John Heron Project

The celebrated author Dan Brown smiled, smugly, until a revelation struck him.
“A revelation has just struck me!” he thought.
He decided that he would not mention it,
Either in internal monologue nor in narration
Until such time as he couldn’t hold it off any longer
Or found the plot was flagging.
“And that’s what I do,” he thought,
“Because I am a celebrated writer — no, author — of religious-themed
Conspiracy thrillers.”
A figure stepped dramatically from the shadows.
“Please,” the figure that had just stepped dramatically from the shadows whispered,
Frustratedly, “Stop. Just stop. With the internal monologue and the adverbs and
“Everything. Stop it.”
Dan Brown immediately recognised his antagonist as minor hack author Wood Ingham,
Writer of a few books he was actually not all that proud of,
An Englishman and therefore likely to be revealed
As the villain of this piece.
Wood for his part, regarded the celebrated American author,
Whose religious-themed conspiracy thrillers had sold
Millions of copies
(And two of which had been made into hit movies starring Oscar-winning
Hollywood actor Tom Hanks and Audrey Tautou who everyone loved in Amelie
Although she was only in the first one
And Ewan McGregor out of Star Wars was actually in the other one)
With a face contorted by contempt and hate
As was his perfidious English manner.
“Perfidious Albion,” mused Brown,
Smirking as he realised that he was about fifty per cent sure what
“Perfidious” meant
And knew that Albion was a good synonym for England or something.
English hack Wood for his part considered what had led him to this juncture…
“Hang on. Hang on,” said the tall, fair-haired bespectacled Englishman,
Doing something sort of English with his spectacles because
That’s how
You build character.
“You just changed point of view! You pull this all the time, man.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” said Brown, not knowing
What the English hack meant.
“I mean, come on, you haven’t even mentioned in your internal monologue
“That you’re tied to a chair, man.
“I mean, what is that?
“I mean, is that really how you think you build tension, by
“Withholding information and then going, hah, here’s the shock that the
“Characters experienced twenty pages ago?”
Dan Brown struggled silently, wondering how he was going to escape
The bonds that held his wrists tightly to the back of the chair,
And which were indeed the subject of his sudden revelation at the top of this page.
Brown bristled, nobly. “Release me, hack!” he cried.
“Shan’t,” said Wood, smugly. “This is my fictional revenge fantasy and
“I’ll let you go when I decide.”
“You just broke the fourth wall! And you tell me I’m not a great writer,” retorted Brown.
“Damned right I do,” said Wood in his
Unmistakeable English accent, undaunted by the great author’s inexorable logic.
“Like, just for the one example, what’s with the European stereotypes?
“Like the French copper is badly shaven a smokes a lot and
“The French lady is chic because that’s the only French word you know.”
Brown realised with a thunderbolt that this wasn’t fair.
He did know other French words.
“That isn’t fair,” shouted Brown, understanding that shouting is better for
Drama. “That isn’t the only French word I know!”
“What other words do you know, then, said Wood, leeringly.
“Baguette,” uttered the best-selling author triumphantly.
“Besides,” added Dan Brown, “You only hate the Da Vinci Code because I blow the
“Doors off your Christian preconceptions!”
“Oh please. Your wife did your research on Post-It notes.
“Badly.
“Anyway. Umberto Eco can write a perfectly decent religious-themed thriller.
“No,” added Wood,
“I hate your work because it’s shit.
“I hate your work because
“You can’t write a believable character.
“Because you can’t write believable dialogue.
“Because you think a Smart Car is faster than a Parisian police saloon.
“Because you think that a self-mutilating albino can be
“An invincible ninja monk.
“Because you think the Greatest Cryptologist in the World
“Can’t recognise mirror writing
“And needs to be told who Leonardo Da Vinci is
“But the thing that offends me most is that every time
“I pass the big high street bookshop
“I see big displays promoting your new book
“And it pains me
“Like physically
“It pains me
“Because you are selling millions and millions
“Of your shitty, shitty novels,
“Because of the bookshop real estate you own
“That means that others can’t.
“Fuck you, Dan Brown.
“Fuck. You.
“Because I am a better writer than you!”
Said Wood, furiously.
Dan Brown thought for a moment, and smiled. He replied,
“And how many novels have you sold, exactly?”
Wood seethed, silently.
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By David John Ingham, age 3, transcribed by Dad.

The Crocodile, he found a friend
And then he found another friend
And then he found his mummy and daddy
And then he ran away
And then he went to bed.
The Whale he found his Dinosaur friend
And then he went to bed.

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Dispatches from the Money-Mouth Interface: Today, we (that’s my colleagues Will Hindmarch and Chuck Wendig and I) launch Jet Pack, a gallery and maybe a storefront for our fiction ambitions. Look out for chapbooks and other stuff in the near future. Right now, though, we’re just doing the fiction.

More news as events warrant, as they say.

I’m burning down a forest
It’s important to start small
And it’s good to have a project, to be honest
So it’s down to the woods with a duck call
Frying the quacking little fuckers with a
Lighter and a CFC Aerosol
IT MUST ALWAYS BE A CFC AEROSOL
I am now only going to eat steak
I’m going to bag up all my
Cardboard plastic tin cans kitchen waste in
Non-biodegradable landfill bags
I’m going to take all my clothes to the landfill, now
BY CAR
I’m going to wear so much leather I’ll be
Sporting two thirds of a cow
Chuck out all those energy saver light bulbs
And put old ones in, permanently switched on
Leaving the fridge door open
And the heating running full
And all the windows open
The upstairs ones obviously — I’m not an idiot

I will now proceed by a series of the shortest
Haul flights I can buy
To Brazil
Where I will hire a gas-drinking
Oil spilling
American SUV
IT MUST ALWAYS BE AN AMERICAN SUV
Drive it out there into the middle
Of the Amazonian rain forest
And no I don’t care that the bloody thing isn’t designed to handle off-road
Because it USES MORE PETROL THAT WAY
Pull up so the inside front tyre
Rides over the male from the last remaining pair of a rare species
Of tree
Frogs whose glands contain
The only potential vaccine for AIDS
Listen to the ripe amphibian splatch
Create a patch
Of green blue red smear with this one still-twitching
Leg sticking
Out the side
MUST TRY HARDER

Out comes the makeshift flamethrower, FWOOSH
Bright-feathered birds with now blazing tails squeal
Trail heat death through the inviolate green
Set off bush after bush
Big eared Amazonian mice make squeaks
You never heard a mouse make
Ocelots
Run for all they got
Iridescent beetles go black
And snap and crack
And pop like Rice Krispies
Only with more legs
A snake thrashes, turns inside out
Smells like chicken
Mmm, chicken in a polystyrene container from one of the fast-food greats
The smoke thickens
And here comes Sting
The final indignity
Here to hug a few pissed off tribal folk
Talk on TV
Write an indignant song.

HAH
That’ll show you Al Gore
With your big old light show and your big old generator and your round the world
Plane tickets
That’ll teach you Guardian family section with your
Great Ideas For Advancing the Cause of the Smug Left
Every Saturday, week in week out,
All “Should I be guilty because of the detergent I use to wash my car windows?”
All floral curtains and Vauxhall bloody Zafiras
That’ll teach you Green Balloon Club
Ethnically diverse and yet nonthreatening middle class kids
And quirky childwoman with your patronising voice
And your incessant need to tell my kids about
How great bird feeders are and recycling
On the telly FIVE FUCKING TIMES A WEEK.

Yeah, that’ll teach you.

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So I got the poetry bug. And I am not alone in this. Obviously, there’s Graham, but my friend, sometime Photoshop victim and collaborator Becky, who used to post here, also has a way with verse (and a whole lot more experience than me). She’s shared several on her blog, but I especially like the one she posted last night:

Clown with a painted smile
Jumps from the wings, a bucket in his hand,
Aims it at the crowd, plays it for laughs,
Custard-pie, a trip, banana-skins,
It never fails to please them, whilst, inside,
He quietly despises those who watch,
And in his caravan, beneath the bed,
He keeps a shotgun loaded, just in case.

Go read the rest here.

I don’t want to look at you, Miss January,
With your eyelashes and your half-open mouth
And your knowing eyes
And your smooth hard derriere
And your strategically positioned arm;
I don’t want to look at you, Miss January.

I realise, yes, I didn’t have this problem with Miss December.
I smiled, kept a copy of her page
For my files, you understand.

I never saw Miss December naked in my aunt’s house
Lying on a mat printed with teddies and happy ducks,
Crying and red and surrounded with
Wetwipes and disposables and
The wrong sort of powder, the wrong sort of skin cream.

Miss December was never a baby.
So if it’s a bit weird for me, I hope you understand,
And let me know the next time you’re in a calendar.
In the meantime, I’ll be meeting Miss February early.
I hope you understand.

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Ed at Robot Viking just posted an interview with me on being a game writer, and about tragedy and art and why nice-looking chairs are no good if you can’t park your arse on them. He asks about my White Wolf stuff, and MSG™, which he’s been especially nice to (I have Ed to thank for the free version getting 1200+ downloads).

As cryptozoological entities go, the Sasquatch — or “Bigfoot” if you really must — is actually a pretty straightforward sort of a fella.

I know this. Because the Sasquatch inhabits the spare room in my house.

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The Manchester Zedders went on an expedition to find a number of places, including a street with my name. Sort of.

So Saturday night the original plan was that I would be on a boat, but bouts of sickness and an occurrence of gale force winds on the Bristol channel meant we all came home early.

Which meant that I got to host my traditional Eurovision party after all.

You lucky people.

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I have a weakness for a good horror film.

Now. Most horror films are quite bad. And even the good ones have a hard time escaping the genre box and establishing themselves as actual films that you can seriously stand alongside, you know, films that aren’t other horror films. Out of the list I have compiled below, only two of them, I think, actually work as “proper” cinema.

But the fact is, that doesn’t matter all that much to me; as opposed to fantasy and science fiction films, which I have a really hard time watching these days unless they have at least a little of that trans-genre relevance. The point is that I can still watch horror films on their own terms. Maybe it’s the near-physical thrill that a really scary, really disturbing horror film produces. Maybe it’s just a professional thing.

Here are eight of my favourite horror films, anyway, in no particular order. Warning! Lots of (nasty) images!

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Let the Right One In / Låt den rätte komma in (Tomas Alfredson, 2008)

So it is more or less a contractual obligation for me to see vampire films these days, and although I managed to escape having to watch Twilight last Autumn, I saw Let the Right One In on Monday.

I expected to enjoy it, but I was unprepared for how unsettling, how touching it would be.

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Bob Dylan and his Band, Cardiff International Arena, 28^th April 2009.

My usual gig-buddy Martin declined this one; instead, my companion was my brother Martyn.

Which is close enough.

Actually, it was Martyn’s idea: he’s a massive, massive Dylan fan and he was desperate to go, but at the same time couldn’t quite face going on his own. Besides, I live closer to Cardiff than he does, so he’d have somewhere to stay. Martyn was so keen for me to come along that he even subsidised my ticket. Because the fact is, I am not all that fussed about Dylan. 

I’ll leave that for a moment to sink in.

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So the new issue of Movement went to the printers on Friday, and it had a fabulous and well-researched article about the legality of same-sex marriage in the US and Canada. Which talked about Proposition 8, and the states that do allow gay marriage, and so on.

And then the state of Iowa goes and upholds the right of same-sex couples to marry. Just when I was celebrating getting an error-free mag out there.

Damn.

Anyway, it seems that Governor Mike Huckabee (one of last year’s presidential also-also-rans, remember, and wait a minute, Iowa’s not even the state he’s governor of) is not happy about the state doing this. he says it’s “an attack on the traditional family.”

I hear this a lot. And what I’d like to ask is: for the love of God, HOW!?

I mean, will gay people (and even lesbians these days, so I hear) getting married stop straight people getting married? Will gay people adopting stop straight people adopting… and maybe having kids? Will, by allowing gay people the right to make vows and be monogamous and faithful to each other, this act promote promiscuity and polyvalent non-heteronormative relationships?

Why is it even a threat? I honestly don’t understand.

Edit: “No, Senator McKinley. I will not co-sponsor a leadership bill with you.” It’s some Mid-Western state in the US, and it’s local politics. But that whole two minute speech has the mark of something historical. I wonder if people will be talking about it down the line. (via)

He laughs too loud, like an alien
Who once took a class.
He never prided his appearance,
Can’t remember the last time he bought a shirt.
He eats ready meals.
He is afraid to talk to people.
He is afraid of getting old.

She cries every morning, panics when
She hears children laugh.
She hates to see her reflection
In car windows and shop fronts as she passes.
She looks anyway.
She is afraid to talk to people.
She is afraid of getting old.

The second time they meet,
He does not expect his stomach to flutter like that
When she brushes his hand and apologises,
And he says, no, it’s fine, really.
She surprises herself when she thinks of him
Like an old house, left vacant, newly purchased,
Paint flaking, wallpaper peeling:
This could be beautiful with a bit of work.

Jade Goody died on Sunday. The newspaper headlines I saw as I was on my travels yesterday made much of her death on Mother’s Day (in fiction, of course, the day one dies is significant) and one tabloid had the headline “Mummy is in Heaven” alongside pictures of her children. Crass? Maybe.

I hope the real woman rests in peace and that her family and friends find comfort in the time of their grief. The fictional character is now in epilogue.

Edit: Here’s an excellent article about class prejudice, the media and Jade Goody from the Independent.

Somewhere, someone who never cared for her in better days is masturbating right now over a recent picture of Jade Goody, the woman as glowing mannequin-saint; willowy and graceful, not emaciated; luminous and iridescent, not papery.

Somewhere else, a young woman is dying. Hollowed out, eternally tired, in pain. This is not about her, not really. I can’t really imagine that she even more than half-understands the thing that has been created around her.

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My daughter as yet does not have access to arms, or at least not of a nuclear capacity.
(Although I am not so sure about the biological and chemical weapons.)
She does not yet have contacts of any worth in the US Government, or in Al-Qaeda.
Her abilities as a demagogue and agitator are somewhat limited.
Likewise, her vocabulary.
So far, the only target of any concentrated policy of terror has been her big brother.
(Although note should be made of the absolute ineffectiveness on his part of violent reprisals as a tool of pacification.)
(Although she and Teddy are definitely up to something.)
Her adorable teeny tiny button nose poses something of an obstacle to any goals of recognition as a figure of fear.
(Although it may be of benefit in subsequent years.)
She is too short to reach door handles.

With a name like Robot Viking, you know what Ed Grabaniowski’s blog is about. Anyway, over there, Chris Braak wrote up a detailed playtest review of MSG™ Executive Edition today. He calls it “a hilarious good time”. Which is nice.

MSG™ Executive Edition can now be pre-ordered in print and bought in a lovely bookmarked PDF version at Indie Press Revolution.

The boys at IPR are very nice men. And they read everything they sell. Also, they distribute to shops. Which means I have distribution. Which is nice.

And it felt like Sunday

And they trapped me in the corner with a notebook,
Fastened me to the pew with Bible/ stapler/ meathook,

And I asked to be martyred. Politely
Put up my fists, told them to fight me.
My bruises aren’t so bad. My attitude is unsightly.

And it felt like Sunday
And I called myself a stormboy,
A slave-to-the-dramatic-form boy,
And it felt like Sunday

And what’s the point of maintaining belief if
This is all? I’m going to be stuck playing comic relief if
I can’t be Darcy/ Rochester/ Heathcliff.

Fact of the matter: I’m no romantic
Hero, when I try the role, I can make a grown man sick.
Man up and take the cash for each safe-sex pen trick

And it felt like Sunday
And I called myself a stormboy
And God said, You don’t know you were born, boy,
And it felt like Sunday

And God said, You don’t get to give in,
And I said, Hey God, what about the forgiving?
And God said, Hate yourself enough and you’ll carry on living,

And I said, I’m all about the things I can get away
With, the supporting-cast lines they’ll let me say,
The walk-on-scenes I can get by the day

And it felt like Sunday
And I called myself a stormboy,
A punctured and torn boy
And it felt like Sunday

It took me long enough to get what it means:
When nothing ever changes, except the cut of your jeans

And they didn’t cast me, gave me a brief look
And they fastened me to the pew with Bible/ stapler/ meathook

And it felt like Sunday
And I wished I was a stormboy
A sacrifice/ saint/ whirlwind/ martyr/ blessed-are-those-who-mourn boy
And it felt like Sunday.

You can now buy MSG™ at the indie-rpgs.com UnStore.

I still have a handful in my mitts, which are still available for the price of £7, as opposed to the current Unstore price point, which is $20 (including postage and packaging, regardless of your location), and the Lulu price, which has gone up to £8.99 and is likely to go up in future for various reasons related to breaking even and the cuts that distributors have to take so they stay in business.

The UnStore is home to lots of brilliant games, my favourite of which is Dogs in the Vineyard, which I would recommend to anyone who is interested in adventure games. It’s one of the best ever written.

This is about as close to a launch as I’m going to get.

I finally got a box of copies of the MSG™ Executive Edition, mainly for the purpose of giving comp copies to the people who worked on it or appeared in it (namely Graham, Becky, Zara, Kiera and John, all of whom will be getting their copies in the next couple of days. Ben Baugh’s in the US, so I’ll send his separately); also, because I want to sell it.

Anyway, I’ll be flogging them at various events (The Crunch, the SCM Conference) and by request for £7 each. If you’re not close at hand, you can still buy the Executive Edition here, although with a bit of luck, we’ll have it with a distributor come the end of February. At the time of writing, I have 14 left in my hand. Drop me a line if you want one.

It’s been nice to play the game a few times in the last couple of months, largely with people with no experience of this sort of thing.

The sheet in the front is mine. The Rep’s name is Alexander Technique. But you can call him Alex. I didn’t win that game. I (and everyone else) got completely humiliated by Chris Stacey, who grasped the Soap mechanic in record time. He must have doubled his points by the end of the game.

[Edit: updated sale link]

I haven’t written anything that I can post here* for ages. Christmas’ lengthy bout of sickness wiped every iota of inspiration from my head, and I can do nothing more than read through my old stuff, going “why the hell can’t I write anything that good?”

Anyway, one of the things I like right now is another comic, and it’s called Nobody Scores! It makes me laugh.

If you share my sense of humour (note: not many people do), then it may amuse you. A few I particularly liked: Projectile Garmenting, Concrete Epiphany, Feel-Good Romantic Comedy of the Year, The Art of Influence, Write What You Know, Snow Days. And a great one about parallel parking.

_________________________
*I wrote one poem that I even read at the Crunch, and which got me more props than any other thing I have ever read in public ever, only it’s so completely obscene I’d finish burning down all those bridges I started burning down ages ago. So no. You don’t get to see that one.

I imagine him:
Blade-creased,
Face a well-kept well-used axe,
Attendants tongueless, carved-backed,
Walking signs of wealth and viciousness.
(They brush his clothes.)
(They bring him wine.)
One lethal eyebrow raises:
Someone out of sight screams.
Someone stops screaming.

I imagine him:
Squinting, open-mouthed
Through steaming viscera,
Fingernails jammed with gore and shit.
Here is a chart in charcoal, urine and blood;
Here is an ill-tempered entourage:
Casks of burnt cedar, groaning camels,
Ointment, clinking sacks, armed men,
Come to bow before
Innocence and squalor.

Urban Corporate Muzak, kids.

Identikit one-name FHM pinup singer? Check*.
Doing the sexy office drone thing? Check.
Getting a sexy cyborg upgrade in a lift? Check.
Branded to all buggery (”Energiser™ Playboy™ Bunny,” anybody)? Check.
Crappy “Street” rapper to appeal to the urban demographic? Check.
Veneer of shiny efficiency, no soul allowed? Check.
Vast carbon footprint (check out the exhaust on the suggestive motorbike)? Check.
Unintentional glass ceiling misogyny? Yeah, I think so.

“If you work hard for your money, you’s a go girl.” Quite.

Edit: Graham also noted the heavy use of auto-tune in the song, an effect which serves to drain any individuality and rawness from the singer’s voice (and which may also disguise an inability to sing).
________________________________
*This is Ciara, like it matters.

Greg Costikyan is one of the original designers of Paranoia, which is a massively entertaining RPG that a lot of people like, and he has been in this game designing game for more than twenty years. Anyway, he reviewed MSG™ a couple of days ago. on playthisthing.com, which is a site that looks at all sorts of games. It was a very positive review. Which is nice.

In a traditional RPG, players are expected to cooperate with each other with the GM as a neutral arbiter; Paranoia turns that on its head by encouraging players to betray and backstab each other. MSG does something similar, but subtly different; it pits the “gamemaster” at the players’ throats, balancing things by having each of the players act as GM in turn. That’s an interesting and novel approach, as are several other elements of the game — the fact that it comes to a definitive ending in a single session, and that there are winners and losers. In short, it defies many of the characteristics we normally ascribe to a tabletop RPG — in the context of a very cynical, and very cool, cyberpunky future where even the minimal constraints on corporate action that currently apply are removed, and any residual ethical norms for businessmen are considered the domain of chumps.

Excellent, in a word.

When I retired the MSG™ Free Promotional Edition, I found that 2,120 people had downloaded it. I’d call that a success. But that’s it. It’s gone now.

The Beta Playtest version is still out there for £3.99 print, £1.99 PDF. I finished the Executive Edition last night, and it’s now in proofreading, hopefully. More on that later.



(Edit: have updated the link to point to the EE)

Kiera again. If companies decided that they were going to get the marketing consultants in on your brain, they’d call it “heADspace™”.

Buy my game!