It's been a while...

It's been a while since I troubled this blog, and I have some catching up to do which I shall now proceed to do in this handy one-size-fits-all post.

Firstly, there seems to have been a slight resurgence of interest in my novel, Against Nature, notably expressed in a lengthy and thoughtful essay by Tibère Lechat posted here. He spots a few things which others usually miss, and even sees a few details which weren't really there, or at least not intentionally, which is interesting. I particularly liked the parallels with Rabelais, not something I recall as being a conscious influence, but I'd say it's nevertheless a valid bit of detective work.

Following on shortly from this, there was a discussion on facebook wherein Tom Shackleton and Niki Haringsma were also talking about Against Nature, and the conversation ended up looking a bit like an interview, and an interview I actually enjoyed and which threw up a few things which seemed worth saying; so just for the record, it went like this:

Tom: After reading Against Nature and Smoking Mirror for the first time back to back I had some thoughts, one being the following - in Smoking Mirror the myths and fiction of the time are coming to life. The cause is attributed to a future version of the Doctor having materialized in the exact same time and place, and the influence of a book which somehow escaped the Land of Fiction. Causing reality - and the TARDIS - to become warped and begin to collapse. Later in the Doctor and Peri's lives in The Time Wrestlers, Timelords from the War go back in time and detonate a fiction bomb to try and gain access to Mexico around the year 1500 - where and when Smoking Mirror and Against Nature are set - Although this is averted by the Timelords involved being merged with their future selves and as such being annihilated. The Doctor was persuaded to come due to what was happening to the TARDIS, but we never see any Gallifreyan telling him to investigate. We just assume it was his people due to the events of The Two Doctors. What if it was in fact the enemy? In Against Nature, Goralschai tries to bring the myths and fiction of the time to life so as to become God and destroy everything, but someone seemingly erases these events after he fails.

What if all of these events are connected? The fiction bomb is what causes the book from the Land of Fiction to return to the second Doctor's pocket so that it ends up in the TARDIS library, causing a separate disruption before the events of Against Nature, which make time and reality sufficiently vulnerable for Goralschai's plan to get as far as it did. The enemy are using the Doctor to try to fix some of the damage, but his presence is part of the reason, why the damage could even take place. Señor 105 brought the Doctor to when and where the fiction bomb was detonated, the area where reality was already in flux. Todd and House Meddhoran's survivors end up in a strange land - a Land of Fiction perhaps?

Lawrence: I can't really comment as I don't remember any of it in the same sort of detail, but it sounds workable.

Tom: Thanks. Workable is more than I hoped for. What part of it did you think was workable ?

Lawrence: I mean it sounds like it all adds up without any bits left over, so all of it.

Tom: Were the difficulties found around the year 1500 as mentioned in The Time Wrestlers meant to be connected to Against Nature and Smoking Mirror, or was it just a throw away line about some unrelated idea or event?

Lawrence: Yes, supposed to be the same thing, although admittedly I was never too worried about Smoking Mirror fitting in because Against Nature was, roughly speaking, me trying to do Smoking Mirror properly. The stuff about Motecuhzoma II revising the calendar around that time actually happened - and is described in Ross Hassig's Time, History and Belief in Aztec and Colonial Mexico - although his motives are unrecorded leaving archeology to educated guesswork; so you might call Against Nature educated guesswork getting a bit too carried away.

Tom: Just remembered something I was wondering about - with the ending and some of the events of the story seemingly erased, would that mean that a version of Goralschai is possibly alive? I also wondered about where he or his consciousness were supposed to be before he tried to enact the final part of his plan. I assume the reason he was in the Celestis Mictlan was so they could try to manipulate him into using his captured Faction tech as a part of their game.

Lawrence: As for Goralschai's survival, I think I hinted at the possibility somewhere, but I can't remember where; and I seem to recall thinking of him as residing in the Mexica underworld prior to the big showdown, or at least something similar, but something I wrote may have contradicted that. Not sure.

Tom: One last thing, the time ship in the prologue with the dead Faction Paradox members on board which dematerialised shortly after being viewed - was there any reason you had in mind for how and why they were in there in that state?

Lawrence: Yes, I had this idea about Tenochtitlan being so dense with belief as to be impenetrable by persons from the Homeworld, hence making it desirable territory in terms of the War, which is why the Faction would have been interested in it. It sort of echoed part of the central theme, or one of them, of Against Nature, namely that of a technologically advanced society not necessarily having the upper hand over a bunch of people they would regard as primitive and undeveloped - so the novel has plenty of persons who aren't anything special gaining the upper hand over the Space Gods. Actually, one of the editorial directions I objected to while writing it for Random Static, was that Primo should be revealed to be someone who would one day become a great leader for his people, which I wasn't having because as a character, he already had a load of weird stuff in his origin story, and why the hell should he need to turn out to be Cesar Chavez? What's so bad about just being some dude no-one has heard of? Is simply being a guy who holds down a job not exciting enough? Anyway, getting back to the question, the idea was that the local Mexica noosphere was of such strength as to overpower intruders. I seem to recall the idea that Icnopilli was originally some Faction guy who went native in such a way that Tenochtitlan rewrote his past for him - but I can't remember if this was specifically an element of Against Nature or just something in one of the earlier drafts. Honestly, the thing underwent so much revision that I can't always remember which version got published. As to why Tenochtitlan should be so dense with belief - what makes it more so than any other ancient culture - that wasn't actually something I ever thought about beyond because it just is, okay?

Tom: I see, so the density of the area killed the Faction occupants of the time ship and shortly after forced the ship out. I guess that's why Lorraine Conti had to have a plant body constructed so she could have a physical presence in the area rather than coming directly in person.

Lawrence: Exactly.

Tom:  I guess Icnopilli being a rewritten Faction member would nicely tie in to his successful use of ritual in his detective work in The Unwoken Princess. That's very interesting; and thank you again for answering my poorly worded questions.

Lawrence: Not at all - at least I understood what you were asking, which I haven't with a few others.

Niki: That's fascinating about the religious density and Icnopilli!

Lawrence: Wish I'd made it more obvious in the text really, as it was an idea I felt quite pleased with. I found it very difficult to tell how much I was actually explaining - hopefully without lecturing - and how much was still entirely inside my head.

Niki: One additional question, what was the significance of Justin and Momacani both being described the same way, as having Caucasian features and dark skin? Is Justin an aspect of Momacani, some other lost and rewritten Homeworlder, or something else entirely?

Lawrence: I had to look those characters up, would you believe? I still think of Momacani as Icnopilli which was the name he had in a previous draft, so I hope that makes sense of any previous answer given mistakenly referencing Icnopilli; otherwise, if there was some significance, I can't remember what it was - beyond that Justin was loosely based on someone I know with those same features. While we're here, as a point of possibly minor interest, I can't remember how much of Rhodenet made it into the final draft, but he was significant in the early versions and was very much based on a friend called Rodney, a person from work who was one of the funniest people I ever met. I inserted him into the story for the sake of punky contrast with the pseudo-gothic Homeworld environment.

Niki: Ah - brilliant. Yeah, loved getting to know Rhodenet in the story, I think the bits with him really worked.

Once again thanks to Tom and Niki for that. Very enjoyable, at least for me. All tales referred to are things you will probably have heard of if you're reading this blog, but if not, have a look through previous blog entries as they will have been subject to a sales pitch at some point or other. Finally, on the subject of Faction Paradox, I painted the cover for The Book of the Peace, edited by Philip Marsh and featuring contributions from Jacob Black, the aforementioned Niki Haringsma and others, and availabubble at the place from which you already bought all of the others.

I seem to have become a regular contributor to More of This Sort of Thing! as described here. It's a print fanzine, just like nature intended, and has usually sold out by the time I'm able to publicise it, which is why I haven't bothered for the last two - although for what it's worth, both featured new material which I wrote exclusively for the zine and as such will doubtless be worth millions of pounds in the very near future. If this sounds like your sort of thing, the best I can recommend is either moving to the Medway towns or joining the Careful Now Promotions group on facebook, so as to keep tabs on forthcoming stuff.

...and finally, Cyril?

Finally, Esther, myself and her indoors were featured on a local radio show, last September - Rob Roark's Vinyl Confessions as broadcast on KZSM of San Marcos, Texas. Well, we weren't on the show exactly, but it would be easier to just listen to the thing than to endure my convoluted explanation, and thusly you should be able to hear it by clicking on this link.


 

Still Smoking Mirror

This one has been around since 2010, but I suppose there's still a slight chance that of the five people who now follow this blog , two of you might not have heard of it. About a million years ago, before I learned how to write, I attempted a Doctor Who novel because I figured it would be fun, a piece of piss, and likely to get published given the quality of Warmonger, Deadly Reunion, Earthworld, and others. I was wrong on at least two of those counts, and I eventually chucked the thing out under my own steam thanks to the magic of Lulu Publishing, mainly because it had taken me a long time to write and it would have felt wrong to just leave it as it was. You may recall it from this post.

Anyway, I've just had some fresh feedback from the excellent Stan Batcow of Pumf Propane & Propane Accessories because I bunged him a copy in exchange for a couple of CDs, and that seemed like as good a reason as any for a new post here, not exactly a review, but here's what he wrote: 

You did indeed make Pumf references in Smoking Mirror - I was also incredibly flattered that the Doctor wanted a copy of Howl's Grand Theft Audio CD, but that he couldn't remember whether Howl had been big in the 1990s or 2090s. Hopefully you'll have been prophetic, and - although I'll be long gone - Howl will finally change all world attitudes for the better in the 2090s. And the citizens of that future time can all then spend Sednan five centime pieces, featuring relief images of the Exalted Howling Batcow on both sides. Last I heard, the centime in the 2090s was worth the same as approximately sixteen thousand GBP sterling today. It was quite strange to read about myself being somehow part of a fictional world, and a most enjoyable experience. Thanks very much for putting me in there!

Apparently I mentioned Stan in the book a couple of times. I'd forgotten all about that. Never mind.

I wouldn't ordinarily point out typos in a book that's already been published, but I know you said you'd re-uploaded files to Lulu a while back for Kiss of Life, so I'll point out that on the back cover of Smoking Mirror, the first paragraph (large font, blue text) has the word and at the end of the first line and the beginning of the second (so it reads Nothing should live forever, and and all must come to an end.) I've seen the exact same thing presented as an optical illusion-type puzzle - the brain is tricked into thinking there's only one and by the action of flicking the eyes to the next line, and thereby momentarily losing concentration. If it's something you can quickly fix and upload for future copies, I'm sure you'd want to. If not, I humbly apologise for having brought to your attention something that will monumentally piss you off forever.

I have no idea how this could have eluded me for the past seven years. Anyway, I've made the correction so copies ordered from hereon will be new and improved at least in this respect. The and and version of the cover can be seen above. Anyway...

I enjoyed Smoking Mirror very much, incidentally. It took me quite a while to get into it, but once I'd assimilated myself into a Doctor Who world I managed to join in with the action quite naturally. Loved the regression of the TARDIS into a prehistoric state, as well as the joint timeline segments printed in two columns side-by-side. I wondered how hard it had been to get the number of words to be close enough to equal in both columns so the layout was correct. (The first occurrence of that device made me think that it was a layout mistake, as the two columns were so close in their wordage). I can safely say that it was far better than many, many other books I've read over the years and makes me wonder, yet again, why you aren't a millionaire. As a first novel it should have had the publishers rubbing their hands together in glee, and banking on earning their retirement fund off your Doctor Who thirteen-novel boxset by 2027. But, as we know, people are far too fucking stupid for that.

So there you go. It's unofficial, and it's fanfic, and I haven't even opened it since proofreading the very first Lulu version (except for the back cover, apparently) because I'm scared it might be rubbish; but it's cheap because I'm making nought from the sales (so as to pre-empt accusations that I am), and some people seem to think it's all right, and Christmas is coming up, 'n' shit, in case you know someone who likes Who and isn't too fussy...

Availabubble yonder.

Smoking Mirror

I produced a POD version of Smoking Mirror some time ago, so it really is old and probably not very interesting news. Nevertheless, it's just popped up as a topic of minor curiosity on the Outpost Gallifrey forum, presumably someone working their way backwards from my more recent, arguably more legitimate written efforts; and I realised I'd never got around to reposting this 2011 review from Andrew Hickey's wonderful Sci-Ence! Justice Leak!, so here it is:

Obligatory disclaimer-cum-explanation as to why I've bought this book. I've vaguely known Lawrence Burton as one of the more intelligent posters on the Doctor Who forum Outpost Gallifrey and on the Faction Paradox forum for a year or two. We've recently become Facebook friends, and he wrote a very flattering review of my most recent book. So I may be biased here.

On the other hand, I don't know him well enough that I think I'm biased - and if you read through that thread (Lawrence reviewing several hundred science fiction books) it's obvious both that he can actually write, and also that he shares a number of my tastes - of the books we've both read, I'd say I agree with at least 80% of his reviews, and especially the stuff he's most glowing about (Philip K. Dick, Lawrence Miles, David Louis Edelman) and his tastes in individual works by writers (preferring The End Of Eternity and The Gods Themselves to Asimov's Robot stuff).

So when I saw he'd self-published a couple of books himself, I bought this one without even reading the description.

It turns out to be an unofficial Doctor Who novel. I'd hesitate to call it fanfic, partly because it was intended for BBC Books (and quite why it was rejected I can't understand) and partly because fanfic tends to suggest something of poor quality, and this is anything but. It's a Doctor Who novel that happens not to have been licensed by the BBC, that's all. (Lawrence is selling the book at cost price and not making a penny from it, I hasten to add).

Given that it's self-published, there are surprisingly few criticisms I can make of it. The review thread linked above is called Crappy 70s Paperbacks with Airbrushed Spaceships on the Cover, and the cover design is a perfect imitation of those, the typography on the back being spookily reminiscent of some of them (the closest comparison I can find is the Granada paperback copies of The End Of Eternity and The Zap Gun, but I know I've seen something even closer). However, the typography in the book itself is less wonderful, being in Times New Roman (or a facsimile thereof) and eight- or ten-point type. Having a legally-blind wife, I know from experience that ideally one should print things in at least twelve-point, and wherever possible use a sans-serif font, for readability.

Other than that, the only really jarring thing about the book is a moment of lampshade hanging, when the Doctor is on a collect-the-plot-tokens quest and thinks about how he hates this kind of thing when it happens in books. It's not done quite well enough to overcome the problems.

One other problem I have - and one that's my problem rather than the book's - is that the book is set in pre-Columbian Mexico, and so the characters' names are all phonetically unlike anything I'm accustomed to. This gave me some difficulty in keeping track of the characters, but that can hardly be helped, given the subject.

The plot is a pretty good one - why has the universe shrunk, so that it now consists of only a small area of Central America and a few centuries? Why are the Gods walking among the humans? - but the plot is less important than the writing. Lawrence obviously has a huge love for the Mexica culture and mythology, and this comes across in every word. Before I read this, all I knew of the Mexica culture was that some of their sculptures in the British Museum look like they'd been made by Jack Kirby, if Kirby had had an obsession with skulls (which is a good thing). But Lawrence manages both to make this seem like a sympathetic culture (putting even the human sacrifice into a context where it seems entirely reasonable) and to bring out the utter strangeness of the culture's myths.

A lot of individual scenes will stay with me for a long time - the Doctor getting an inkling that problems are starting when Carl Sagan starts talking about how the Earth is a few thousand years old, the god at the centre of the TARDIS, the journey through Mictlan - this is a book as much about the journey as the destination, and Lawrence isn't afraid of devoting time to his interests, whether that be retelling old myths or explaining Mexica social structure or making asides about old sitcoms.

In fact, after the obvious in-joke that the Third Doctor used to watch Dad's Army (which starred Bill Pertwee) I started wondering about the other references - what does the confirmation of a Doctor-Who-universe Wilfred Brambell and Tony Hancock mean for the careers of the 'Whoniverse' Ron Grainer and Terry Nation? - but that's just the 60s-TV fan in me coming out.

And there's a very sitcom feel about parts of this book, but in a good way. It's a funny book, but the humour all flows from the situations, whether it be the Doctor's other console rooms (I want to see the McConsole Room™ now) or the TARDIS translation circuit malfunction that renders speech more… idiomatically than before. The one funny bit that doesn't quite fit in is the bit with three priests (trying not to spoil anything here). But that is so funny - and so incongruous - that it works, even though it could easily have fallen into the too-common trap of mistaking a reference for an actual joke.

The characterisation is spot-on as well. Lawrence catches Peri's voice perfectly, and his Sixth Doctor is definitely Colin Baker (although the character here is closer to the TV series than to the more nuanced portrayal in the audio stories - understandably, as this was written in 2002, when the audios hadn't been going that long). At times the Doctor seems almost too verbose, but then this is a Doctor whose defining writers were Pip & Jane Baker, and the fact that nobody else talks like that shows it as a stylistic choice rather than a tin ear.

It's a first novel, with all that that entails, and Lawrence's influences are clear (and he thanks Philip Purser-Hallard and Simon Bucher-Jones in the acknowledgements, if it hadn't been obvious) - I'm sure the use of Mictlan here is at least in part a reference to its use in the Faction Paradox books - but while this doesn't rise to the level of the very best Doctor Who books, it's funny, clever, well-written and written by someone with an obvious love for his subjects - both Doctor Who and pre-Columbian Mexica culture - and is certainly better than a good 90% of the Doctor Who books I've read.

Now if only Air France hadn’t lost my bag with my DVD of The Aztecs in, I could do a compare / contrast here. Oh well…

I wouldn't necessarily recommend this to a non-fan of Doctor Who, but it's an excellent self-contained story which requires a minimum of continuity knowledge, so if you're even a casual fan - especially if you're a fan of the Sixth Doctor, who's otherwise even worse-served in print than on TV - this is well worth a read. I'll definitely be buying Lawrence's book of short stories.

So there you go - that all seems fair. It's available here if anyone's tempted.

Finally, I should probably stress for the benefit of the three of you to whom this might make any sense, although Smoking Mirror shares a setting with Against Nature, it's a distant ancestor rather than a direct relative, and certainly isn't the first draft of the more recent title.