The Prodigal Daughter by Jeffrey Archer - A Book Review

I always pick up a Jeffrey Archer whenever I spot one. I saw this in a charity shop in Moffat or Biggar on a camping trip and even though it seemed the protagonist was a woman, fished in my pocket for a quid and shuffled out of the shop with it under my arm like a goblin having stolen some treasure from Aladdin's cave.

Don't I like stories where protagonists are women, I hear you ask? Maleficent, Aliens, Silence Of The Lambs and Spirited Away are some of my favourite films, so that can't be strictly true.

Do I think men can't write convincing female characters, I hear you ask? Well, maybe, maybe not. They say write what you know, but they also say write what you don't know. So who knows.

Do I think the book was marketed towards women and so would have little for me to enjoy or empathise with? Maybe a little.

When I was a kid my Mum always had issues of Woman and Woman's Own lying around the house, and I used to flick through them and think, 'There is nothing in here for me' - a 12 year old boy - 'except for the competitions.' I read somewhere (probably in a book entitled 'How to Win at Competitions') that the secret to winning competitions is entering them. Lots of them. So I entered as many competitions as I could get my hands on, several from Woman and Woman's Own. And did I win anything? No. Not from them. But I did win a mug from a competition in Your Sinclair or something like that for my sketch on how Andy Capp's hairstyle might look under his cap. I remember drawing a very colourful mohawk. So I guess I am an 'award-winning artist.'

Anyway, whatever my chauvinistic, preconceived ideas about the book, I bought it, didn't I? And why? Well, a) because Jeffrey Archer, despite ending up in prison for perjury and perversion of the course of justice, and being a conservative, writes damn good novels and has constantly delivered on plot, humour and character in the past. It would be no exaggeration to say that Mr Archer's arrows hit the bullseye consistently when it comes to good, solid fiction. (See what I did there?) B) the cover had a red cloth, a white thorny rose and a president's seal on it. Not the usual soft, bright pastel shades on a cover aimed at the middle-aged housewife demographic. And c) there were also two duelling enemies in it called Kane and Abel. Wasn't there already a book about them, or a movie? Oh yeah, the bible. No, I mean another one.

Suffice to say, I was intrigued. And so should you be.

I imagined from the title and book cover that it was about a young woman who started out good and kind, then lost her way, became an evil sorceress, and then came back to save the day just before the final curtain falls. Was I close? That would be telling. Also sounds a bit like the plot for Maleficent.

Anyway, 'The Prodigal Daughter' (published 40 years ago in 1982) was great. I loved it. I laughed, I cried, I gripped the pages in triumph, I held them in slack disappointment, I followed the life, loves and career of Florentyna from her teddy bear christened Franklin D Roosevelt who gets his arm torn off and covered in ink, to her final golf game that she loses on a technicality. Her life is a real rollercoaster.

I don't know how he does it. I don't know how he weaves his tale into history so skilfully you end up asking yourself, did that really happen? You can't see the join between fact and fiction. It's flawless. It's so detailed. Nothing is missed. I don't know how a British writer can know so much about American politics. I don't know how long he takes to write a book but it seems he fires them out effortlessly. 

Hats off to you, sir.

Notes On Hellscraper

This story began as a series of writing exercises when I was living, single and alone, with a lot more time on my hands, in my one bed apartment in Kanagawa near Tokyo, Japan in 2006, called the 'Top Of My Head'. The premise was to write whatever came off the top of my head for an hour and see what came out. What did this time was a short story about a futuristic assassin called, "Another Day At The Office." It ended as the protagonist climbed onto his rock bike having obtained a personnel shifter, and rode back down the surface of the skyscraper. 

Years later and on a different continent, I included the story in a printed A4 binder full of tales called 'Hidden in The Old Stone Wall' and gave it to a fellow West Lothian writer to read. 'Another Day' fell into his 'Needs Work' category. He commented that he wanted to see more of the central character and his world.

As I hoped to self-publish 'Hidden in the Old Stone Wall' sometime before I died, expanding 'Another Day' became a priority.

Around that time I was giving another fellow writer feedback on his science fiction, asking, "How do people live? Are they inhabiting skyscrapers high up in the clouds or living in shafts deep in the ground?" I don't think he applied my suggestions, so when I received the signpost about 'Another Day' I decided to turn these thoughts to my own story.

I spent a ridiculous amount of time with spreadsheets calculating terminal velocities of falling humans in different positions (spread-eagled or bullet-straight, accelerating or in free-fall) and discovered that the fastest speed a human has ever skydived was 373 mph by Henrik Raimer in 2016 or 601 km/hr (167m/s) in the upper edges of the atmosphere. I put this towards how high a future skyscraper had to be and calculated floors fallen per second and all that, and in the end just thought 'Fuck it. It's high. It all happened fast. It's just a story. That'll do." When I ran the scene past West Lothian Writers they confirmed this. No-one cares.

After finishing the re-write I decided the tale merited a better title and figured it was all about getting into his home shaft, which now seemed the most interesting and futuristic element of the story. It was basically an inverted skyscraper, so I wondered if a hell-scraper was a thing. I googled it, and the word appears in one other place, to describe an architectural work in Madrid, Spain in 1972. I figured the link was tenuous enough to use the word as a title and there you have it.

I was in two minds about the "Sayonara, fuckface" line. At one point I deleted it and exchanged it with, "Goodbye, Mr Grant," only to find that the story immediately lost something. It became boring, bland, insipid, like a cup of weak, lukewarm tea you'd immediately pour in a nearby pot-plant. Is that all the protagonist could think of to say when his family, life and livelihood hung by a thread?

Around that time I began to realise no-one was likely to buy an anthology of short stories from a writer they hadn't heard of, and decided to switch tack and submit some stories individually to magazines where they might fit in thematically and therefore hold more value by adding to the publication.

I sent it off to a couple of places (it was enjoyed but rejected by Neon (a great online literary fiction magazine, check it out) who responded that although they liked it, felt it didn't fit in their publication. When I read their magazine I agreed, but their positive response encouraged me to keep trying elsewhere.

After hearing about StarShipSofa in an email from either Federation of Writers (Scotland) or West Lothian Writers (I forget which) saying they were open to submissions, I gave it a shot, crossed my fingers and waited.

Just when I was about to lose hope, I couldn't believe my eyes when I received an acceptance email in my inbox.

What followed was another few months of waiting as I did my best and failed to stop thinking, wondering, hoping what the story would sound like read by an American voice artist as an audiobook. Every second Wednesday I logged in to StarShip and found someone else's name on the featured story banner. I bit my knuckles. I chewed my nails. I pondered the imponderable.

Finally there it was. I couldn't wait a moment longer - I leapt into the podcast and listened with bated breath. I loved the host's reaction to the title of "What The Maid Sawed" and settled down as Hellscraper was read in an suave, hard-boiled tone by Mike Boris, with a high quality recording and wide array of voices (especially impressed by the robotic ones). But as he continued, one thing became clear: he'd put a lot more into his reading than I had into my writing, which I felt paled in comparison. Each word he spoke was done so with care and attention, whereas I flung words out haphazardly like buckshot, hoping to hit a target. 

I decided to take more care with my words from that point on.

One last thing: Mirligo, the name for the assassin's daughter, comes from the archaic Scots word mirligoes, meaning vertigo or dizziness.

Thoughts for other aspiring writers: Don't give up. Keep trying. Believe in yourself. Join writing groups. Sign up to newsletters. Knock on doors. Listen to feedback. Polish. Someone out there wants your work. Set a time aside daily for writing and stick to it.

You can listen to Hellscraper, delve into a huge back catalogue of awesome SF stories, or maybe even consider supporting writers & voice actors by setting up a regular Paypal donation to Starship Sofa here. Hope you like it!

Hellscraper

I've been so looking forward to this! Many thanks to Tony C Smith, Fred Himebaugh and everyone at the Starship Sofa podcast for accepting this longish short SF story, 'Hellscraper', read excellently by Mike Boris. Huge gratefulness also to Federation of Writers (Scotland) for the heads up and West Lothian Writers as always for feedback and guidance.

"David Reynolds is a wary mercenary for hire (dubbed 'The Sandman') in a far future city, where the rich live the high life in the clouds above and the poor eke out an existence on the garbage and radiation-strewn Earth's surface. Then there's the Undergrounders, surviving in poorly air-conditioned shafts miles below..."

It's about 40 minutes, with a few colourful swears, injury detail description and drug use. Hope you like it, and be sure to check out the great back catalogue of other SF audio stories on there

You can listen to it here

http://www.starshipsofa.com

Burning the Candle

It's been a good week.

Last night, after a ten-day abstention from alcohol, I thought I'd treat myself to a couple of Stellas and a film. So I sat down and searched through Amazon Prime Movies, rated 15 or 18, four stars or above, and scrolled down to 'End Of Watch' (2012) with Donnie Darko (Jake Gyllenhaal) and that Mexican chap who's really good (Michael Peña, actually American), an LAPD drugs cartel cop thriller. I think the phrase 'From the writer of Training Day' may also have swayed me (David Ayer).

I'll be honest, the opening scenes kind of put me off a bit, but I stuck with it as I had a feeling this could be part of the character arc in the story, as the cops seemed to be really blasé and shallow, and I feared a repeat Jarhead performance. (To be fair to Jake Gyllenhaal I think I watched that on a plane) But as things began to unfold I realised 'shit was going to get heavy' pretty soon.

The camera shots were very shaky at times, presumably to express the chaos of the situation, and added to the tension, not knowing which was up. You just knew everything was going to go badly wrong. And even when things went right, you still knew things were going to go ... badly wrong, just from a greater height.

But some of my favourite themes running through Training Day appeared here as well, especially 'honour among police' as well as 'honour among thieves'. Ayer really cuts to the heart with this one, and the finalé (coupled with the alcohol) left me a broken and weeping man.

But damn, that was good. 9/10.

Michael Peña was nominated for the Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Male for his performance in this film.

What else have I been up to?

Decided to start a new script for West Lothian Film since 'What The Maid Sawed' had run its natural course. So on Thursday I got another idea for what seemed to be at first sight an amusing and potentially leg-having cross-genre story. But I can't tell you the title because that would give the whole thing away and you might run off with it yourself, write an award-winning script and film and produce it and win several oscars in the time it takes me to finish it myself.

Suffice it to say I rattled out the first scene yesterday, we read it at the group and it got a couple of laughs. So I'm satisfied.

I also finally completed the edit of a 30 minute documentary about my visit back to St Andrews last summer, which has been on my to-do list for six months. 30 minute seems a bit long now and I doubt many will watch it to the end, but I don't know how to cut it down further. Ideally I suppose, it should be under twenty minutes. I might have another stab at it. Unfortunately in parts the sound is affected by the wind, but do I want to try to re-record everything and do a redub? Will it look and sound natural? I guess all I can do is try. Won't make it any worse eh?

That's all I can think of at the moment. Trying to get back up to 100% attendance at my writing desk to finish off 'The Luminari', but there is a constant battle between my desire to stay up late and my desire to get up early. In order to get up at 6:15am I need to physically climb into my bed at 10pm, read for a bit, and lights out at 10:15pm. Who does that? Eight hours. Sounds easy, doesn't it? But it ain't. I need to sacrifice one for the other. I have to give my finger to the night. (Sounds like a Chris de Burgh song).

Anyway, I shall keep you posted.

The Clear Out

We've all been there, right?

You sort through an old box of high school jotters from the attic and have one last nostalgic look at your school days before throwing them out. It feels kind of sad chucking them all in the recycle bin but you just don’t have the space or time to store or peruse them all, and you doubt your family would find them very interesting. Ultimately though you can't shake the feeling you're somehow inhaling the dead skin cells of your old teachers...

But a few things struck me.

1. I never use any of that maths. Algebra, graphs, trigonometry and all that, it turned out, apart from being a stepping stone into university, was a waste of time. Maybe if I’d kept going down the academic road it might have been useful, but the choices I made ultimately lead to an intellectual cultural-de-sac. All those hours spent on French and German. Gone up in smoke. Only my 1st and 2nd Year English jotters filled with stories I saved from the blue bin of doom.

Pythagoras' Theorem has actually helped me to cross parks faster

2. Some of the handouts were still useful even now, such as ‘How to Make electricity’ or ‘What is poison rain?’ or ‘What is a virus?’ And I’ve kept them, along with any decent booklets.

3. I was (was?) quite immature for my age. All through the jotters are doodles and daft jokes and weird concepts. It’s surprising I ever passed anything. I ought to ease up on my own son.

4. Where were the real ‘useful to life’ notes? Like: 

• Health and Nutrition? 
• Mental Wellbeing? 
• Relationships?  
• How to combat Global Warming? 
• Self Reliance? 
• Renewable Energy Generation? 
• Growing your own Fruit and Vegetables?  
• The Dangers of Social Media? 
• Staying Focussed? 
• Organisation? 
• Business? 
• Car Maintenance? 
• SEO? 
• How to get More Followers? 
• How to Create Engaging Posts? 
• How to Get Rich Making and Playing Video Games? 

But of course half of those were not an issue in the 90s and the other half I wasn’t interested in.

5. I was not bad at doodling but never pursued it. I remember saying to someone when they asked what I wanted to do with my life was to be a cartoonist. Their reply was that it wasn’t a real job and I could do that in my free time. Probably true, but that was the end of my cartooning aspirations. Later I learned that cartoonists can earn up to £200 a day.

6. Where were my old diaries?

From the age of 15 onwards (1991) I kept intermittent diaries, usually the hardback day-to-a-page ones from John Menzies. It was nigh on impossible to write a page every day, and the guilt from having so many blank pages eventually lead me to abandon that format in my later years for regular notebooks without dates. 

Anyway, on New Year’s Eve I would sit down and read through all I’d written that year and enjoy a good old chuckle at my past self’s expense. Now I’m 46 I don’t do that anymore. Who has the time to write a diary these days, let alone sit down and read it again?

No-one. Because life is too fast and furious. We’re rattling around like a steel orbs in a pinball game, bouncing off the internet, the news, social media, websites, people’s expectations, 24/7 business, a constant barrage of advertising and people clamouring to be noticed. Lights flash, bells ding, no-one has time or energy to think. 

The planet that never sleeps.

But what’s going to happen to my diaries when I’m dead and gone? Will my family read them? Will anyone care? Will they just throw them out to be lost forever? My son might read them, but why should I expect him to sit down and plow through 8 or 9 volumes of handwritten stream of consciousness, some of which might not be suitable (let alone legible) for his eyes?

So I’ve come to realise that I need an editor. And a typist. But I can’t afford either.

As usual, it's just me.

So I’ve fished them out and as a side project (as if I don’t have enough side projects already) I may type up any interesting bits and publish them here on my blog.

90s nostalgia and teenage angst. Coming soon.

A Spot Of Gardening

I hadn't done much in the garden recently, I must confess. The neighbours' incessant noisy dogs barking, angry shouting, loud radio and arguments have pretty much destroyed any enjoyment I'd hoped to get out of the garden. It's gotten to the stage we hardly use the back door any more in order to avoid the commotion. The back garden is in danger of falling into neglect. 

The avocado seems to be doing well

Nevertheless, my son and I stuck a bunch of potatoes in the new plot in the spring and since then I've been weeding a bit and watering over the dry months, but other than that it's just been a case of crossing my fingers and hoping for a big yield. Since this is the first weekend I've had off in what seems like forever, I thought I'd spend a bit of time going round the garden and seeing what's to be seen.

Space for Plot 3 on right before plum tree

When we moved in I instantly envisioned three strips of arable plots for crop rotation: brassicas, legumes and root vegetables. I dug up the second plot last summer (if I remember rightly. It's all been a bit of a blur since Covid reared its ugly head) and the plan should have been to dig up the third and final one this summer, but to be honest my spirit was not in it. Plus I was beginning to realise - more land needs more water. And more work. So I really need to get another water butt as well as get off my own.

Anyway, it's not too late. Maybe I can do some tomorrow morning. (Yeah right.)

This morning's fruit harvest

The great things about growing your own veg, even as a beginner, are: exercise, fresh air, cheap organic food, better for the environment, low carbon footprint. It's also educational for the kids. "Look, remember the potatoes I made you plant against your will and you complained about being dragged away from your screens for five minutes three months ago?" "Nope." "Well, look at this." "That's great, Dad. Big wow. Potatoes. Dude, I'm 12 years old, did you care about potatoes when you were 12?" "No, I was spending all my time watching TV and throwing cake ingredients at neighbours' windows." "Riiight."

Hopefully get a few more mini toms before the frost sets in

First I poked my head in the greenhouse, after using a stick to de-spider-web the place of course. Nothing better than getting a cobweb, several dead flies, spider exoskeletons and arachnid babies in your hair just after a shower. I plucked a napping snail off the inside of a pane and cast it onto the front lawn, where it tumbled to a halt near the hedge, no doubt thinking to itself, "WTF!" or whatever the snail equivalent is. Then I talked to the tomato plants. I apologised for ignoring them, I said thank you for their fruit. I asked them how their day was. The usual. They didn't respond but I like to think they appreciated it. 

The Monster Beetroot may soon get up and walk by itself

The beetroot was doing well. Not sure whether to dig it up now or leave it a bit longer. I imagine it might rot if I leave it in too long.

The strawberry

Then I examined the strawberry plant. Interesting thing about that is, last year it was overcome by grass until I left it for dead for several months. The grass died out but the strawberry survived. Now it has its pot pretty much to itself. Maybe I should rehome it.

Before

I looked at one end of the potato plot. Gathered three containers : one for weeds, dead plant stems and mouldy spuds destined for the compost; one for plastic or other inorganic matter that somehow found itself into the previous compost and therefore soil, destined for the rubbish bin, and a third for potatoes, destined for the kitchen. Got a spade and steeled myself for some hard, back-breaking, physical labour.

After

About 40 minutes later and some minor back pains I had half a sack of spuds and 1/6 of the plots had been turned over. Looked pretty good. Very satisfying. Didn't want to stop because the sight of potatoes popping up just by turning over the soil is always very rewarding. Food from the ground. Hooda thunk?

5.1 kg

The compost went into the compost, the rubbish went into the rubbish, the spuds went into the kitchen. I went for a lie down. 

Job done.

Brenda The Carrot

Heart Of Scotland 4 : Aberfeldy & Dun Coillich

Woke up at around 6:30am and decided to try my hand with the volcano kettle. Unfortunately we were only allowed to make a fire in the fire pit at the corner of the campsite near the river, which made lighting with the zippo problematic. Also, the sticks we'd harvested from the bush near our house turned out to be not very flammable. Experimented with building a small fire with kettle on it first, which didn't work, then starting the fire first and putting the kettle on top, which burnt my hands, before trying to light a fire outside the fire pit, which someone else had done on the sand, which didn't work either. Luckily, however, between the three ways the water had, although not boiled, gotten hot enough to make coffee.

We had a nice breakfast and I began to feel better after my volcanic failure. Used the gas stove to heat more water for tea. Ahh, technology!

At some point we realised our son had left his walking boots outside the car in the car park back in Callander 50 miles away. Wonderful. No doubt because he'd been so absorbed by the crappy blue cap gun and its crappy silencer. I'd toyed with the idea of driving  back to see if they were still there (50% chance of that, I reckoned) but in the end decided the two hour round-trip, cost of fuel, wear and tear on the car etc. all probably accumulated to about the same cost of a new pair of boots. So we decided to drive in to Aberfeldy for some new ones instead.

Castle Menzies

Stopped at Castle Menzies for coffee and carrot cake. If my second name had been Menzies we may have even forked out the twenty odd quid to go round the museum. (Actually on second thoughts I'd probably have felt we should have gotten in for free!) Saw a stallion urinating in a field round the back. That was a first. No idea if he was Italian so don't ask.

Aberfeldy Cinema Cafe Bar

Aberfeldy, described (perhaps a little unfairly) in the Lonely Planet Guide To Scotland as "a shabby town and rough after dark", seemed fine to me. We parked behind Tesco and walked up to the centre where we saw a nice cinema/cafe/bar and had lunch in the Fountain. (There I killed a wasp with said Lonely Planet and put another outside by trapping it within two coke glasses, elevating myself to undisputed wasp-exiting legend in the eyes of staff and customers both). I had lasagne, my wife had a baked potato, and our son had an enormous cheese burger and chips which I helped him finish (Delicious. The clever lad had even had the forethought to put a few chips in the burger). 

There was a guy outside at a table who was the spitting image of Eric Clapton and I was tempted to go out and ask for his autograph (even if it was "To Chris, all the best, Dave").

Made our way up the road apiece to a shop called Munros which had some good walking boots and a face scarf for our boy, 4 replacement Maglight bulbs (which I'd been searching for for about twenty years), and a bunch of other great stuff. Very helpful staff too. 

Made sure to get the hell out before sunset.

Climbing Dun Coillich

After stocking up on supplies we drove back to the campsite, and I decided I was going to climb the hill at the back called Dun Coillich (572m - known as a Marilyn on Walkhighlands.co.uk). Our son said he'd join me.

We drove up the 500 yards to the car park (as per the campsite owner's advice) only to find a message on my phone from wifey asking us to bring the cool box back to the campsite to put the recently purchased perishables into. So we drove back to the campsite, off-loaded said cool box, and returned to the car park (I got the turning right this time) and at last set off.

Our route up Dun Coillich.
Note Geographical Centre Of Scotland nearby

The way was marked with green and white markers which helped greatly. (If only life was thus signposted. "Fame and Stardom 50yds on left") They were painted stakes stuck in the ground every 20 yards or so. We were to follow green & white until roughly between the two hills, and there was to be another path branching off to the right that would hopefully take us up to the peak. I was wearing my blue shorts, waterproof jacket and JCB work boots. Son was in new boots, black trousers and black jacket. I thought to take the umbrella just in case. Turned out good we did as it f*&^ing p*^&(*ed down.

I was a little concerned about ticks and checked and rubbed my legs continuously. My son and I took turns taking point and pushing on through the ferns, nettles and showers as best we could. It wasn't long before our feet were thoroughly soaked, and the hill didn't seem to be getting any closer, although the views of the campsite below were definitely getting better and further away. My son kept voicing his concerns and I did my best to encourage him and press onwards and upwards. It helped to focus on our feet and not fret about the immensity of the task ahead.

Whose idea was this again?

At last we came to the turn off - white dots on green. We turned right at a red marker and followed the new ones up between two more peaks, unsure which one we'd be scaling. It got pretty steep and we decided to just keep our heads down and rest at every marker. After the steep bit it levelled out again and a little later we came to a solitary, final marker in the mist, but no cairn. And it didn't feel like we'd reached the top. Felt more like we were in a saddle. But no more markers. On a hunch we headed up the right hand slope, doubling back southwards, just tramping over the shallow heather/gorse/bracken, slightly ascending and looking back now and then to keep the final marker in our sights.

The cairn! Damn, forgot to bring a rock. Back to the bottom!

We made it! After about a hundred yards we reached the top, and simultaneously found the cairn, saw a cloudy, mist-laden panoramic view, and were blasted in the face by quasi-sleet being blown hard at a 30º angle. We only paused at the top to take a couple of out-of-focus selfies, partake in one or two well-earned high fives and catch our breath before withdrawing to the lee-side of our approach and back to the relative safety of the final marker.

Click to expand

Coming down we were rewarded every few yards with what seemed like a different photo opportunity, and there was a lot of fishing in the pouch for the camera to snap a great view. It had taken us about an hour to get to the top and we took our way down slowly and carefully.

This, however, did not prevent me from twisting my left ankle badly and taking a tumble, ending up with a few spikes from some thistle or other in my palm, but otherwise unscathed. Fortunately this happened near the foot of the hill. Turns out my JCB steel-toe capped workbooks were not suitable for hillwalking after all.

These boots were not made for walking

Glad also it was me and not my son, because that would have put him off hill-walking for life and completely negated the whole point of the character-building exercise.

We got back to the car and my ankle felt fine. Very glad of the walking stick I'd bought on instinct in Callander. Poured water out of our boots. Dried off as best we could. Note to self: Have dry shoes, socks and a towel in the car next time you go hiking in Scotland.

The descent also took about an hour, meaning a round trip of two hours up and down. Would have been 1:45 without tumble and selfies.

Really glad of the automatic Toyota as we drove down the hill back to the campsite (no need to use left foot on clutch).

Anyway, it was a great experience and I hope my son will carry it on in the future.

We treated ourselves to a hot chocolate as a reward