So, I crumbled . . . I wasn't going to produce any new work but I competition worth £5,000 caught my eye.  It was a challenge to produce something - short notice,

I have a few fans out there so don't read on. The synopsis reveals virtually everything. **Spoiler Alert!**

Moving Violation Synopsis
 
In a society ruled by surveillance and paranoia, Corrine is recorded as:  Corrine Pearl Radman; 29, credit rating 637, a single white female, ordinary, not a person of interest.   A financial analyst in New York, Corrine is extremely active on social media, known for her sarcasm, tongue-in-cheek conspiracy theories, and outrageous sense of humour.  Professionally, Corrine is renowned for smart, intuitive investment choices and leads the company rankings in simulated investments. Her poor attitude is all that bars her way to a lucrative partnership position and a 35th floor corner office.

Corrine's life implodes shortly after one of her outrageous conspiracy tweets comes to fruition: an explosion at a nuclear power station coincides with Corrine dumping millions in stock. Corrine's direct supervisor, Sadeeq Parreett, returns to Pakistan on the same day of the explosion, setting off alarm bells inside the US government. Overnight, Corrine becomes a person of interest in the eyes of several government agencies.
 
When Homeland Security announce, the explosion was the result of a terrorist attack, warrants are issued for Corrine's arrest.  Special Agent Vanessa Caldwell heads the FBI team hunting Radman. Caldwell is recalled from compassionate leave after her wife (a CIA Agent) was killed during a covert operation. Caldwell is angry with US government because they refuse to acknowledge her wife, Adele, has been killed. They will not bring her body home as it would confirm the US had been spying in China.
 
A dire situation worsens when it is discovered that for the past five years Corrine has be mirroring her fantasy investment choices with her own real money. She has a substantial amount of cash squirreled away in an off-shore account.
 
Corrine finds herself on the run; her credit cards and bank accounts have been frozen, her cell-phone no longer works, both the FBI and Homeland Security are permanently camped outside her apartment. She needs to flee the city, where cameras are on every corner, but she cannot travel out of State without ID.  She finds herself in the ghetto, a dark world where the cameras have been vandalised and law enforcement fear to tread.

Desperate, out of cash and sleeping rough, Corrine enters a local bar fully convinced turning to the oldest known profession is essential to her survival. Single father, Calvin James, turns out to be her first and last prospect.  But the best deal Corrine can negotiate is a hot shower and a bed for one night. One night turns into two, then a week, then a month.

Shortly after Homeland Security appear to have backed off and Corrine's face is no longer plastered on every TV screen, the US launch a drone strike in Pakistan, killing the man they believe to be Corrine's co-conspirator. Corrine's status is reduced from America's most wanted to Person of interest. But Corrine doesn't want to live the rest of her life in the margins as a fugitive and Calvin wants a better life for him and his daughter. Moreover, they want to be together. The only way that can happen is to make Corrine a bona-fide citizen again. Corrine reveals to Calvin that she has $5.6 million in an offshore account.
 
Unaware that FBI Special Agent Caldwell has apparently gone rogue and is still on the case, the fugitives hatch an ambitious plan.  After travelling to Venezuela they purchase the documents of a terminally ill woman, Maria Gonzalez. Corinne marries Calvin using Maria's name, and proceeds to obtain new documents using the name Maria James.
 
12 months later, Maria Gonzales dies and is buried as Maria Gonzales. Corrine (as Maria James) flies to the US to be with her husband.
 
Agent Caldwell was always monitoring Corrine's offshore account, and has been following the money.  At JFK, seconds away from being reunited with Calvin, Corrine is detained and transported to the FBI's New York field office.
 
Rather than take her into custody, Caldwell provides Corrine with new documents and a newspaper article detailing Corrine's death before telling her: the explosion was down to a software error. There was no terrorist attack, but hey, we went to war, bombed a country over the incident, the US Government was never going to walk that back.
 
In an attempt to confirm that she's free and clear, Corrine asks Caldwell if any charges remain against her. After a moment's thought Caldwell replies, "Possibly bigamy. Technically you're married to me."
 
As Corinne exits JFK, the CCTV system identifies her as: Adele Lyle, 31-years-old, credit rating 615, a single white female, further information classified.

So I recently rediscovered an old very literary very short piece. On the face of it, it's pretty, it's clever, but apparently nonsensical. To be understood by the minions any explanation requires more words the the piece itself. 

The outer, unwritten framework, is the story of a middle class woman in an abusive marriage. The story is her cryptic cry for help. By design, reading the story provides little insight into her message. However, reading the story out loud to a third party may offer enough clues to unravel the tale.

After a domestic violence 'incident' the woman miscarries. (It was a boy). In her grief she becomes depressed and afraid of her husband. During her next 'fertile' period her husband forces himself on her. A new pregnancy, whether boy or girl, goes some way to ease her depression. But she remains in fear of her husband.

THE CONFINES OF THE CASTLE
 

After the fall, the morning of the passing sun hailed a winter that would never end. Now without life, and love lost, her spring had left her, and now she feared the night.

During a new season the night would come, and the night would know her. And by early light she felt the comfort and warmth of the birth of a new dawn. Or the promise of a summer sun, to brighten all her days, and to ease the pain of morning. But still, she feared the night.

So, it's not really my project but I find it fascinating. In these times of shortened attention spans, publisher's needing tightly defined genres, and creative writing guru's insisting there must be a hero, a villain, a villain, a conflict, and a resolution - Michael D Scott has simply said "Fuck it! . . . All of it."

Fibonacci's Child is written in five parts. Part One plays out like a 'romantic comedy'. Part Two reads somewhere between 'misery lit' and 'tragedy'. For Part Three it's a visit to the 'S/F' shelf. And Part Four becomes distracted by the 'Fantasy' genre. By Part Five you'll realise the whole series was about mythology and destiny.

Ultimately it's a story about a woman who makes a tragic mistake. The more Katrina tries to fix her error, the worse the consequences become.  What is probably unique to this story is the utilisation of a "Groundhog Day" type plot but without the need for time travel. This is achieved by marrying the themes of 'clones' and 'twins'.

****Spoiler Alert****

Katrina causes the death of her twin sister. When a similar tragedy occurs in the next generation Katrina is quick to recognise a pattern. But twins begatting twin means procreation is always to the power of two. Which twin is destined to kill its sibling is little more that a guessing game. Katrina believes if she can prevent one tragedy she can halt the pattern.

The story is deceptive in almost every way. Whilst the reader and the characters believe they are following a random story the author is simultaneously playing out several stories. "Cane killed Abel", "Zeus split apart the hermaphrodites",  "Pollox and Castor are twins but Helen came out of the same egg." there's even a bit of "Heroes" and "Kill Bill" in there somewhere. The story is secretly driven by mathematics, nature, and religion. Katrina thinks her mistake was to clone a twin. Subsequently, the twins want to reproduce 2, 4, 8, 16 . . . Nature wants to follow the Fibonacci Sequence 1,1,2,3,5,8 . . . and is killing them off to keep the numbers right. Katrina is trying to fix the problem using science.

RACIAL STEREOTYPES – WHITE MEN CAN'T DANCE!!

If you're Asian this has nothing to do with you, nothing to see here – move on. If you're a trained dancer, this doesn't apply to you either.

A lot of folk say white people can't dance but experience and study show this not to be true – it's just the men. If we go back, way back, back in to time, the 70's and 80's when funk and disco ruled the airwaves, we note this was a period of time when people like Alf Garnet accused black men of 'coming over 'ere' and 'stealing our women'. (A young Nigel Farage was badly affected). If we examine what was going on amongst the teens and their raging hormones at the time we can begin to understand ensuing mixed race baby boom.

It starts at the school disco where pubescent children overdosed on sugar and experiencing the rush of red dye 40 were subjected to loud music. Affected by the funky beats the black kids, born with natural rhythm, hit the dance-floor. The white girls, quickly realised God have recently endowed them with new bits that they were able to wiggle and shake in a provocative manner. They were compelled to express themselves. The white boys, however, remained around the edge of the assembly hall discussing football, the offside rule, and Doctor Who.

The die had been cast.

School's out. The little buggers have all obtained fake ID's. They are frequenting night-clubs where they are throwing copious amounts of alcohol down their throats. The dance-floor has become a 'no-go' area for the average white boy. Like an adult who didn't learn to swim as a child he decides it's too late now. Even the genre is against him, this is not a style of music where he can attempt to look cool by playing air guitar.

You know I'm just f—king with, right?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8AOAap6_k4

Enter into evidence the video recording of a Womack and Womack's 'Teardrops'. It's a laid-back video showing the band recording the track in the studio. All the black people are totally chilled out (you know they've all been smokin' weed). They all got their grooves on. But check out the bass player (white male) – that's some embarrassing shit.     

 

I've never understood why Americans live their lives in fear of terrorists. Statistically speaking, there are a million things that will kill you before any terrorist. But if your autopsy does declare 'death by terrorist' you may have to thank the likes of Donald Trump.

Imagine the devastation of an attack on US soil leaving 53 dead, over 2000 injured, a billion dollars in damage, a city in tatters, and over 4000 US troops deployed in response.  This toll would place the incident third on US list of terrorist attacks (behind 9/11 and Oklahoma).

Who would be to blame for such a tragedy?

As a child I heard "New York, New York" - I don't know where from, maybe my parents were listening to it. Anyway, one line, "these VAGABOND shoes" impressed me. I had no idea what "VAGABOND" meant - it just sounded good! I adopted it, and assigned a meaning to it. In my culture we have an expression "judging clothes".

http://www.woolerykitchen.com/blog-posts/article/what-are-judging-clothes.

So I kinda assumed "VAGABOND Shoes" went with "Judging clothes". (Turns out I wasn't too far off the mark). So, I was a happy kid running around the neighbourhood in my "VAGABOND Shoes".

You're wondering why I'm capitalising "VAGABOND". It's to avoid bias.

Here's the thing . . .

I'm a super-intelligent adult now. "New York, New York" was recorded in 1977 by Liza Minnelli (Sinatra didn't record it until 1979). But the Vagabond Shoe Company has been trading since the 60's, and you Americans love your branding. Throw into mix I've never seen the original lyrics, I've only heard the words.

I can only conclude the following: Liza Minnelli is a woman, and women know all about shoes. Therefore her version refers to "these Vagabond shoes".
Frank Sinatra is a man, and by definition, knows nothing about shoes. His lyrics are "these vagabond shoes".

This thinking opens up a whole new world: does he mean "These little town blues are melting away" or "These Littletown blues . . .?" 'Littletown' being a bar in NYC - that also makes sense. 'Littletown is his regular haunt

Oh, wait . . . I'm getting it now.

"Start spreading the news . . ." could mean "Start spreading The News" - Our Frank has woken up in his vagabond shoes, with a hangover from his night at Littletown, and has opened his daily paper "The News" in search of out-town jobs.

Hot damn! This is not a song celebrating New York - Frank's on down to his last dollar! He's thinking of quitting but wants to give it one last chance.

How the hell to people communicate verbally, without punctuation?

If there's a moral to the story?

I wrote something . . . for the five bucks you paid it can mean whatever you like.

. . . and for those who really didn't get it - I'm just fucking with you!

I stumble into a lot of comments about books or blogs on writing. I'm fairly comfortable with the way I write. I don't need advice on the use of adverbs - I'm way past that. However, I do study.

A new novel calls for a new character. (It's surprising how hard that is to do).

I've written the first chapter and it has become apparent that New Yorker +Elizabeth Jeanette Radman+ is attractive, single, very smart, and works in broking (finance). Her downside is that she is socially inept. I don't know any real people to base this character on but she sounds a little bit "Sloan Sabbith" to me.

So I spend some time studying the character starting here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-7oN84Gi8k

It's a fairly quick study because although she's just a character she's often reacting to real life situations which I've had my own thoughts and feelings on. e.g. Raising the debt ceiling or Fukushima Daiichi.

I spend a few hours on Youtube studying her. I find it particularly interesting, the only time she got really passionate was about raising the debt ceiling. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gj5-G01iRyk

My next task is to research the actor, Olivia Munn, to see how far removed she is from the character. The good news is - she's not. She's a bit of a klutz and is borderline OCD.

She makes a good base for my character because she has opinions and issues that I don't share (some of them I wouldn't even think of). But in other ways she's very different from 'EJ' - 'EJ' has secrets which affect her behaviour.