One of Those Days

Have you ever had one of those days when your hair won’t lie down, your morning coffee tastes like radioactive sludge and you’ve run out of serviceable underwear? Yesterday was one of those days. After 2 weeks of promising myself I would cut the grass and continually postponing it because it was too cold or too late or too early or too wet, I finally got the lawnmower started. Ten minutes later there was an ominous click, the wheel drive engaged all by itself, and the machine scuttled off on some private mission of its own. Wrestling it to a halt I switched it off before it could shred every flower in the garden, and booked it in for repair.


I drove to the supermarket for a few supplies. Tissues, tea, bread, butter. At the checkout I discovered I’d come out without my wallet. They were very nice about it, and let me take my supplies with me on a promise that I would pay the next time I was in the store. As soon as I got back to the house — you’ve guessed it — I remembered I was out of cheese.

I started the washing machine. Then the sun emerged from behind the clouds at just the right time, giving me an unexpected opportunity to hang my clothes out to dry, and lifting my mood. But try as I might, there was no way I could colour-coordinate the clothes pegs with the clothes.

It was just one of those days.

Guest Post: Laurence O'Bryan

Today’s blog is from the author of the excellent new thrillers, The Istanbul Puzzle and The Jerusalem Puzzle. Laurence's latest book in the series, The Manhattan Puzzle, is on the drawing board. I’ve asked him to tell us something about his motivation for writing these books and here is his reply:

The Themes of The Manhattan Puzzle

By Laurence O’Bryan

What has been hidden in Manhattan by the most powerful people on earth?

What would you do to a Manhattan banker who treated ordinary people like slaves?

What magic is buried under Manhattan that allows it to rise again from anything the world throws at it?

These are the themes of The Manhattan Puzzle. The story sees Sean and Isabel (my characters from The Istanbul Puzzle and The Jerusalem Puzzle) reunited in Manhattan at the headquarters of one of the world’s largest banks. There’s been some grisly murders, and now the plot takes a new twist. The contents of the book they found in Istanbul are revealed.

My personal journey with this story grew out of my disgust at the financial crisis that has brought many so low. I am interested in the myths and the beliefs of those who value money above everything.

Right now I am on my second set of structural edits for The Manhattan Puzzle. I plan to submit these changes, some tightening of the plot here and there, by April the 29th. We are on track for a global release, in English, on October 10th.

But don’t get me wrong. I love Manhattan. It’s a city in a snow globe of dollar bills. So look in your bookstore and on your E-readers and pre-order if you want or just sit tight. You’ll be hearing more about this book.

To preorder click here.

BXH building, vehicle entrance visible under the arch

A Washerman's Tale

My wife’s in Australia. She went over for the grandtwins’ fourth birthday and will stay for 2 months. That’s 2 months that I can devote to writing, and I’ve started on the sequel to The Black Orchestra.

Today, I decided I needed to wash some clothes as I’m running out of underwear. I put a load into the washing machine, added 2 soap tablets and fabric softener and a colour-catcher. Pressed the start/pause button and nothing happened. I opened the door and banged it closed again a few times. Still nothing.

Then I noticed a big dial marked with lots of options: quick cottons , quick, cottons, wool, synthetics, delicates, drain, rinse, spin, reverse thrusters, docking, main wash only, self-clean, intensive + U, intensive, colour, hygiene. This dial was parked at the top, marked “0”. Okay, so I had to make a choice here.

Over to the left, I found a series of buttons. I had to choose a temperature, a spin speed, and a load size. There were a few other buttons marked with strange hieroglyphs. I think one of those had something to do with the plasma flow rates for the warp engines. The other one was definitely for the inter-dimensional stabilizers. Either that or the inertia dampers. Anyway, I decided to ignore all those buttons. I’m sure the engineering department (aka my wife) would have pre-programmed these at their optimal settings. When did washing become so complicated? That machine is like a nuclear power station. And what smart Alec decided to do away with those nice, simple top-loaders?

Anyway, I pressed start/pause and off it went. An LED on the front showed me what it was doing, wash, rinse, spin, and the estimated time to completion.

When it was finished I extracted my washing and wouldn’t you know it, I finished up with 2 odd socks, one grey, the other navy blue. I hunted high and low for the missing items, but without success. The tumble drier took most of the moisture from my clothes, but I had to drape them over the radiators to get them completely dry.

Six hours later, as I was folding the duvet cover I detected something lurking inside. Ah-ha, I thought, I bet this is where those pesky socks have been hiding. I poked my hand in and pulled out just one sock - a black one!

WW2 Heroes

There were many heroes who fought for the allies in World War 2. I’m sure there were lots who fought on the losing side, too. But, of course we hear nothing about them. While writing The Black Orchestra, I discovered the story of The White Rose, a series of anti-nazi leaflets published between June 1942 and February 1943.

Hans and Sophie Scholl were sister and brother, both studying at the University of Munich. They and a small group of their fellow-students, recognizing the nazi regime for the evil that it was, printed a series of 6 mimeographed leaflets in which they implored the German people to oppose the government by whatever means they could. The leaflets were distributed all over Germany by a network of willing helpers.

They knew the risks they were taking, risks that escalated with each leaflet and as the Gestapo tried desperately to identify them.

When they were caught, they faced trial by a kangaroo court. The students spoke bravely against their oppressors, but they were found guilty and several were sentenced to death along with one of their professors, Kurt Huber.

Hans, Sophie and their fellow student, Christoph Probst, were executed by guillotine on February 22, 1943, the day of their trial. Christoph Probst was 23, Hans was 24, Sophie was just 21.

It was an uneven contest. How could the nazis prevail against the single-minded courage of the youth of Germany?

Ref: Sophie Scholl & The White Rose by Dumbach and Newborn Oneworld, 1986, 2006.

Books Missing from Amazon

If you access the Amazon web site, select Kindle Books and search for my name JJ Toner you should see 9 books on the list, including my three novels:

St Patrick’s Day Special
Find Emily
The Black Orchestra.

My author page should show all of these books as well.

If you live in Ireland you will see only 8 of the 9 books. The latest one, The Black Orchestra apparently is not available for purchase in Ireland. I can think of no valid reason for this. It must be a programming bug on the Amazon site.

I know of at least three other authors afflicted by this creeping disease. One guy has lost 4 of his 11 titles, but only in the Irish market.

One of these authors lives in the UK, as far as I can tell, so this is not something limited to Irish authors. If you are an author of eBooks for the kindle, it may be blighting your sales efforts in the Emerald Isle.

Use the comments below if you’d like me to check your author page as it appears for potential customers over here.

WW2 Germany - What the German People Knew

While writing my WW2 spy story, The Black Orchestra, I had to research many details about the early years of the war. I had to find a map of Berlin for the period, and I found one here.

I had to find answers to 1001 questions, like these:

What food and drink did Berliners have access to?
Was coffee available?
When was food rationing brought in?
What about clothing rationing?
How widespread were telephones in Berlin?
Were the phones tapped by the Gestapo?
What about public phone boxes?
What levels of salaries/wages were people earning?
Details of public transport - buses and surface and underground railways
Details about railway stations
Were bicycles common?
Were domestic flights allowed?
What about international flights to neutral countries?
What did people wear?
Where were there open-air markets?
What was bought and sold on the black market?
What sort of cigarettes did people smoke?
Details about Wehrmacht and SS ranks.

Some of the questions I had to answer were more fundamental to the storyline:

What did ordinary Germans believe/feel about the Communist party “threat”?
What did ordinary Germans believe/feel about the so-called "Zionist threat" to the Reich?
What was people’s perception of Hitler? Of Reinhard Heydrich and the other nazi leaders?
Was membership of the nazi party mandatory for people in the public service?
What about members of the armed services?
What was the role of each of the various branches of the police, ORPO, KRIPO and Gestapo?

And the biggest question of them all:

What did the man in the street know about the nazi purges of the Jews in the early war years?

I decided, after much research, that the German people knew that the nazis were oppressing Jewish Germans - removing their basic rights (including their rights to earn a living), burning their businesses, and deporting them. But I don't believe the German people knew of the nazis holocaust, not during the early years of the war, anyhow. The "final solution" was not proposed until the Wannsee Conference in January 1942, and it was only after that that the killings became systematic.

Short Story - The Prince and the Dragon

The old king lay on his death bed. All the apothecaries’ potions and embrocations proved powerless against the evil that had struck him down, sapping his life force. The physics bled him for days but his condition weakened with every leech they applied.

The king had three sons. The two eldest, the stone princes, stood in an anteroom disputing his inheritance in hushed tones. The eldest, Shale, had the strongest following among the palace guard, but the next in line, Marl, had the backing of the small-people of the forest -- fierce battle-hardened warriors, every one.

The king asked to speak with his youngest son. It was common knowledge that he was the king’s favorite, ever since the day when the prince, aged no more than four, had fallen into a crocodile pit and the king had leapt in to save him. The scars from that day lingered still among the tattoos on the old man’s arms.

Entirely ignorant of the king’s failing health, the young prince and his two close friends, Scotty and Bill, were in the west wing of the palace blissfully pounding on their instruments. Scotty played lead lute, Bill played upright bass, and the prince did the vocals. The combo lacked a drummer.

By the time the young prince had made his way to his father’s death bed, the old king was barely conscious. He lifted his eyelids. “Come close,” he whispered, his breath no stronger than the beating of a butterfly’s wings.

The prince held his father’s hand. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here earlier. No one told me—”

“Listen to me,” said the old man. “My time is near spent. I have named you my successor.”

A shadow passed over the prince’s face. “You want me to be king? But Shale is the eldest. The crown is his birthright.”

The king rocked his head from side to side on the pillow. “Shale would be a brutal ruler. He would bring unhappiness and revolution to the kingdom.”

“Marl, then. He is gentle and compassionate. Marl would make a fine king.”

“Marl is weak. If Marl took the throne, the kingdom would be thrown into war, for Shale would never accept him as king. No, you are the only one of my sons fit to rule.”

The prince shook his head. “Shale and Marl both have armies, Father. I have none. How may I challenge my brothers for the throne?”

“Take this ring,” The king removed his ring and placed it in the prince’s hand. “Go show it to the dragon that lives in the Angry Mountain. He will help you.”

“But Father, I have no wish to be king,” said the young prince. “You know that all I ever wanted was to make music with my friends. Music is where my true destiny lies.”

As these words were spoken, the king’s strength left him. He gave a last shuddering sigh and his soul left his body. The prince bowed his head and cried.

#

The day after the king’s funeral, Prince Shale began to prepare for his coronation ceremony. Prince Marl commissioned the most famous sculptor in the kingdom to fashion a likeness of the old king. The young prince set out for the Great Forest with his friends and a group of trusted outriders.

No sooner had the prince and his outriders reached the deepest, darkest region of the forest, than they were set upon by a group of mercenaries, heavily armed and intent on murder. The battle was short and fierce. Fighting for his life, the prince found untapped resources and he and his outriders bravely beat off the attack.

One attacker lived long enough to reveal to Scotty, that the ambush had been organized and paid for by Prince Shale, as he had learnt from his spies the words spoken by the king on his death bed.

This news spurred the young prince onward. He and his small band hurried through the deep forest to the foot of the Angry Mountain.

Night had fallen. It was too dark to climb the mountain, so the prince and his brave companions made camp. Scotty broke out his acoustic lute and they had a sing-song around a friendly fire.

The morning greeted them with bright sunshine, although the summit of the mountain was cloaked in dark clouds, and distant thunder could be heard. The Angry Mountain was living up to its name. Leaving the others behind, the prince and his most reliable companion, Bill, began their ascent of the mountain.

As they climbed, the thunder grew louder and more ominous.

Resting on a ledge 500 cubits above the canopy of the forest, Bill remarked on how regular the thunder rolls sounded. The young prince agreed. They continued their climb.

At 2000 cubits they came upon the entrance to a massive cave and stepped inside. It was immediately clear that the thunder claps, which were much louder now, were coming, not from the clouds above the mountain, but from somewhere deep inside the cave.

A dark tunnel led them to a broad cavern lit by a blue light. On the floor of the cavern they saw the dragon, its scales glistening in the blue light, sitting behind a gigantic drum kit, giving it the business.

Bill looked at the prince and the prince looked at Bill.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” said Bill.

“I think so,” said the prince.

#

The dragon wasn’t too happy about having his drum practice interrupted. He belched some fire at the two companions until the prince produced his father’s ring. After that, the dragon and the prince became the best of friends.

The dragon’s name was Jeremiah. They called him DJ for short. He soon barbecued Shale and his pathetic army, and when Prince Elvis and his band issued their debut album, everyone declared him The King.

© JJ Toner

For Chuck Wendig's Challenge http://terribleminds.com/ramble/2013/02/15/flash-fiction-challenge-write-what-you-know/