My first BlogHop! The
delightful Ruth Booth has kindly tagged me, along with Neil Williamson and
Jennifer Williams, so that I can test the waters of this brave new world. Check
out Ruth’s bloghoppy installment here: http://www.ruthbooth.com/2014/05/bloghop-three-things-i-dont-write-and-three-things-i-do/
One wee caveat before
we begin. Like Ruth I’m not entirely sure what I do or don’t write. I just
write. When people ask me what I write, I reply “stories” and they think I’m
being facetious. I’m not. I write whatever comes into the old brainpan and I’ll
give pretty much anything a go. In fact, I’m currently thinking about some gothic Bunty/Enid Blyton Space Opera Erotica fan fiction… Onwards!
Three Things I Don’t
Write.
1. Hard SF
It’s not because I don’t want to, I simply don’t know enough sciencey
stuff to make it any good. I’ve not read a great deal of it either, so in many
ways I’m ill-equipped. All that said, I am partial to a spot of Arthur C.
Clarke and I was brought up by a pack of feral Astronomers, so the stars
and the great dark depths of space have always been a fascination for me, so
maybe one day…
2. Time Travel – I don’t know if this comes under the umbrella of
Hard SF or not, but I’m guessing it doesn’t entirely. Time travel makes my
brain hurt. Hurt, I tell you! Paradoxes and timelines and all that business panic
the tiny goblins that operate my cerebral cogs and throw them into riot. And
then they die. Bad times. There are so many possibilities and problems with
time travel; when would you travel to? Would you go backwards or forwards in
time? Wait though! Can you simply travel backwards or forwards, or is it more
complicated than that? Hang on, what about diseases? Would you really want to
go to Elizabethan England and catch a nice dose of the plague or smallpox? And
what about where you wind up, geographically speaking? What if you land in the
middle of an old building you didn’t know existed before and you get bricks up
the wazoo? And then there’s the small (!) matter of paradoxes (I can’t even get
my head around most of that business) and of the potential, not to mention multitudinous, consequences of changing
even the tiniest thing. Lordy! I’m confused enough just getting up in the morning…
3. Children’s Fiction – I swear too much. I have to learn not to because I’d quite like to
have a crack at children’s fiction and, indeed, some YA. Why not, I say? And
then a fuck or a bollock trips out of my fingers and my hopes are dashed. One
day, sensei, one day.
Three Things I Do
Write.
1. My Own Worlds – I don’t set stories exclusively in invented
worlds, but I confess that I prefer mine to the “real” one. I’m a control freak
and live (at least part-time) in the delusion that I am The Mighty Warrior Empress-Mage
of All Time and Space, so creating a world from the ground up appeases a little
of my wannabe-megalomaniac tendencies. The characters are my minions and I
their overlord… okay, maybe not that because my characters seem to do whatever
the fuck they like. Quite rude.
In addition, it’s like Jake Chambers says, right before his second death
in Stephen King’s The Gunslinger, "Go, then. There are other worlds than
these." There are. I’m sure of it and if I can’t visit them, I’m going to
grow my own.
2. Mental Health – You drop the old MH bomb and people visibly quell. Still. Which is
probably why it’s something I’d like to explore more. My story “Maggie and the
Cat” http://www.terranullius.it/home/index.php/rubriche/75-etemenanki-no-subtitles/540-maggie-and-the-cat-chloe-yates.html was one of my favourites to
write so far. I wrote it with the work of Leonora Carrington in mind (albeit very
loosely). I wanted to convey the disconnection, confusion and uncertainty of
something like depression, how it can cloud your actions and thoughts and how,
furthermore, the selfish ballbaggery of others can compound the anxieties you
are already dealing with. The absurdities and unexpected juxtapositions that
are central facets to surrealism seem like ideal tools to blur those kinds of lines.
Mental health is a difficult subject to write about in a way that doesn’t
overload the reader with sanctimonious solemnity. I’d like to write about the
experience of having a mental health problem without it having to be an
exemplar of inspirational dogma. Sometimes we can be crazy and just be crazy. We
can’t be fixed, but we do deal. Sometimes the lesson, if there is one, is simply
the experience itself.
3. Swear words – I like to swear and that’s a fact. Cursing instantly conveys visceral emotion that can lack punch with “ordinary” words. Besides, swear words are as much a part of
our language as any other kind of word – denying that denies a rich folk
heritage of cussing. I like to be creative with my swearing – no word is ever
thrown in just for the sake of it. I think about it hard and look for the right
word at the right time. When I can’t find the right one, I make that shit up.
Of course, I understand some people don’t like it, I’m not an idiot, but sticks
and stones, baby. They’re just words. As long as they’re not directed at a real
live someone in a vicious way, they’re not going to crush your soul or steal
your sweets. There’s already plenty enough to get upset about in this world. (PS.
Not every story I write is a cuss fest. Check them out for yourself and where you can get hold of them at www.chloeyates.com)
Right, that's enough of my blather. I’m
tagging my fellow skulk members, Alec McQuay and James Bennett, who are both
excellent writers and genuinely decent human beans.
Alec McQuay is a horror, fantasy and science fiction writer hailing from Cornwall
in the south-west of England; an area renowned for natural outstanding beauty
and the worst internet connections in the country. Capable of going off at odd
tangents, bizarre flights of fantasy and generally being incapable of taking
things like bio-writing seriously, Alec spends most of his time scribbling
notes and ideas on his phone and talking the ears off his wife and friends
about whatever mad-cap scheme he intends to write next. Alec’s novella
‘Spares’ is already available and his debut novel, the steampunk
adventure ‘Emily Nation’ will be released in 2014. You can find
Alec’s blog at http://alecmcquay.wordpress.com/
James
Bennett is a British
writer of fantasy, horror and the odd contemporary fable. He and I shared our
first public reading together last year and I couldn’t have asked for a better
companion. For further information, and to find where and how you can read his
work, check out James’s blog at http://jamesbennett72.blogspot.com/
