Guest Post Archives - Page 6 of 6 -

December 14, 2015December 12, 2015

African Monsters : Behind the Scenes by Dave De Burgh

Getting an invite to write a story for an anthology is probably one of the best feelings in the world for a writer. There’s a kind of acceptance that comes with that invitation, a sense of ‘Yes, we believe you are capable and good enough’, and since writers are always fighting themselves and the multitude of blank pages which need filling, this kind of thing happening is not only a boost for the writer but also for the writer’s other projects. I certainly crowed with excitement when I read the email from Margret Helgadottir – not only because of the invite, but because of the publisher behind the anthology, Margret’s fellow editor Jo Thomas, and the idea behind the anthology. Accepting the invitation was a decision I didn’t have to think about – needless to say, I had no idea what I was getting myself into.

My first instinct was to choose the Tikolosh or Tokolosh – I had done some research regarding this strange, mischievous and dangerous creature for an article I had written some months before, so I had a good place from which to start. The Tokolosh, however, had already been nabbed by one of my fellow storytellers, and so I had to find a new creature to build a tale around. I began thinking that I needed to choose a creature which hadn’t received a lot of (or any) press, something that the folks reading these tales would be intrigued and creeped out by. And when I came across stories and reports of the Popo Bawa, I knew I had my creature.

The first roadblock, of course, presented itself then and there – most of the stories I had read about the Popo Bawa came from Zanzibar… The only other country I’ve been to either than my home (South Africa) is Australia, so how was I going to convincingly write about a creature I’d just read about and a country I had never been to?

Obviously the first thing I did was panic.

Googling Zanzibar presented me with countless links and hundreds of articles – searching on Facebook brought me to tourist companies, and although their beautiful photos helped me to begin envisioning Zanzibar’s beautiful coast lines, that was about as helpful as those photos proved to be. Until I came across Stone Town. That was when it all began to click into place.

Stone Town is ancient and iconic – it has a long, varied and multi-cultural history, has been home to countless peoples, religions and beliefs, and was a trading hub between the Persians and Africa. *click* The link to my Tokolosh article bloomed in my mind, and then the rest of the tale began to fall into place.

I still needed a character to tell the tale through, however – someone who I could relate to (as the writer, having to ‘live’ inside his mind for a bit) and someone who knew just enough about the situation in the tale that I could comfortably explore Stone Town without coming across as a tour guide after a good tip.

I was still panicking – I hadn’t written a thing yet, and the deadline for submissions was fast approaching. So I began watching videos about Zanzibar on YouTube, and I began listening to Taraab on Soundcloud. Listening to that wonderful, energetic and rhythmic music someone helped to pinpoint the character I was going to use – a hard-bitten, cynical South African who was paid to investigate certain strange occurrences and deal with the creatures behind those occurrences.

So, I had my creature or monster, my setting, my character, and the details of a plot. I knew, however, that I would probably surprise myself with something in the plot – it usually happens, me getting this spark of inspiration which usually sends the plot off in a surprising direction while still leaving me the chance to connect it to the main plot.

And so ‘Taraab and Terror in Zanzibar’ took full shape; a tale about Terence and his trip to Zanzibar to investigate reports of resurgent and dangerous Popo Bawa. Except things are definitely not as they seem, and even Terence –with all his experience and street-smarts- is surprised when the full extent of the threat is revealed.

Be warned, though – I’ve taken some liberties (you’ll know them when you read them) in service of the tale.

I hope you enjoy it!

July 28, 2015

Guest Post : Naked Gutterthon

Occasionally here at FS we invite guests to come and hang out because you know, we like that thing they do. In the case of the Cultural Gutter, one of our own skulk members is heavily involved in an awesome project, so obviously we wanted to help! Please do pop over, check out the Gutter, help if you can and just eenjoy it if you can’t. – Aunty Fox

***

Gutterthon 2015: Naked Gutterthon

Hi, I’m Carol and I’m the Comics Editor and Evil Overlord of The Cultural Gutter. Back in the misty shadowlands of 2003, The Cultural Gutter was founded to offer clear-eyed and thoughtful writing about disreputable art: comics, video games, science fiction and trash cinema. Since then we’ve expanded our mandate a bit adding editors who have written about television and romance. Most of these art forms are more respectable than they were back in the Aughts, or at least particular parts of them are, but we feel like we’re still offering something special with our essays. We’re not great at telling you whether you should go out and spend your money and sometimes we talk about art from sixty or even two hundred years ago, but we always try to have an interesting angle and some things to think about—or at least some good jokes. Right now we have a piece up about “Time Loops and the Failures of Memory” in films ranging from Groundhog Day to Momento. Auntie Fox has written about just how long she’ll give a show before she gives up with, “The Core Dynamic; Or, Why I Won’t Give A Show A Half A Series To Figure It Out.” And I’ve written a few things I’m pretty pleased with—a piece about Planet of the Apes and “relatability,” another about strong female characters and one about Punisher: War Zone and what we mean when we talk about “bad.”

I’ve only been the Gutter’s publisher and Evil Overlord since 2006, but I am proud of our site and our writing. In all the time that we’ve been online, we’ve paid our writers—both ongoing Editors and Guest Stars—for their pieces. Originally, we were supported by an operations grant from The Canada Council for the Arts. Unfortunately, times being what they are, we lost our grant. And that’s where Gutterthon comes in. We’re trying to raise money to stay online and keep our commitment to paying writers. With our goal, it doesn’t come out to much, about $20 per article, but these days, with so many creators being asked to create for exposure, we think it’s important to pay our writers for their work. Exposure only really means something if it leads to something better.

But before I get all hot-headed about the newfangled system of platforms, content creators and exposure, I’ll just thank Fox Spirit for the books they’ve donated to our cause. If you contribute to Gutterthon 2015, you have the chance to pick up digital copies of Drag Noir (2014) and The Girl At the End Of The World, Vol. 1 (2014), which include stories by me: “The Itch of Iron, The Pull of the Moon” and “Sophie and the Gate to Hell.” (I hope you like them). And we also have medieval charms (your choice of healing or agricultural) made by the Skulk’s K. A. Laity. And I’m making some homunculi, star stones (to keep the Great Old One’s terrifying dreams away), and some handprinted Cthulhu Moleskines to offer as perks. But even if you don’t contribute, I hope you’ll come and hang out in The Cultural Gutter.

(Sweet Naked Gutterthon poster art by Brian Kirby of www.shelflifeclothing.com)

June 29, 2015June 23, 2015

Monday Methods : Kim Bannerman Continuum

Kim’s final Monday Methods post for us.

Monday Methods – Continuum

At the beginning, there are only words. They don’t necessarily relate. Like a pile of excitable puppies, they fall all over each other, tumbling out and racing around with too much energy, not enough focus.

Adjectives aplenty! Adverbs gone wild! The craziest euphemisms you’ve ever seen!

Then, as the words progress, they start to fall into patterns. Fragments cohere and make sense. They start to move together, find their rhythm, and the words become sentences. There is no story yet, but there is motion. A pulse begins and the first signs of life flicker between the letters.

And then, at some point, the words and sentences begin to breath on their own. This moment of quickening isn’t a sudden revelation or a lightning strike, but more of a gentle recognition by the author that this are more than a mere clutch of words; ideas lurk below the surface. There is meaning. There is direction.

The sentences become rivers with strong currents, pulling the writer towards a conclusion. It may be a horrible ending, a boring ending, a sudden ending, an ‘it was all a dream’ ending, but it’s still an ending and that’s okay. With patience, stubbornness and perseverance, that first babble of random gibberish has travelled along a line to coalesce into a hero’s journey. The author might not be able to point to the exact moment that chaos became order, but it doesn’t matter. The first draft is complete.

June 8, 2015June 8, 2015

Monday Methods – Noir by Graham Wynd

by Graham Wynd

If you write noir then you know the murky streets where darkness and rain seem nigh on constant. When Monday rolls around it’s just another day and you face it with a hangover more often than not. The slug of whisky in your coffee is just enough to stop the shakes and the dame that rolls into your office looking too slinky for the daylight reminds you how you got into this state in the first place.

But she’s got that one thing you need: a story. That’s the real drug. You can sit at your battered Underwood—issued to all would-be noir writers at the inception of their careers—and open a vein as Red Smith suggests, but blood only gets you so far. You need a narrative to lasso your reader and drag them along behind you.

If you’re writing noir, you need atmosphere too. It helps if you have the kind of heart that’s heard “too many lies” because after all “one more tear won’t make no difference to the rain”. Your heart has to yearn for something it’s not likely to get, yet that goal has to be close enough to your grasp to make reaching for it irresistible. That’s what keeps the shadowy streets, rainy nights, cool dames and dangerous guys from slipping into cliché.

It helps if you have an ear for dialogue. You can go plain and hard, like the Continental Op, but once the bodies pile up you find yourself spitting out phrases like, “This damned burg’s getting to me. If I don’t get away soon I’ll be going blood-simple like the natives.” You have to feel isolated, like you can’t trust anybody really, even if you need to relax once in a while. Every description reminds you that death lurks behind every transaction. The Op hears things like, “Polly De Voto is a good scout and anything she sells you is good, except maybe the bourbon. That always tastes a little bit like it had been drained off a corpse.”

If there isn’t the risk of death, the stakes aren’t high enough. Sit down and list your characters: figure out what they want and how they suffer and see where the lines cross. Make them doubt every step of the way—make them also think they’re the one who’ll get away with it, that they’re ahead of the game.

And make them suffer. Make them all suffer. Take another shot of whisky. You’re bleeding now.

A writer of bleakly noirish tales with a bit of grim humour, Graham Wynd can be found in Dundee but would prefer you didn’t come looking. An English professor by day, Wynd grinds out darkly noir prose between trips to the local pub. Wynd’s novella of murder and obsessive love, EXTRICATE is out now from Fox Spirit Books; the print edition also includes the novella THROW THE BONES and a dozen short stories. See more stories (including free reads!) here.

April 11, 2015

Spinning Tails: Animals and Cornish Spyrys (Fae) By R. A. Kennedy

Something a little different for you today from deepest Cronwall (where they put jam on their scone then the cream). So without further ado I shall hand you over to your host for the day. R.A. Kennedy.

***

When asked to do an article about Cornish Fae by Aunty Fox, I immediately knew what it was I wanted to write about. Animals.
It comes as no surprise that animals are prevalent in Folklore, and Cornish folklore is certainly no different.
The relationship between Fae and animal shows that the two can coexist, and their destinies coincide and collide with one another on a regular basis.

I remembered hearing a story when I was in Primary School and since have heard only a few times after, although very different versions to what I originally heard. I havent been successful in finding it any publications online or otherwise. I did however manage to find out from other sources such as friends etc that such a story is within existence. However, the many different versions makes it difficult to confirm where in Cornwall it happened. Folklore is like Chinese whispers i.e A barrel can roll to one end of the street and in the next town that barrel can be something else. Its one of the many wonderful things about such stories.
So I took up my trenchcoat and fedora and went into the Private Investigation business. So let me tell you about it, its quite extraordinary.

Sculpture by Marilyn Collins. Image source http://undergroundlore.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/i-love-spriggans-in-springtime-i-love.html

Romeo Kennedy F.I.
Thats my name over the door. The F is for Folklore and the I is for Investigator, or on a bad day the F can stand for Innumerable amount of things that I’m not willing to repeat.
Tracking down stories is my thing. Stories that lay hidden for years, stories that tell of the Spyrys and all manner of wonderful creatures, among other things.
I was sitting at my desk, late one misty Monday evening when there was a knock at the door. With a creak and a groan I got up from my comfy chair and casually opened the door.
Said she was a Spriggan, told me her brother had gone missing, asked me to find him.
I asked how long he had been missing?
She told me a thousand years.
The look on my face said it all. ‘Did you not think to search for him a bit sooner?’ I asked
Thats me, always try to go for the cheap shot. Needless to say she wasn’t Impressed and the snarl and large hands around my throat told me as much.
Looks like I have a new client, I thought, and I wasn’t in any position to argue.

The Spriggan told me that her brother’s name was Tiddy and he just upped and disappeared one night. Spriggans don’t tend to leave explanations. Hell they never usually leave anything except bones. Especially when treasure is involved.
Before Tiddy’s departure, he would regularly make long distance journeys to somewhere and come back with nets full of fish. When his sister asked where he had been Tiddy said not to ask. This went on for months, until he vanished.
‘Maybe he doesn’t want to be found?’ I said taking a sip of my stone cold coffee.
Apparently that wasn’t the case.
A few days before our meeting she was handed a note by a Pisky named Trevara. I say ‘a note’; it was more of a cryptic scrawl written on a leaf in a watery blue ink.
She handed me the screwed up leaf and I held it under the lamp. I couldn’t read whatever the hell it said but knew someone who could. I asked if it was okay to hold on to it.
That was all she could tell me. Other than: ‘Find him.’ Which was either a threat or just a friendly reminder that if I didn’t I would probably have a lot more free time on my hands, if you catch my drift?

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