My name is Christopher Lee and I am the author of Westward, a Channillo exclusive serial release occult fantasy that blends X-Files and the Magnificent Seven.
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What made you choose publishing your work as a serial as opposed to a collection/novel?
DAN: I have collections with my publisher GenZ, Lapping Water, Humbled Wise Men Christmas Haikus, and Home other places I’ve yet to see. Channillo has been a good place for projects of mine that I view as smaller endeavors.
CHRIS: For one I love to write as if my story were being presented as a TV show, each chapter I write feels like an episode of a show to me, so it made sense to present it this way. The format of serial publication allows me to work on my story at the same time as I get feedback from readers on previous chapters, etc which in turn helps make the story better down the road.
What benefits have arisen with plot, character development, and/or voice as you write a serial?
DAN: It’s fun to write these poem-letters in “Weathergirl.” I call it soap opera poetry.
CHRIS: It takes a huge load off of the authorś shoulder to know that they don’t have to crank out a huge manuscript in order for readers to access their work. There is a flexibility that I mentioned before that allows the writer to breath, take a step back, and then return to the keyboard recharged and excited to write the next chapter of the story, not to mention it keeps the readers hungry for more.
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I concur about that load being shirked off! However, I know one problem I have when posting my own Young Adult Fantasy MIDDLER’S PRIDE is publishing on time.
What challenges have you faced writing serials?
CHRIS: Honestly, I have not faced any, save that classic HIT THE DEADLINE. When I began to write Westward, I had a fully developed story arc with complete show/chapter ideas. This allows me to simply sit down and write the next installment, whereas had I not done so I might have run into an issue of keeping the story straight, so to speak. Ultimately it is all about consistency when running a serial. You need to market it consistently and produce the content on time so that your readers know they can count on you. After all, there is nothing worse than investing time as a reader in a story that dead ends.
DAN: Letters to the Weathergirl is about a man writing to a news anchor and the reader doesn’t know if he is a deranged fan, or a fan, or her actual lover and I haven’t had any problems developing that. I’m very fortunate.
Now while I myself have never published any poetry, I find it a pleasure to read! It seems to fit well with the serial form. Because I’ve written Middler with the serial publishing platform in mind, I find myself constantly looking for little arcs or episodes to write within the larger novel-arc. How do you feel your writing and/or genre’s been affected by publishing it in a serialized form?
DAN: Letters to the Weathergirl is weekly so when holidays turn up I like writing themed segments. The arrows on the clock are pointing at me was like a fun dumping ground for unpublished poems and I hope to maybe start another series like that. Venus Fly Trap kept my haiku skills sharp and Little Silver Microphone explores recordings both home and live.
CHRIS: I primarily write in the fantasy genre, which I believe is aided by the format. Fantasy in some ways suffers from the drudgery of 600+ page novels that remain inaccessible to the general public at large. Many consumers of media want smaller bites that they can digest while they ride the bus, an Uber, or just before bed, etc. Just look at Netflix and the advent of binge watching or in this case binge reading.
What do you think draws readers to read serial (non)fiction?
CHRIS: Accessibility and consistent content creation are the two major things for me. One that readers can have an a la carte or buffet experience with different genres, authors, and styles. Two is that there isn’t a huge delay between content dumps from the authors, its the exact opposite of the George R.R. Martin effect, for example waiting for years for a conclusion to the story you as the reader have invested time in.
DAN: I like to read serieses on Channillo because I find it relaxing, interesting and a cool thing to catch up with. “The Domesticated Poet” by Kerriann Curtis is one on there I enjoy for those reasons.
Do you receive any reader feedback on your writing as it’s posted? What do you do with those reader comments? DAN: Yes, I do. I’ve gotten great feedback that has meant a lot to me. Sometimes I post quotes about my series on the work’s homepage.
CHRIS: If I am being honest, I have not received much in the way of comments via the Channillo platform, but I have been contacted via Twitter, Facebook, and email from readers who have given me some of the most constructive feedback I have gotten to date. It is a really cool experience to have that level of connection with the reader. Usually what I do with said commentary is to implement whatever makes the most sense to the story, all while keeping the core message of the reader close to heart.
What advice do you have for fellow writers who want to give serialization a go?
CHRIS: First and foremost you need to have a fully developed story before you kick the thing off. If you don’t have that, then you run the risk of hitting a dead end that could cause you massive problems. Ultimately a plan will save your booty if you get in a pinch.
DAN: Make sure you do your installments on time with interesting material to help build an audience.
I found this quote published inThe Washington Postback in 2015, and I’d like you to comment on it:
Critics will undoubtedly moan that serialization would favor literature that’s heavy on cliffhangers and light on subtlety — and that it would corrupt more “serious” works. … Yet it requires the same characteristic any worthy novelist already seeks: momentum — a value that needn’t come at the expense of integrity. –Hillary Kelly, “Bring Back the Serialized Novel”
CHRIS: Kelly makes a great point, though the critics of serialization see it as low art or cheap in quality, I find the process to be far more rigorous. You can simply slap crap together and throw it at the wall and hope that it sticks. In fact, you have to take even more time to craft a tight narrative, then you would in the case of a novel. To run a successful serial you have to keep your readers hooked. In the traditional method, example a fully fledged novel, once they buy your book, the transaction is largely done, you have the readers money, whether or not they come back for subsequent books is altogether another animal. With a serial, you have the flexibility that you don´t have in the traditional sense, and that is the true strength of serialization.
Thanks so much for sharing your thoughts, guys, and good luck building those Channillo stories! You’re reminding me I need to update what’s going on with Meredydd…
In the meantime, check out these authors and other amazing folks at Channillo. You can scope out their amazing store of stories FREE for thirty days. Who knows? Maybe you’d like to write for them, too!
Tomorrow I’ll be compiling all the indie author interviews from this month and sharing them on my newsletter, along with a couple updates on my own writing. Be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss out!
Now here’s a fine fellow I’m excited to share with you. Yes, he’s written a book, which is awesome, but I’M keen to share him with you because of his creativity with music. If you’ve visited my blog before, you know how important music is to my writing, so to speak with a songwriter is a great honor, indeed!
Let’s start with an introduction first, shall we? Give us a bit about who you are and what you do.
When will all the pieces come together? And if I don’t like the picture am I stuck with it forever?
a line from a song I wrote when starting out.
The words stayed with me. Kept me honest. A mantra for the inspiration self-doubt hands out in shedloads when it feels like it.
Who am I? Since finishing uni with and against all odds,
a BA (Hons) 1st in Music Technology I’ve gone by the alter ego ‘Zoolon’ but
generally when people call me ‘George’ they get a response. I’m a
singer/songwriter and sound artist without an ego, preferring art above glory;
composition over crowds. On balance I prefer animals to humans and am wary of
men in suits. I’m colour-blind and dyslexic. I work alone, writing lyrics,
composing melody, performing and producing all my own stuff.
Having gone the generic teenage route of live gigging
playing lead guitar in an average band and figuring out it wasn’t for me as the
politics of people were a thing I could do without, I eventually decided to
invent a version of me that could make a music career without going through the
rituals of just performance. Hence the birth of ‘Zoolon’ a couple of years
back.
The key stat that made me look at the music industry
differently was reading that 1% of artists draw in over 90% of the available
income. That means most musicians, however exceptionally talented they might
be, haven’t got a chance. I just knew I had to take a different path. I’m not
there yet, but two years into the ‘Zoolon’ project I’m still in business; I’m
doing OK. Just.
I like to vary the genres I work in from things as far
apart as classical music at one end of the scale to heavy metal at the other
and in between, ambient, acoustic, folk, alternative and experimental.
Growing up I’d never realized that I was dyslexic and
colour-blind until the day came when some professional bloke at great cost to
my parents confirmed it. That they were the reasons I could barely read or
write and that I only saw things as black, grey or white. It’s interesting
being told you are something you never knew you were.
My audience is anyone who’ll listen in. In terms of completion of the Zoolon project I hope that one day I’ll be writing the score for a blockbuster movie.
Now you’ve been studying music a long time. Which instrument started this quest for you, and did you begin composing on this same instrument?
I was about 8-9 years old when my parents gave me my
first guitar. They’d forgotten I was left-handed so the one I got was regular
version. I remember feeling a bit bad about telling them they’d bought the
wrong thing so I taught myself how to play right-handed. I still play
right-handed.
I eventually upgraded to better guitars but remember I did write my first song, ‘The Universe Has Forgotten Me’ – a stereotypical teenage angst number – but wish I could forget. I cringe every time I think about it. I still have that first guitar. It’s bad luck to get rid of the first one.
Your first album, Dream Rescuer, is actually something of a story told in music. What inspired this project within you, and can you describe your creative process to make it?
At uni I composed two concept albums, ‘Cosa Nostra’ that was a sound art composition using captured sound and electronic music, and ‘Liquid Truth’, an album themed on Plato’s Allegory of The Cave. I never released either as they were both in demo form and I’ve never got around to remaking them. As for ‘Dream Rescuer’ – Zoolon’s first album – I had to start somewhere so I put together a collection of songs that each had its own meaning. From that album there are the two songs that have had the most plays out of all my work so far. ‘Sunlight & The Dust’, a protest song regarding how much the world would suffer when farmers and thoughtless gardeners have killed off the bees, and ‘Rexie Believes in Magic’, a take on being lost and finding yourself again. There was no specific creative process. I just let the songs arrive in their own time. Luckily for me, they did just that.
Now your website Zoolon Hub often shares posts where you share poems that may or may not become a song, but I don’t recall you often having this “issue,” if you will, in reverse. Do you find that the lyrics come more readily than, say, the instrumental themes?
Because I have a short span of attention I find it
easier if I try to vary the stuff I put on the blog, throwing in some pics I’ve
taken, plus random story words and rhyming verses mainly, although sometimes
structured ones, plus pieces of music I’ve created and/or that of well-known
artists I like. Foster the People; Coldplay; The Villagers; Paul Simon; Randy
Newman; Metallica; Lola Marsh; Within Temptation; Lana; Marina; Aurora and so
many others.
You’re right though, I do put up quite a lot of simple verse type stuff on the blog from time to time, well before any melody has even been thought about. Mostly, I go for melody before words but can do it either way. Inspiration for instrumental music comes from whatever mood I’m in when I’m on a roll – especially the electronic classical numbers, like ‘The Forgotten Daughter of Zeus’ and ‘Barbed Wire’.
A good example of exactly how I work are the two numbers
I wrote for the album ‘The Pigeons Are Switzerland’ about the life and death of
Francesca Woodman a photographic artist from the States who topped herself aged
22 in 1981. They probably reveal a lot about me and the way I write my music. I
can’t claim I discovered this artist myself. I got introduced to Francesca’s
work by another blogger who writes words better than mine and most others. Dark
words and great metaphors you have to think about. Also, she certainly knows
her art.
Anyway, what I found amazing about Francesca was that
she was her own muse. She did what she did without the assistance of any
others. A massive portfolio in black and white portraying/capturing, at least
that’s how I see them, reflective statements, moods and emotions in a surreal
way. My work also is something where I don’t involve others. My end result is
often the same as hers, just that it’s spoken through a different artistic
genre. Maybe that’s why I’m hooked on her work. Some people don’t get it when I
say, ‘I hunt alone’. I can’t help it.
I wrote the blog words for the vocal track, ‘Francesca’ well before I turned it into a song. Once I had a melody in my head I used just the selected words from the original I needed for the song that might match Francesca’s mindset leading up to her death.
I like having verses in the closet but rarely stick to them when composing. Also, my love of instrumentals meant I just had to cover her final moments in music and try to do her proud with that ‘freedom at last’ track, ‘Eastside 1981’. If you listen, at the very end you’ll hear the gentle whispering of disturbed air as she took a leap of no faith.
Like a lot of artists her work only
made the big time after her death. A shame.
That’s basically how I work.
I’ve often thought that the composer’s choosing of instruments is akin to a writer choosing the right voices to tell a story…unless, of course, the music chooses its instruments for you. I’ve had that happen, too, where the characters come to me with their stories rather than me hunting them down. What factors are in play when you select the instruments for a song?
That’s a hard question. I think I can only answer it by providing a list. My mood; gut feeling; influences of other artists (whether I’m conscious of it or not); writing with a bespoke purpose in mind; testing my limits; trying to please; and the random thoughts of the scatterbrain I am.
You’ve received some awesome top-notch ratings for your work. Can you tell us a little more about that?
Certainly and in some ways surprisingly, being featured in the February 2019 Lifoti Magazine improved my stats for a while and having a number of songs curated has helped the Zoolon brand get ‘known’ out there, although certainly not ‘well-known’ yet, plus it’s helped to get my work selected for custom-made playlists as well as things like music for mobile apps, retail outlets and stuff like that. Being UK No. 1 and in the Global top 10 for two months earlier this year on ReverbNation has helped spread the word. I’ve got some good potential irons in fires that may come to fruition soon. A year ago I had none of these things.
I imagine that the marketing strategies of an indie musician can be very similar to that of an indie writer. What do you to keep your discography visible on social media?
Not enough. I’m driven to make music, not driven to make
marketing strategy. I glaze over at the word ‘marketing’. It’s stupid but
honestly it’s the truth. It’s a musician thing I think. On social media I go
through the motions best as I can. WP is OK as it’s one to one contact most
often, but Instagram and Facebook are soulless. Twitter is what it is. It’s not
as useless as some people say. Twitter has done well for me.
Word of mouth seems more powerful to me than social media where everyone is competing for the self-same thing – selling music. I probably need a full-time manager, but they generally wear suits!
I love how your songs carry a wide variety of feeling: some have a touch of melancholy, others tension; some anger, others hope. Sooo I don’t really have a question on this, but I’d love for you to comment on the emotional drive for your music. Hmmm, I suppose you could say I’m asking this: Does the emotion come first to inspire the song, or does the song help build these emotions inside you?
I never know how a song’s emotion will evolve.
Creativity never lets on how and if she’s on my side on any given day. I just
have to live in hope she turns up in a good mood. When she turns up bored
senseless more often than not I produce work that ends up getting trashed. A
good day to me is one where I get so involved in what I’m doing that I forget
to eat and drink. I try to get out for breakfast most days just in case I’ll be
starving myself without realizing it for the rest of the day and well into the
night.
On your site you offer to turn a writer’s poem into a song. That’s such a cool service! What inspired you to do this? Do you find it a challenge to create around someone else’s creation?
Working a project for other artists whether they are
poets who want their poems turned to song, or other musicians who want
something they can’t do themselves is great. Just knowing what the brief is
seems to take the pressure away – unlike composing my own stuff from scratch.
The poem to song thing seemed like a good idea; a
sensible thing to add to my WP website. At Zoolon’s WP special rate of just
£100 across the board I’m saving the writer of the words probably £2500+ when
compared with the alternative of hiring a whole load of others from musicians,
singers and sound engineers, plus studio time. The only reason I can do it so
cheaply is that I do everything myself. Also, the customer gets the copyright
for the finished article. I have a number of satisfied customers out there but
could do with a few more. I enjoy creating for others. It’s a warm glow
feeling.
Lastly, do you want to share any updates about your current works in progress?
In January just gone I released the instrumental album
‘The Forgotten Daughter of Zeus’ and had planned a new acoustic set of songs
for later this year. The new collection was, so I thought, progressing really
well. An early release was on the cards. Then it hit me that the title track was
a bit special and overshadowed the rest. Others have also confirmed that I
might be onto something good with this one.
Because of that a later release of the whole set is now more likely as I need to rethink where I am and where I want to be with the other songs. In many ways this is a good thing. Quality means everything. I’d like to say more at this time but for now all I’ll say is that for the title track I’ve done something entirely different to anything I’ve done before. More on that on my blog in due course.
Many thanks, George! You can find Zoolon’s albums here on Bandcamp, and his book here on Amazon. If you’d like to chat with him, you can find him on his blog as well as on Twitter.
If you’re curious about my own thoughts on music, feel free to visit my collection of “Writer’s Music” posts. You can also read the results of that inspirational music in my novel and free fiction, available on this site as well as on Amazon.
Helloooooo, my lovely folks! While I vanquish the mountain of term papers and attempt to discover new territory in Camp NaNoWriMo,I want to treat you all to a month of interviews with amazing indie authors. As April is also Poetry Month, it is only fitting to begin with the one, the only, Master Mike Steeden. x
First, Mike, why not tell us a little about yourself?
As to imparting ‘a little about myself’ it is probably for the best that such information remains left untold. Were I to continue there is a very real risk of your readers becoming consumed with the urgent desire to open a vein and end it all out of sheer tedium.All I will say is that aside from being a time-traveller…and frankly that’s not all it’s made out to be…and having shared a few beers with both Joan of Arc, a lovely gal, although lacking that certain panache on the coiffure front, and the much maligned yet a decent sort when you get to know him, Vlad the Impaler, there is little of interest to divulge.
What first inspired you to create with words?
I know many ‘words’ yet cannot spell for toffee, hence the day I discovered that Word had a ‘spellcheck’ I was inspired to have a stab at writing. To my addled mind, although irrelevant in the global plan of things, that event became my metamorphosis moment. Notwithstanding the spelling issues, possibly I should also extend my thanks to the inventers of the keyboard for I am incapable of reading my own handwriting.
You create a lush mix of poetry, prose poetry, flash fiction, and novel fiction. When does that form take shape? That is, does a story always begin a story, or does the scene you begin later transform into a poem? Your piece “The Shop that Sells Kisses” feels like it could have been a bit of flash fiction, but the rhythm of language clearly demands its rightful place among your poetry. 🙂
When fate affords me a decent ‘first line’ or a ‘title’ I’m straight on the case. Hardly ever do I know in which direction or sub-genre the words might take me. I simply leave it up to them. Some words beg to rhyme others seem to not care less what happens next. I tend to work to my disorganized version of organized and without a blind clue as to the content of what I’ve written until it feels like the finished article. Only then do I read it back. At that stage some finished pieces face the firing squad, others live to see another day. ‘Words’ are anarchistic creatures…free roaming is their way of life. Were it the case they ended up confined within the cages of Manuscript Zoo they would commit hara-kiri. In life I cannot, as the old London saying goes, ‘Organize a piss up at a brewery’ and likewise when writing I’ve never been capable of successfully structuring a coherent plan. Quite the opposite as I live in constant fear of preordained rules. Free-thinking never submits to precedent’s ineptitude.
Something I’ve always wanted to ask a poet pertains to line breaks. “The Longest Night” has both fluid lines, long and winding, as well as stark lines of extreme brevity. How do you decide where lines should be broken?
As I alluded to previously, the words make decisions for me. I have no say in the matter. It is akin to being in a maze wearing just a blindfold and socks. I’ve never claimed to be a poet. ‘Almost poetry’ is the name I coined for my genre. The words decide the line breaks amongst themselves. Rarely do they argue with one another. A democracy of syllables? Possibly. Some words are shy and want to hold hands together, others prefer the hustle and bustle of the cityscape on a summers night. Given that rules bore me rigid I am grateful to the wantonly pliable words for making life easy. In terms of ‘The Longest Night’, albeit written in what feels like a lifetime lost I do remember being sat outside a café watching the day go by when a group of now aging Gurkha ex-soldiers strolled by. For whatever reason the chalk on the blackboard inside my head came out with the obscure first line, ‘Forgotten tribes and luminaries outwear handicaps’. It hit me smack in the face Tysonesque punch style. I suspect that the pattern the words took was due to the quantum leaps of shifting back and forth across two time zones. Sorrowfully, the event I wrote of was concerning the stupidity of WW1. The word collective demanded the whole picture be seen even if the subject matter was in cameo; a convoluted fiction of respect.
What, according to you, is the hardest thing about writing?
By far and away the hardest thing is when, over an evening’s glass or two of something French and red I’ve welcomed in the multi-coloured immigrant words and ensured the poor things are safe and sound in the sanctuary of my laptop only to find come the morn they have mutated into a gang of shaven headed, tattooed archetypical plain white indigenous thugs. Sadly, I have to evict the unwanted and await for new arrivals.
Do you pen down revelations and ideas as you get them, right then and there?
Yes. Words are delicate things. Give them a home at the drop of a hat in the knowledge that should they not be cared for they will die young.
You’ve clearly tapped an endless vein of inspiration from WWII and the Cold War, as poems like the “The Sunshine Girl” and “She is the Ghost of Generations” show. What is it about these particular years that hold your imaginative curiosity above all others?
Twixt the end of one evil, namely WW1 and the commencement of
another…morally far, far worse than its predecessor…a new dawn would trade
peace’s bright sun-shiny new dawn for darkest storms clouds that would
hurriedly mature into the tempest that was the unremitting thunder and
lightning of WW2. Within the traditional
European battlefield a Lilliputian era of unrefined, unadulterated passion for
passion’s sake. A ‘passion’ initially
for simply ‘living life to the full’; a thing lost in the death and destruction
of what had gone before. Then, in passion’s adolescence; new artforms; adapted
old artforms; polar opposite political doctrines; deliciously sullied ‘encounters’
of any and every shape and form; writers taking bold risks like never before.
Nothing was taboo. At its centre was Paris, ‘The City of Love’, although Weimar
Berlin ran it a close second. How could
I not be drawn into such an array of talent revealed; sometimes wasted in this
Bohemian, Parisian wonderland? Oh, to be
a fly on the wall. I have said before,
even in the knowledge that by 1939 the world would once again be in conflict, I
would give my right arm to, as the poet Max Jacob said when taking up residence
in Montparnasse district of the city, “I have come to sin disgracefully.”
One must not overlook that during those years at various times
within this small quarter was home to Hemingway, F Scott Fitzgerald, Man Ray,
Picasso, Gertrude Stein, Dali, Henry Miller, Ezra Pound, Lee Miller and a whole
host of others from abroad. In the case of the many young, talented American’s
arriving, they came because they believed their ‘native land was a cultural
sink.’ Perhaps all ‘native’ lands had earned such a dull tag when compared to
Paris back then? Whatever, Ms Lee that is the reasoning behind my constant
musings.
My risqué ‘romance come espionage’ book, ‘Notoriously Naked Flames’ is themed around the events of that short-lived libertine era. Writing that book was pure joy. I think I fell in love with the albino Goddess who was my lead character and a diamond gal, to boot.
Another element of poetry that fascinates me is word choice. When you write poems like “The Passing of a Myth,” do you first concentrate on creating the visuals within the poem, or are you first dedicated to building the music of the line? Both are gorgeous in this poem, but I can’t fathom trying to work on both at once, so I’m assuming there’s a process. 🙂
There’s no process, I promise.
In truth I’d forgotten I ever wrote that one. Having just read it once again I recall that at the time a dark depression had consumed me. I’m particularly good at those. In their own clinging way they have a creative spark unique to their species. The addictive perk depression offers is that it spawns words of own volition. They may have come alive in my head yet I never feel ‘ownership’ of them. What and how I write is, as ever, at their discretion. If there is a benefit in chance visits from my old nemesis, Monsieur Chien Noir, then it is that, by way of compensation for outstaying his welcome, I often find he settles his account by way a currency born of milk and honey words that flow like there’s no tomorrow.
What advice would you like to pass on to young writers of today that is unconventional but true?
Well, this is my personal take on the subject. I’m sure many will justifiably
see it differently. I would firstly advise that nothing is sacred. You can get
away with murder when your only weapon is the written word. Never pull a punch.
It took me an age to realize that words beg to be out of their comfort zone. Let
them run feral. Also, never run ahead of yourself and believe you’re a poet or
a novelist. You’re not. I’m not. Most aren’t. To me only the greats who have
earned their stripes in that regard can lay claim to those tags. Mostly they
never find that out, as accolades tend to chase only the great and grateful dead.
Importantly, grab hold of self-doubt and make her your new best friend. She’ll never let you down. While a smidgen of self-believe is a harmless thing, never believe you’re capable of walking on the inky waters of Lake Egocentric for you will lose all respect from your peer group as well as potential readers.
If you’re writing about a city/country/culture you haven’t physically visited, how much research do you conduct before you start writing?
Albeit a contradiction given what I’ve said vis a vis ‘words’, yes I
do research. I find it chivvies the lazy words amongst the contingent along. In
many ways it’s the most enjoyable aspect. I learn shed loads of things I never
knew previously. Even with my ‘Jonny Catapult the Plumber the Artist’s All
Trust’ lunatic skits…as per my new book, ‘Fanny,
I Think of You Often’…I had to research pretty much all angles of
plumbing believe it or not…not that I shall actually or actively ‘plumb’ now
or at any time in the future unless there is a revolver fixed firmly at my
temple. Plainly, it is essential to share my research with the tribe curious ‘words’
thus giving them an idea as to where I live in hope they will travel.
‘Notoriously Naked Flames’ demanded a whole mass of painstaking research. I had to discover exactly how life was and how it looked during those years building up to WW2 in countries and cities across Europe, from Amsterdam, Mother Russia…including the Ukraine, Istanbul and Berlin, none of which I was that familiar with, although when it came to Paris and the coastal areas of Belgium I was very much on home territory. History, architecture, politics and the ways of life of both the good and the bad became key to creating a canvas upon which words could paint their picture.
Thank you so, so much for taking time to chat, Master Steeden! Let’s wrap-up with a rundown of your latest works available now on Amazon.
I’ve have already made mention of the new book, full title, ‘Fanny, I Think of You Often & Other Tales of Abject Lunacy’. It is the first of two books both of which are a deranged collection of skits, such as ‘Audrey Hepburn’s Bout of Gout’; ‘Marilyn Monroe’s Distressing Flatulence’; ‘The fate of the old grannie from Lowestoft who once upon a time inadvertently stepped upon Elvis’s blue suede shoes’ and much, much more. The sister to this tome, ‘The Elastic Snapped,’ is also available.
Another addition to the shelves at Amazon/Kindle is co-authored with Shirley Blamey. It’s name is ‘Whatever Happened To Eve?’ Eighteen months previous I commenced collecting ever willing words for this story. A third of the book complete, the new words arriving were a motley crew who failed abysmally to direct my tale toward a conclusion.
Then a stroke of good fortune. It was in September last year, having
suffered an irksome eye injury some months previous that had slowed my progress
when coaxing words, that Shirl and I took a short break in France and it was
there a story imagined over cold bière blonde in a clandestine darkest corner
of a once voguish bar in ‘Paris par la mer’ took on a new shape. Twixt the pair
of us, in concert we found ourselves acting and reacting to the seductive pulse
of mutual, sometimes deliciously wicked thoughts. No ‘what if’s’, ‘but’s’ or ‘maybe’s’ when a
dark fantasy drops out the night sky for it must, for rationalities’ sake, be
put to the written word before it is lost forever to the merciless ether. An
excited cluster of unshackled ‘words’ agreed. We were on a roll.
I have to say, come breakfast, I questioned Shirl on a number of potentially
controversial topics and storylines we had come up with that night in France.
“Can we really get away with that? Seriously?” I asked. “Molly Parkin got away
with it time and time again. Why not?,” her pokerfaced riposte. Soon after wily
‘words’ found they had two craniums to take up residence in. I tend to think
mine was just their holiday home.
130,000 or so words later we have a book we shall shortly make known
to others. Having said that…and you
are the first to know, the lovely Ms. Lee…
‘Whatever Happened To Eve?’ is, in truth, already available in both
paperback and Kindle at Amazon sites far and wide.
Lastly Ms Lee, my
thanks for the invitation, your time and patience.
I tip my hat to you, Great Master Steeden!
Many thanks, folks, for reading my interview with Mike. Please check out his website, The Drivellings of Twattersley Fromage, and his wonderful books on Amazon.
Gentlemen Prefer a Pulse: Poetry with a Hint of Lunacy: Gentlemen Prefer a Pulse is Mike Steeden’s first published collection of poetry and features over a hundred poems that are sometimes humourous, serious, satirical, surreal, thought provoking and brilliant! Mike says his inspiration is drawn from his self proclaimed love of the fairer sex, his passion for ‘people watching’ (a trait born of his time as a private investigator), social justice and compassion.
The Shop That Sells Kisses: Poetry with a Hint of Magic: Mike Steeden writes his poetry always with ‘a touch’ of something or other. Often that ‘touch’ is a surreal one, occasionally one of lunacy of being, and with this tome he had added a hint of ‘magic’.
Notoriously Naked Flames: Part espionage thriller, part romance, part fantasy, part adventure, ‘Notoriously Naked Flames’ is Mike Steeden’s first novel. Spanning the lead up to World War II, the war itself, and into the early 1950s, the unnamed heroine of the piece, a bewitching albino of Bohemian bent, masquerades in all manner of risqué guises dishing out her own version of clandestine justice to those evil souls spawned of conflict’s disregard for compassion, law, and order.
Fanny, I Think of You Often… Nothing is sacred. If permitted, the mind wanders free in the knowledge that anything and everything is possible. Season such a mind with a pinch of satire plus a hint of Pythonesque surrealism and the dish of ‘fusion lunacy’ is ready to be served. Within the pages of this deranged collection of skits you will discover how Audrey Hepburn dealt with a bout of gout; similarly what became of Marilyn Monroe’s false teeth; the fate of the old grannie from Lowestoft who once upon a time inadvertently stepped upon Elvis’s blue suede shoes and much, much more.
The Elastic Snapped: WARNING: This book may contain traces of nuts (not of the edible kind) and may also cause drowsiness amongst those unfamiliar with the English language. Bibliophobia sufferers may experience severe panic attacks. Additionally, it is strongly recommended that you do not drive whilst reading.INGREDIENTS: Lunacy, stupidity, silliness, idiocy, absurdity, aberration, eccentricity and fragments of appallingly bad taste.
Whatever Happened to Eve? No writer can help what he or she writes. Whether they be scandalous or sweet, dull or bright, words arrive as and when the fancy takes and evolve into whatever fable suits. With that in mind this collective of untamed words, of their own volition, chose not to be pitched at the easily offended or fainthearted, instead they opted for a captivating darkness.
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Poetry requires a deftness with space and language, a skill akin to lacing. Lacing needs sure fingertips, careful measurements, knowledge of the spaces as well as the threads, their knots, their weaves, none of which I’ve fully understood.
Oh, I’m not putting down prose–a great book requires all these things, too. But there’s something about the poetic line, that tight little collection of words that must balance just-so with the empty space surrounding it, that is needed more in poetry than prose. Studying such rich handfuls of language can only better the prose writer, inside and out.
I can still remember the first poem that shook me. Not a hymn, not Scripture–pshaw, I grew up around that stuff. For the first couple decades of life, that stuff sat next to the peanut butter, mixed into the pile of bills on the kitchen table, hung on the hook in the hall. Just another part of the day.
College: changes.
For the first time, I was in a place where no one else knew my family. I wasn’t being judged by the actions of my parents or brothers. I was me. I finally embraced my passion to write and yes, I dared choose story-telling over music. I worked to understand that which mattered inside me.
That which hurt.
For the first time, I spoke to an adult, the college chaplain, about The Monster. His hands. My despair.
Later that same day I was trapped in a poetry unit of a lit class. I didn’t get any of it: meaning, syntax, meter. Hell, I was barely listening. Blah, blah, sentence fragments words, blah, blah. I just wanted to leave, and deal.
Next in our anthology was Langston Hughes’ “Mother to Son.”
Well, son, I’ll tell you:
Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.
It’s had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor—
Bare.
But all the time
I’se been a-climbin’ on,
And reachin’ landin’s,
And turnin’ corners,
And sometimes goin’ in the dark
Where there ain’t been no light.
So, boy, don’t you turn back.
Don’t you set down on the steps.
‘Cause you finds it’s kinder hard.
Don’t you fall now—
For I’se still goin’, honey,
I’se still climbin’,
And life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.
Every line. Word. Space. Stuck.
Never had words burrowed into me, gripped the pit of me and twisted, fucking hurt as they twisted and pulled–because they were trying to right me. I took that poem to the dorm, and bawled for a long, long time. I still cry every time I read it.
Of course all writers want to grip readers. But there are those, like Hughes, who do far more than entertain, or inspire. They transform us. That transformation may be one of the bloodiest experiences in our souls, but we are, yes we are, the stronger for it.
~*~
College: changes.
I studied literature for a summer at University College Cork.I didn’t really fit in with those who spent every lecture drinking alcohol in soda containers and flying to London on weekends to go clubbing. Nor did I fit with the academics who’ve read Ulysses and/or Finnegan’s Wake twice and sat on the dormitory’s stoop to pontificate nature, economy, philosophy. I spent much of the off-hours alone, wandering Cork, reading Seamus Heaney, doing my damndest not to be a dunce.
I can’t tell you which poem fell upon me me first. “Blackberry-Picking,” I think.
Late August, given heavy rain and sun
For a full week, the blackberries would ripen.
At first, just one, a glossy purple clot
Among others, red, green, hard as a knot.
You ate that first one and its flesh was sweet
Like thickened wine: summer’s blood was in it
Leaving stains upon the tongue and lust for
Picking. Then red ones inked up and that hunger
Sent us out with milk cans, pea tins, jam-pots
Pardon me for being evil, and breaking his stanza. I want to pause it here, because I can feel the call-back of the memory in these lines.
The title seemed simple to me. I should be able to understand a basic description, right? And being the Midwest girl that I am, raised in a farming town before getting shuffled to Milwaukee because God said so, I felt like I could even–gasp–write almost-intelligently about it. Harvest. Rural life. Childhood innocence. Yay, I understood something!
Then something else happened, something that for all my writing aspirations, I had never really considered:
Language.
The first two lines form a smooth sentence, a prosey sentence. But line 3 comes along and says: “glossy purple clot.” Suddenly I am holding something, vivid and bright. Yet “clot.” Why “clot”? Who associates “clot” with delicious fruit? We want blood to clot, I suppose. And there you have it, lines 5 and 6, describing sweet “flesh” and “summer’s blood.” Line 7 builds to “lust” and–hey! The sentence is broken! The space urges me to line 8 where capitalized, separated by the rest of the line with a period, comes the act, the want, the purpose: “Picking.”
Every word Heaney shares connects with one or more senses:
Where briars scratched and wet grass bleached our boots.
Round hayfields, cornfields and potato-drills
We trekked and picked until the cans were full,
Until the tinkling bottom had been covered
With green ones, and on top big dark blobs burned
Like a plate of eyes. Our hands were peppered
With thorn pricks, our palms sticky as Bluebeard’s.
The “briars scratched.” The “wet grass bleached our boots.” I read these lines out loud on the sidewalk outside a bookstore, the buzz over the latest Harry Potter deaf on my ears. The way “briars,” “bleached,” “boots,” roll in the mouth, berries all their own. “Like a Plate of eyes”–a return to the flesh imagery! Emphasized with the association to the murderer Bluebeard, who hoarded wives as the young characters do berries:
We hoarded the fresh berries in the byre.
But when the bath was filled we found a fur,
A rat-grey fungus, glutting on our cache.
The juice was stinking too. Once off the bush
The fruit fermented, the sweet flesh would turn sour.
I always felt like crying. It wasn’t fair
That all the lovely canfuls smelt of rot.
Each year I hoped they’d keep, knew they would not.
Gah! Not just “grey,” or “silver,” or “fuzzy,” but “rat-grey.” Immediately, we think of pestilence, unwanted, toxic growth. More of such vivid sounds that we can taste against the roofs of our mouths and yet see, all at once: “fresh berries/byre” or “fungus, glutting.” Action moves quickly with the imagery: “fruit fermented”…”sweet flesh would turn sour.” Three words transform what is loved to what is lost.
And the ending of the poem…we have this sort of short “o” sound three times in the last four lines: “sour,” “rot,” not.” “Sour” creates tension on two fronts: that growling “r” carries on in “fair,” the positive, the hopeful, only “It wasn’t fair,” was it? And the short “o” of “sour” echoes in the harsh monosyllabic phrase, “smelt of rot.” Damn, such a slamming there. A child, stomping his boots at the unfairness, the inevitability despite the hope the narrator knows is in vain, yet holds in his jars and cans every year: “knew they would not.” The whole last line is monosyllabic, too, words falling like so many spoiled berries one tips from the can onto the ground.
I carried Heaney and all these thoughts back with me to the dorm. No, no tears today, but another epiphany, yes. For the first time, I wasn’t looking at words for what they achieve as a whole. Of course, “Blackberry-Picking” is a story in its own right, complete with characters, conflict, climax. But so much is accomplished in the little things here, too.
Every word written carries a rhythm. Listen with every sense. Capture what you can.
Jean Lee's World 