Two Women and Some Books
The life of an elderly delinquent in limericks – with free optional snark…
I am old, and persistent abuse
Has rendered my skin somewhat loose
So it shouldn’t be news
That it’s made my tattoos
Grow misshapen and blurred and abstruse
I never knew you. Not really.
You haunted my dreams and my daydreams, filling the well of my soul. I even felt you watching over me that day, I still could not really believe you had gone. No word. From my bed, from my life. Five years and then – nothing.
I walked up the path and the sky darkened. When the rain came, it was as if your tears splashed on my face.
The river ran deep and silent here, between the high walls built to contain it’s might as it ran through the city. I thought I saw your face, from the corner of my eye. It was reflected in the dark water, like the ghost of a memory.
Something made me turn and scour the path, not thinking to see you, not thinking at all.
An old lady was there, carrying her world in a huge carrier bag and dressed in too many clothes.
“You alright, pet?” The concern in her eyes brought a hot stinging to my own. I looked away and back at the alluring promise of oblivion in the water running silent below. “You look like you could do with a nice cuppa. There’s a caff just round the way.”Her hand touched my arm, tentative and tender. A fellow human being lost in the abyss of life.
The first step back was the hardest and, as if she knew, she gripped my hand, briefly. Steadying me. Then the next came more easily and by the third, I could release her hand and meet her compassionate gaze.
“I might have enough for two teas,” I told her.
“You’re alright, pet. Come on, let’s have a chat. They do free bourbon biscuits too.”
“It must be a terrible place to live,” Oliver observed as the documentary went on, “I mean, having a social score based on who you’re friends with and what you buy, determining whether you can get a train ticket.”
Krista nodded agreement and finished leaving a bad rating for the delivery driver. He’d been five minutes late. Some pathetic excuse about traffic. “Just glad we live in the free West.” Her fit-watch vibrated and she sighed. “I’ll have to leave you to it. If I don’t get enough steps done today they’ll cancel my health insurance – or quadruple the price.”
As far as discreet went, Bene Placito served that up in buckets. The place was in one wing of a small villa, presumably also the home of the chef who owned it, that nestled in the hills behind Viriconium. The villa had a long private driveway which wound past fields of vegetables and livestock, showing off the produce that they would soon be eating.
Dai and Bryn were greeted at the door by a simply dressed waitress who asked their names and explained that each party or individual was given their own secluded dining room.
“Domina Cynddylan is in the Rose Room. If you will come with me…”
Bene Placito was a small slice of Roman elegance and opulence thrust into the British countryside. The decor and furnishings were all items that might grace the pages of patrician’s lifestyle magazines and set in amongst the modern, sophisticated, decor were exquisite examples of ancient Roman statuary and other artefacts.
The Rose Room turned out to be well named. It had a window onto a small walled rose garden, though at this time of year the bushes were little more than pruned back twigs, and there were several pots of indoor miniature roses sitting on small pedestals. Dai’s heart sank as they were shown in. he should have expected it, but somehow he had not. It was a triclinium. The three couches had been set to overlap, in three sides of a square with the table in the middle.
Justina Cynddylan was already ensconced on the central couch, helping herself to some olives from a bowl on the table. She smiled as the two men were shown in and made a sweeping gesture to the empty couches on either side of her.
“Thank you for joining me, please make yourselves comfortable and we will see what the chef is providing today.” Dai eased himself on to a couch, feeling awkward, but noticed with surprise that Bryn seemed completely unperturbed and slid onto his couch as if patrician born.
“You will have to excuse me from getting right down to business, but we can’t be assured of complete privacy until the meal has been served. The timing of that is always a little uncertain as Chef can be very temperamental.”
“I understand,” Dai said, though he was not sure he really did. But he sought an alternative topic of conversation. “There are a few antiquities here I see.”
“Oh yes. I have sold several genuine ancient pieces to Chef. He is a bit of a connoisseur of Etruscan art and it has been my pleasure to help locate and arrange the purchase of one or two for him.” She lowered her voice “To be honest he is a little obsessed, he is convinced he is descended from Etruscan ancestors, but when one is such a great artist as he is, one can be forgiven such foibles.”
The door opened as she was speaking and the waiting staff piled the table with heated stands and small covered pots, as well as plates with a few multi-coloured leaves strewn over them. A bottle of good wine and glasses completed the spread, then the staff withdrew.
Justina lifted a few lids and helped herself to some of the contents, and made the same imperious sweeping gesture with which she had greeted them. “Eat up. We can talk and eat.”
Dai eyed the items on her plate with some suspicion. He went for a plentiful portion of the grains and vegetables and only a couple of the more innocent looking meat slices, spooning garum over the whole lot to disguise any odd flavours. Bryn, meanwhile, was cheerfully piling his plate with samples from all that was on offer.
“The flamingo is excellent, don’t you think?” Justina nodded towards the meat Dai had chosen. He had some in his mouth at the time and chewed and made himself swallow before managing a nod. Why did the Romans insist on eating such things?
From Dying for a Vacation a Dai and Julia Mystery by E.M. Swift-Hook and Jane Jago
The life of an elderly delinquent in limericks – with free optional snark…
I am old, which increasingly means
That my ass is outgrowing my jeans
I guess my mistake
Is doughnuts and cake
Instead of dry muesli and greens
From Iconoclast: Not To Be, the eighth Fortune’s Fools book by E.M Swift-Hook.
The funeral was beautiful and her death had been a liberating experience.
Kahina Sarava knew she had a lot to thank her murderer for and made a mental note that she should be sure to do so if probability ever permitted it.
Not that many here knew Kahina had been murdered.
A few would be raising a slight eyebrow at the official pronouncement of her having passed away after a sudden, unspecified, illness, recognising in that formula the designation that suggested foul play. But Coalition policy prevented the assassination of those at its heart in Central being generally known unless they were so public that it could not be avoided.
The official commemoration of her life was everything Kahina could have wanted. Smiling beneath the all-concealing mourning veil, she listened to music commissioned especially for the occasion and eulogies from those who had spurned her so completely, following her fall from grace as one of the key pivots of Coalition power.
Her death had been a liberation. It had freed her from the need to lurk in the shadows, eking out an existence, closeted away in the extravagant country estate she had always loathed and allowed her to return to her true home in the midst of the greatest Central metropolis.
Admittedly the luxurious apartment she now occupied was slightly less desirable than the one she had lived in at the top of Sarava’s headquarters building. But it was chosen for being perfectly placed to allow her to access and be accessible to, those who breathed the refined air at the pinnacles of power in the Central establishment. She was not about to allow the inconvenience of her demise to prevent her from living out a full life in the manner which she preferred.
Question 1: As Fortune’s Fools draws to a close, we are no nearer to really understanding Durban Chola. Will we ever really be allowed inside his head or will he remain a ‘man’ of mystery? Do you understand him yourself?
I think the issue here is that Durban is something of an enigma even to himself. As author I know his motivations, his intentions and aspects of his character that he, in the story, is utterly unaware of.
There is a lot more to come about Durban in the last two books and in Iconoclast: Not To Be we finally get to understand what he has been working towards since he realised exactly who and what he was. However, understanding what he wants to achieve doesn’t necessarily mean understanding the full impact of it.
Question 2: You manage to make your readers empathise with even the darkest of villains. Is this a conscious choice or is it simply your own empathy with your characters spilling out onto the page?
Both, I suspect. I struggle to accept the idea of any individual being one hundred per cent good or evil. Most who do ‘evil deeds’ are not the classic pantomime, moustache-twirling ‘evil for evil’s sake’ variety of antagonist. Some evil people find themselves that side of the line because of a choice made in one moment from a place of high emotion. Other have a sincere belief in the necessity and rightness of their actions for the greater good. Some are driven by strong selfish ambition. But most are people of goodwill who are simply and profoundly ignorant when it comes to the reality of life for others. They have things in their lives they take for granted so much it never occurs to them others don’t have the same.
I call this ‘The Marie Antionette Effect’. She said ‘let them eat cake’ when told the poor were starving from a lack of bread, not because she was callous, but because she truly did not realise that those who didn’t have bread couldn’t even dream of having cake. In my opinion, this kind of lack of understanding and ignorance is responsible for many of the shortcomings in our world and, being human nature, will continue to be so. But if we ‘other’ such people, we lose all chance of ever changing their viewpoint. And, if we look into our own hearts we all have some places where we echo their deeds…
Question 3: Who has been your favourite supporting character to write?
Jaz. He is so completely unlike me and represents the kind of individual that I would never wish to have anything to do with in real life. His worldview is light years away from any that I could live with. But maybe because of that rather than despite that, I find him the one I most enjoy writing.
Question 4: There is a core of grimness to these stories, and as a reader, I find myself constantly bracing for the next blow. Do you understand that is what you are doing, or is the story simply driving your writing?
‘Grimness’ – I see what you did there! A story needs conflict so a lot comes from that. The setting the characters are in is not utopic – though I do feel it is far from a true dystopia. Like the real world, there are places, cultures and strata in society where people can live a decent life. But, as in the real world, there are also those where life is indeed grim.
I do try to point out on more than one occasion that the lived experience of the vast majority of the people in the Coalition is not bad. They may not have access to all the top high-tech toys, but they have decent homes and freedom within limits. Much of this world’s population live like that too. They are happy enough with their lives, not feeling downtrodden, miserable and oppressed all the time by it.
Question 5: Who the hell sets out to write a nine-book series? And why set yourself such a mammoth task?
I had written over four of the books before I knew it was going to take three full trilogies to tell the tale. Before that, I had a kind of open-ended idea it might be four or five books. I don’t feel I set myself the task, more it needed that amount of time and space to unfold things in a way that would do justice to the story, the characters – and the readers.
E.M Swift-Hook is the author of the Fortune’s Fools dark space opera series and co-author with Jane Jago of the alternate history whodunits the Dai and Julia Mysteries.
In the words that Robert Heinlein put into the mouth of Lazarus Long: ‘Writing is not necessarily something to be ashamed of, but do it in private and wash your hands afterwards.’
Having tried a number of different careers, before settling in the North-East of England with family, three dogs, cats and a small flock of rescued chickens, she now spends a lot of time in private and has very clean hands. You can follow her on Goodreads and Twitter and keep up to date with Fortune’s Fools on Facebook.
Kanu lay down in the sacred place in the Dreaming Room and closed his eyes. The rolling chants of the priests in the god’s sanctuary reached in through the doorway lifting his inner self free.
Then he was standing on the shore beneath a dark star-filled sky on the shores of a blood-red sea.
“Look!”
The voice was that of the High Priest and yet also that of the god. Kanu looked into the water and saw his reflection. Talons. Wings. Horns. A towering body with primal strength.
It was true.
The prophecy was true.
He was indeed the Destroyer.
Inspired by original artwork from Ian Bristow
Maybe by Jane Jago and E.M. Swift-Hook . Sometimes we walk the edges of realty…
Half an hour later she was driving away, to somewhere. Anywhere. Just away. She stopped to eat the sandwich when it was starting to get dark and hunger bit, pulling off the road and into the carpark of what looked like a run-down, sea-side amusement park. Which was when she found it in the glove box. The gift from Roald. Part of her wanted to hurl it, unopened, away from the car. But instead she took it out of the colourful paper bag and lifted the lid. A necklace of silver beads, carved to resemble ammonite shells.
Throwing it out of the window, Jess swore violently and turned the key. Nothing happened. The car sat there. She tried several times, giving up only when she realised it was not going to happen. She picked up her phone to call roadside recovery, and was somehow not surprised to find there was no signal. With an odd sense of inevitability, she picked up her magnalight from the map pocket beside her. Its weight, as much as its light, gave her a sense of security, it could be a weapon at need. She pulled her walking coat on over her fleece jacket and left the car to see if there anyone around in the amusement park.
There was stiff sea breeze coming in from across the bleak scrub that lay between this place and the sea. A moon, nearly full, gave enough light that she did not need to turn on the torch, and slid it into the inside pocket of her coat. There were no other cars parked up outside what must once have been a bustling attraction. But who wanted a seaside holiday when you could go to Costa del Sunburn for not much more? There was a high wall which ran across the end of the car park and as Jess walked towards it, she could see it stretched away on either side.
The entrance was through a turnstile gate, or should have been. Someone had broken the spokes of the turning part, so anyone could walk through, past the shattered and blinded glass eye of the pay booth, boarded-up on the inside. Jess did so and something moved beside the booth. She turned fast, her hand gripping the magnalight as a slapping sound send a sudden pulse of unwanted adrenaline into her system. She pulled the torch free and shone its powerful beam at the source of the sound.
A sign hung down, still half attached to the top of the pay-booth, its broken back clapping against the heavy door set in the side of the small brick cabin. The words were barely visible:
…COME TO ….HELL…
Somewhere an owl shrieked and, despite herself, Jess drew a sharp breath. She took a step towards the broken, flapping sign and played the torch beam over it from end to end:
WELCOME TO SHELLEY’S FUNPARK
The owl screeched again and Jess smiled. You had to love it when the atmospherics played up to the occasion. It would only take a sea mist rolling in to turn this place into something out of an old-school Hammer Horror production. The really chilling thing was not any kind of supernatural danger here, it was the realisation that this was indeed an abandoned and empty place, with no one around who might have a phone she could use to call the roadside recovery and this place was a very long walk from anywhere. Only a year ago that would have meant very little. She might even have enjoyed the bracing breeze and the countryside at night. But not now. Now she would not make it more than a mile before she was crippled with pain.
The laughter carried on the night air, coming from behind the low roofed building immediately in front of her. At a guess it had once been some kind of cafe, but now it was heavily boarded up, metal shutters pulled over the windows, like a creature retreated into its shell.
Shelley’s Funpark? Why did that sound so familiar? Jess would have given it some more thought but the laughter came again, masculine, plural and loud. It was not from someone with any thought of trying to avoid attention. Still gripping the magnalight, its beam dimmed, Jessica made her way past the cafe-building and into the open area beyond.
The shadowy figures moving vaguely on the far side, close by the enclosing wall, sprang suddenly into stark relief and were revealed, as as an orange glow flared behind them. Jess froze, hearing drunken cheers as the fire took hold and watched as, like the ritual of some strange coven of witches, the group of youths all started throwing things into the flames.
Part 4 of Maybe will be here next week…
Be careful where you draw the line that marks out ‘us’ and ‘them’
The line that cuts those you approve from those that you condemn.
For many who you banish to the far side of that line
Will share with you more qualities than those you did define.
And every time you draw to cut out what you disapprove
You also many other great attributes thus remove
You may condemn a person, a group, a crowd, a throng
Just because one single thing they hold you see as wrong.
But others draw their lines as well and something you once said
Might make them put you on the other side of ‘us’ instead
And those you feel are on your side of your dividing line
Might think that you do not belong and even so opine
When you allow ‘us’ and ‘them’ your worldview to be
That line defines just who you are and cuts you off from ‘we’.
Iconoclast: Not To Be the latest Fortune’s Fools book by E.M. Swift-Hook is now available in ebook and paperback.
It was like walking around with a bomb in your head.
That wasn’t such an unfamiliar feeling for someone like Jazatar Baldrik who had served time in the Special Legion. There they plumbed a direct link into your brain and set it so that you had to keep connected to the data network lattice or it would fry out and kill you. Even if you made it through the five years of hell so you could qualify for release from the convict unit, as very few ever did, the device had a bad effect on the brain tissue it was implanted in and would kill you eventually anyway. Jaz had personal experience of that too. He had recently lost a friend that way. A man he had once considered as close as a brother.
But this was different.
Different because this bomb wasn’t going to go off and kill himself. When it went off, it was going to kill one of the very few people he actually cared about. Getting that news had been the most unexpected event of the day. But still only one in series of unexpected events. and that in a place where the unexpected was so rare it never happened.
For the past two cycles Jaz had been effectively imprisoned. Initially against his will and now with a kind of grudging acceptance, he was held in a secure clinic run by the terrorist organisation known as The Legacy. It was the kind of place where today was the same as yesterday and tomorrow wouldn’t be too much changed from that. Running to its own quiet, pre-planned patterns, nothing was allowed to penetrate which might risk breaking the steady rhythm of daily life. It was the sort of protected and predictable environment Jaz had never known any time in his forty-two years of life. He had even begun to feel safe.
Which was a mistake.
When they told him he had a visitor, he’d been a bit puzzled, but mostly just curious. It wasn’t like anyone he knew had any idea he was even here. So he didn’t expect it to be the kind of visitor most of the other inmates of this place got now and then.
It wasn’t going to be some family member who would look all concerned. Or even an awkward work colleague, checking up on how he was doing because someone had to and they had drawn the short straw at the office. Jaz had seen those kinds of people in the reception area sometimes, waiting to be taken through to see one of the inmates – or guests as the staff smilingly called them. There was even an elderly couple standing there now, the look of worried parents clear on their faces. Obviously distracted, they didn’t even notice him. He walked right in front of them and into one of the therapy rooms.
It took him a moment to realise who his visitor was and when he did, his first reaction was to turn himself around and walk right out again. He had to use some real willpower to make himself stand still and not do that.
Car Torbalen.
The man ultimately responsible for Jaz being put in this place and being taken very much out of circulation. Even thinking that was enough to make Jaz tense up all over. But, in a place where yesterday and tomorrow were both so much the same, he was curious enough about this sudden shift to see what it might be about.
Torbalen greeted him with a slight smile, holding out his hand like some formal event.
“Jaz. I was delighted to get your message that you wanted to see me today. Let’s go for that walk you suggested, eh?”
Something was wrong.
Jaz was more than sure he’d sent no such message. Even if he had the faintest idea on how he might have set about trying to get in touch with Torbalen, he would never have been inviting him over for a cosy one-to-one, walking in the grounds.
This man had effectively betrayed him. But the fact was Torbalen was standing there and knew that. He must also know he wasn’t going to make it on to Jaz’s link list in any conceivable future. Which made Jaz wonder enough that he didn’t deny or challenge what Torbalen had said.
There was nothing to read in the pleasant smile, because Torbalen was an operator with a lot of skill, but there had to be something important behind this. For him to step away from his so-busy life drawing in ever more fanatics for The Legacy, there had to be something pretty big on his mind. So Jaz took the offered hand briefly in a firm grip and said nothing. Then he went through the door which Torbalen had opened and walked out into the secure grounds around the clinic.
You can keep reading by grabbing yourself a copy of Iconoclast: Not To Be
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