do, journeys to take – I am already looking at tickets for Transylvania and Istanbul in April – but already I am seeing the glimmerings. A scene. A sentence. An image. Its something to do with falcons…

The first chip of the chisel on rough stone.

Deliverance

2006-12-11T08:24:00.000-08:00

I have emerged. ‘Ragnarok’, Book Three of The Runestone Saga, has been Fedexed off to Knopf, my publishers, in New York. It required me to check into a hotel for three nights so I could bury my head in words. (Strange, staying in a hotel in the city you live in. I highly recommend it!). And there was a fair bit of rewriting, as I tried to sort out not just the end of a novel but the end of a trilogy. ‘Tis a long road my protagonist, Sky, has gone through. From naïve schoolboy to Norse God. (No, you’ll just have to wait and see.)

Mixed feelings too – euphoria followed by depression. Its always a hard moment, letting someone else into the world that's mine alone. Of course, the people who read it now I totally trust – my wife, agent and editor. All smart people, always with good advice. But… I think it’s one reason people don’t finish things. You submit, to other people’s opinions, your fragile creation. A necessary ending and beginning, but…

Couple of other things of note. My latest adult fiction, ‘Absolute Honour’ got a very nice review in Canada’s National Post – just in time for Christmas if anyone’s short a stocking stuffer! And I gave a talk at a school last week. Getting there was hard though – major snow all over Vancouver and poor directions. I was lost, and wandering and I asked three City workmen who were clearing snow if they knew where the school was. ‘Sure, we were there yesterday. Hop in!’ So I arrived at my talk in a snow truck! Ah, the glamorous life of the author!

The students were great. Grade 8, seemed to like the book, and asked very good questions. I think its hard to get anyone to admit they were scared by it, but a couple did, kinda. But if there’s anyone out there reading this who had to put it outside the room to sleep, I’d be very happy to hear.

Oh – I’ve been nominated for a Cybill - it’s an online Teen Lit Blog. Not sure what it all means but it’s a delight that some people are enjoying the book. And I’d be even happier to win. ‘Members of the Academy…’

I shall try to blog more, now the book’s gone off. In the week or so respite I have before I start my next one, that is!

Donnacona's Oki

2006-11-27T21:44:00.000-08:00

For those dedicated few who visit my blog (and you are a select band, I feel sure), apologies again. The race to the finish line of the third YA novel, distracted by having to do the page proofs on the second, the record snowfall, the sprouting child, all all conspire against me. I will improve, honest. If I can just get past these next two weeks…

Always great to return to a nearly complete novel. Reminds me that my present struggle is just a stage in the process. ‘Vendetta’ is sequel to ‘The Fetch’ and is now at that stage where I can merely look for misprunts… but also its my last chance to bait a hook for the one I am finishing now. It is the problem with series writing, if there is a gap between books, or if you hop around in time as I do in my Jack Absolute series. Vital things that you wish you’d put in, missing.

Mostly, I’ve caught them. A memorable one…

April 2002. I was staying at Hawthornden Castle, near Edinburgh, a writer’s retreat for a month. Me, loose in a medieval castle? It was, well, bliss. Anyway, I’d started running again, after a year’s lay off for injury. Was running down an abandoned railway track when a deer leapt across my path, vaulted a hedge, vanished. And I thought of my second ever novel, Blood Ties, where the tribe I dealt with were the Tahontaenrat, or People of the White Tail Deer. The book was going to the printers that week. And I suddenly remembered that I’d forgotten to deal with a very important piece of power, a strangely shaped stone given to the young native hero by his Uncle – Donnacona’s Oki. So I ran faster, back to my room in the attic in the relatively modern part of the castle (1632), attached my cell phone to my computer (feeling very 21st Century!) and send off a rewrite to the publishers, begging them to put it in.

They did. I may never write the book. But if I do, Donnacona’s oki must be in it.

The Lemming

2006-11-15T21:11:00.000-08:00

I’m lost in second draft land. Hence my lamentable absence from the blogosphere.
What happened to Time? Why am I always running like a lemming towards the cliff? I always pictured myself as a ‘lie on the hillside and stare at the clouds’ kind of fellow. These days, I barely look up.
Is this a common writer’s malady? (Or should that be a ‘writer’s common malady’?) I told my wife once, in a drunken moment, that I would go out with a question, not an answer. I think its probably true. But it doesn’t promise much time for lying back and staring.
Is there a place you reach (in time and space) when you can just sit back and go, ‘Ah!’?
Back to the cliff!
(By the way, I've just realised I have a thing for rodents. Two of my postings deal with them)

BODY SURFING

2006-11-05T20:33:00.000-08:00

Just back from a weekend at Long Beach, Vancouver Island. Next landfall: Japan.

A couple of years ago I realised that the thing I loved to do most in the world was - uh hum Quiet in the back there! – body surf. And made a sort of vow to do it at least once a year.

Long Beach this time was a sudden surprise. We were meant to be somewhere else. So I hired the suit and took to the waves. Bit choppy, no huge runs. Rains lashing down. But just to be in that water! Its why I love just using the body. You are in the wave, not on top of it. To quote Braveheart: Freeeeeedommmm!

Don’t think I thought about ‘Ragnarok’ for a week. Can’t wait to read it through tomorrow.

Jour des Morts

2006-10-31T22:58:00.000-08:00

You think Halloween is scary. Just wait for Jour des Morts.
November 2nd. The day after All Souls Day. I write about it in 'Vendetta', the sequel to 'The Fetch'.
Dia de los Muertos.
Jour des Morts.
Day of the dead.
When they must be pacified - with gifts, prayers, homage, candles, incantations.
As it says on Sigurd's tombstone: Non Omnis Moriar - 'I will not die... entirely.'
And they don't.
Wait till November 2nd, and you'll see.

All Apologies

2006-10-27T22:19:00.000-07:00

(And no, I am not commenting on the news that Kurt Cobain is the highest earning dead musician!)

My apologies are for my absence from Blogspace. I have been deep deep in Fetch World. Today, I actually finished the first draft of the third novel in that series, provisionally entitled, ‘Ragnarok’ (The last battle for - and destruction of - the Norse Gods).

It is a big moment. There’s so much work yet to do. But having the draft there, even in such a rough form, is a big step forward. I can now go back and work on something. Not just sit in my chair each morning and hope that something comes. Though there are moments during first drafts when I chortle as I write, when it feels like I am taking dictation, they are rare moments. But a second draft! Paper to hold! An ending to be worked towards!

In the Academia in Florence, Italy, in the same room as ‘David’, there are four other Michelangelo sculptures. They are known as ‘The Prisoners’, because they are human shapes, in varying degrees of doneness. It as if they are struggling to free themselves from the rough marble blocks. They are art in limbo - parts of their forms beautifully smooth, others barely marked.

They are like my first draft - a rough hewn shape. But a shape nonetheless. Now I am about to take a finer chisel to it, smooth out more roughness, shape more limbs, find the fingers, seek a face; eventually reach for a polishing cloth, and a brush of the finest hair.

Something solid to work on! Hallelujah!

Rendezvous

2006-10-14T00:36:00.000-07:00

The evening began on the bus, meeting one of my few readers, and fellow YA Fantasy Horror writer, James McCann. Discussed the iniquities of editors, usual writer moan. Then met my good friend Michael aka Jungle Boy on Comercial Drive and walked. As usual, much putting the world the world to rights. I believe in the bacchanal, a once in a while chance to drink beer, and talk both sense and non-sense.

I think I wrote one of the key passages of all three Fetch books today. A pivotal moment. First drafts are heaven and hell, both.

The Lesson

2006-10-09T21:25:00.000-07:00

How have I blundered? Let me count the ways!

I've been ranting at Blogger because I haven't been able to sign in at will. It always rejected my password. I deleted cookies and caches, changed browser, all to no avail. But did I listen to them when they advised it might be a user name problem? Nay! I just clicked on the user name that came up each time.

So, apologies to the good folk of Blogger and to all the Gods whose names I have called upon in vain. I shall attempt to be a better blogger in the future.

Sounds of Silence

2006-10-03T21:36:00.000-07:00

I am trying to post. But I am having huge difficulties logging in. My password is rejected each time. But I will keep trying. But if all three of you who are reading this right now have any ideas, I'd be very grateful to hear them.

The Rat

2006-09-28T21:44:00.000-07:00

My wife called me from my desk this morning (I was wrestling with possession, as usual) and showed me a ziplock bag with three grains of rice in it. Except they weren't. They were rat droppings. There was also a half gnawed pear.

We have slightly different takes. Of course we both want rid, and summoned a Pied Piper who laid a lot of traps. But she's disgusted and I'm more phlegmatic. 'It's a rat,' I say helpfully. 'We've lived with them forever.'
'I knew you'd take the 'oh its all part of our history' line,' she said.

2006-09-26T22:40:00.000-07:00

2006-09-26T22:26:00.000-07:00

In the beginning…

September 25th 2006

This is my first ever Blog entry. Be kind to me, those few who visit.

I am an author. Chris Humphreys, the name. You may have found me through my web site: www.cchumphreys.com.
And the site is one of the reasons I wanted to start a blog. It’s just so hard to update a site, unless you have computer skills beyond the basic. I don’t. So a blog seemed to be a way to keep in touch with my readers, find new ones, find out what you are thinking about my stuff, any stuff, life…

I began writing, like so many, in journals. Confessions, observations, some things you didn’t want anyone else to read…but phrased elegantly enough because secretly you hoped someone might!

Be careful what you wish for. Some people did read. Didn’t like what I’d said about them - nor find out what I’d done.

So I’ll try and be more discreet here. ‘Try’ being the emphasised word. No promises.

But I think this blog will be less about gossip, and my skewed view of the world. More about my writing, I hope. The process, the struggles, the triumphs, the disasters – there have been a few. Perhaps, also, all that stuff that doesn’t make it into the books. The great ideas you have to chuck away, or save for a different kind of book, for a different readership.

This is my first ever Blog entry. I’ll keep it brief. But I should probably give a little background. Just about the writing for now. Those other stories, the personal ones, are for the dead of night. Maybe.

I have six novels published – some or all of them in English, German, Russian, Italian, Czech and Greek. One in proofs, one that I am a third of the way through. The list, and extracts, are at my site. More bio there too. Five of the six are historical fiction. The latest is my first…do we call it YA? Teen Lit?

It’s called The Fetch. The Oxford English Dictionary defines a Fetch as, “The Double, Wraithe, or Apparition of a living person.” Others might call it a doppelganger.

The Fetch is the first book in The Runestone Saga. The cover’s on this page and those are runes on it.

I’m going to write about runes. In fact, I think I might do a ‘Rune of the Month’ and talk about each one. For those who haven’t heard of them, runes are an Old Norse or Germanic alphabet. They are also sometimes called the Norse Tarot. So they are letters, but they are also symbols representing some object, or even force, in nature. Fehu, is “cattle”. Thurisaz is “thorn.” Cattle means wealth, because a man’s richness could be measured in his herd. So, in a runecast, cattle could mean hard work, steady progress. A thorn could protect something. Or prick you till you bleed.

Why me and runes? I’m half Norwegian. Plus my grandfather had a Fetch who walked. And when I was born, my mother said she felt she knew me straight away. That in my first cry, she heard her father’s laugh.

As the REM song says: “Oh no, I’ve said too much/I haven’t said enough.”

Which? I’ll stop now till some other blogger lets me know. (Heh, I’ve just called myself a Blogger. That’s a start!)

For those who might have found me because of my other writing – The French Executioner perhaps, or Jack Absolute – dubbed by some my ‘fantasy alter ego’ - fear not. Or fear much - I will be talking about them soon enough. As I will about my love of history, my acting career, my obsession with Hamlet, my ludicrous support for Leicester City Football Club, my…

Enough indeed. So for now:

“Good night, Sweet Prince. And flights of Angels
Sing thee to thy rest.”

(Goes for Princesses too)