The Fortune-Teller

Disclaimer – a few folk have asked whether this is fiction or truth. It’s absolute truth, almost word for word. Happened today while I was working at the bookshop.

I don’t hear him until he coughs; a broad-faced Indian man with a black Mr. Monopoly moustache leaning over my desk. When he smiles I see perfect polished teeth, his tongue rapping uncertainly at the roof of his mouth. He clutches a clipboard to his chest. The sleeves of his knitted sweater are frayed, green fibres twisting in the lights like spidersilk.

“Hello,” he says. “I am Tony Gavarasana and you are very lucky because there are great worries in your life. I can see by your forehead and your hands. Give me your hands.”

“Are you-”

“Give me your hands. Let me see. I tell by your forehead you are very happy but there are worries coming and great unfortunate events. I can help you. I am a fortune teller. I am Tony Gavarasana. You know I am.”

He reaches over the counter and tries to grab my hand but I recoil. “I don’t want my fortune read, thankyou.”

“There are secrets in your hands. These unhappinesses will find you. They will bring terrible sadness to you.” He smiles again, bobbing nervously. “I believe you know.”

“I think I’ll find out what happens on my own, thanks.”

He sucks his lower lip. “I am Tony Gavarasana.”

“Please leave?”

His smile slowly fades. He fiddles with the clipboard. “Such unhappinesses,” he says, and I can almost see the tears pricking at the corners of his eyes. Then he bows. “Bless you, my son.”

I watch his green sweater fade into the crowd outside the store and turn over my hands to inspect my palms. All I see are scars.

- – - – - -

Other snippets of my life:
A Chorus of Bells
Hiding in a Doorway

Small radio silence:

Was in Canberra for Easter, seeing the folks. Was a good time all round. Too much chocolate, perhaps?

Finished the first three chapters of this new novel. I’m leaning towards “Alpha Slip” for a title. Much better than “Lie Back, Breathe Deep” which conjured up images of gynecologists.

I’ll have the opening chapters up soon, once I’ve given them a thorough look-over for spelling and somesuch. More substantial posts coming soon. Hope you all had a wicked Easter!

New novel in the works!

I’ve got a high concept sci-fi novel in the works and it’s been a ton of fun to write so far. Ant Tower is on the backburner for now – this new book is eating my brain and has to get out.

In the near future, psychiatrists link minds with their patients and create a melded environment in which to safely explore their patient’s neuroses and lingering traumas. But a patient with willpower and mental strength who knows how the system works can hijack the dream environment and start to play games with their therapists. The strongest can even trap others inside the meld and toy with them at will.

How long does it take to break someone when you’re inside their dreams?

- – - – -

Vice settled into the chair and tried to relax. The cool steel of the plug against the back of his skull was unnerving. The end of each armrest had grooves for his fingers to grip and his bare feet slotted into stirrups. The lights were much too bright, making spots dance before his eyes, and he suddenly had the image of lying on an autopsy table, still and cold and yet still screaming in his head as the scalpel touched his collarbone…

“Okay,” said Brewer. “We’re not going to jack you in as a sub. You’ll be a co-Alpha, along with Scott.” On the far side of the mirror Scott was relaxing into his own chair, fiddling with the wrist-straps. “Remember, you’re there to observe, not interact. Unless, of course, things get hairy. Use your own judgement.”

“I remember.” Vice tucked his hands through the wrist-straps and they cinched down, just tight enough to keep him in place. He wiggled his fingers. No tingles. Calm.

“You still need to set your exit word.” A series of clicks as Brewer sent test pulses down all eight nodes. “Something unique.”

“Onion.”

“Too easy. It might come up accidentally. What was your word, back in testing? You always had the same word.”

Vice shook his head. “Can’t remember, honestly. Too far back now. Okay, what about… unleaded?”

Brewer paused, then laughed. “Good. Okay, unleaded. Say it a few times and I’ll lock it in.”

“Unleaded. Unleaded.”

“Good. The lines are clean. All subs are reading base beta” A few more sharp clicks, and the whine of a dial being turned to max. The plug in the headrest began to hum, vibrating through his teeth. “Ready?”

Vice swallowed. “Ready.”

“Okay. Meld is winding. Doctor Scott Feeme as Alpha, Doctor William Vice as Second Alpha. Booting the meld at eleven-twenty four AM, June seventh, two-thousand-forty-five. Time begins in seven, six, five-”

Vice closed his eyes and squeezed the armrests tight.

“Four, three, two-”

His gut was a tight knot.

“One…” A moment stretched out to what seemed like infinity. “Time to dream,” said Brewer, and the electric snap of connection echoed through Vice’s skull. Hands pressed him down, warm and soft and slippery like eels, and behind his eyelids the lights began to dance.

Then nothing.

Mx publishes bullshit Parkour article, nobody is surprised

About two weeks ago I got a call from a friend. “Hey, when did you give an interview to Mx?”

“I never gave an interview to Mx,” I said. For anyone who doesn’t live in Melbourne or Brisbane, Mx is a trash tabloid newspaper given away for free at every major train station in the city. It’s run by the Herald, and is essentially a way of acclimatising readers to the same dumb-as-a-post writing style used in the Herald (a similar bottom-shelf newspaper, except it actually costs money).

“Well, you’re in here,” the friend said. “On the front page.”

Parkour on the front page!

I've circled the errors - click for a larger image

The only way to learn is by doing

Feeling quite good about myself right now, because I’ve got feedback from Weathermen and one of my recent shorts rolling in, and the feedback is all positive. Really positive. (Except for that ABNA bullshit).

It’s extremely satisfying, because the folk now giving me the thumbs up are the people who have been giving me the thumbs down (and the tentative horizontal thumb wiggle) for the past three years. Sorry, Mum and Dad, but your encouraging reviews will always come with a little bit of parental bias. Meanwhile, the folk in the Writer’s Block have been unremittingly harsh and honest, and their advice has been more beneficial than any writing course or degree could be.

What I’ve learned from the Writer’s Block is that there are rules of grammar, and there are rules of flow, and there are rules of language. There are no rules of storywriting. The way a person should construct a story depends on what sort of story that person likes to write and how they write it. Hemingway and Kerouac both write about real people in real situations, but nobody would argue that they should both construct their stories in the same way. They each build their stories in a way that best complements the way they approach language, and nobody would argue that their methods don’t work for them.

So, based on my few years of writing, and the way I mangle language, and the sort of stories I like to write, these are the lessons I’ve learned that work for ME. They might work for other people… but maybe not. I’m just saying, someone could have written these lessons down on a piece of paper and handed them to me three years ago and it wouldn’t have helped me at all. You need to discover through application, not through lecturing.

How Ruzkin Should Write (narrated in grandiose 3rd person)

My ABNA reviews! Lulz!

So, I was just about to publish a long post about things I’ve learned about writing over the past few years when an email arrived from Createspace. The reviews of my excerpt of Weathermen were in!

If anyone remembers, to get to the semifinals of the novel competition you had to post a 3000 word excerpt of your novel (which was the first two chapters of Weathermen, for me). The semifinalists would be based on reviews by two “Expert Reviewers.” I didn’t make it to the semi’s, so I was hoping for some really illuminating reviews from these “experts.”

Ha!