This short-order, self-published, POD Mad Novel of mine will comprise six chapters each of 8,000-10,000 words - except for the first one which has turned out to be around 13,000 words. I'm hoping to pare that down when I ruthlessly edit it later, although some over-length may be unavoidable due to the need to set the story up, introduce the rather large cast of characters and so on. I've made a decent start on the second chapter too: close on 3,000 words of fair quality. However, I think it makes more sense to measure my progress at this stage by the number of scenes I have completed to decent first-draft standard rather by the numbers of words I've produced. It is vital that I don't end up just covering paper, as it were. Tying-up a scene within a self-defined timeframe is more likely to exert the sort of discipline required if I'm to meet my ludicrous deadline. So let's quantify the task a different way. I'm anticipating each chapter comprising around six scenes. Six times six is thirty-six but let's round that up to forty just in case. I have six of those forty scenes in good enough order to set them aside for now. I have another three underway. And I have three weeks left to finish the whole thing. Gulp.
Meanwhile, here's a tiny taste of what I've done so far. It features two of the main characters: Genevieve Low-Bunga, Cultural And Moral Philosophy post-graduate prodigy from the University of Virginia Waters and her teenage sidekick and protege. They are watching a football match between two under-11 teams on the protege's home town recreation ground. There's just been a controversial sending off.
"As the game got back underway Genevieve turned to her companion, a young man she outranked by nearly a foot.
'So Wilfred,' she said, 'How do you interpret the conflictual bricollage which we are both observers of and, albeit tangentially, participants in too?'
Wilfred Tapscott – 'Wilfy', since the demotic code shall always apply here - glanced up at Genevieve from deep within the fur-lined hood of his camouflage print parka. Before answering, he took a good look round. The match was being held on the permanently half-ruined recreation ground of a small town called Fullbladder, the truly, madly, deeply unrewarding place where Wilfy had been born seventeen years earlier and had lived his entire life since. The landscape of the rec was imprinted on his soul, as were those that stretched beyond it: climbing away on one side, the wind-hammered, sheep-mottled Fullbladder Moor. On the other, narrow streets ridged like dinosaurs’ spines with tiny terraced houses and at their addled heart the Poundstretcher panorama of Fullbladder town centre.
Wilfy's customary tone when speaking of his hometown was one of sledgehammer deadpan. This was a true reflection of his attitude to it, but also a means of concealing both his immersion in its stagnation and his addiction to its lore. Fullbladder's biggest claim to fame was the lynching in 1317 of a resident simpleton, the so-called 'Fullbladder Len', for aggravated hog-worrying. According to Fullbladder: Myth and Mystery, a local history pamphlet compiled by Fullbladder’s now ex-librarian, the culprit was forced to endure 'obliteration by blancmange' - though this may have been a misprint - a demise greatly enjoyed by a crowd of 'several score'. Wilfy made much of relishing this heritage when inhabiting the ironising persona he habitually chose to present to the world. Yet he was secretly excited that Len's pre-eminence in Fullbladder history was certain to be eclipsed late on the coming afternoon when a different kind of slaughter would occur - that of the local football team Fullbladder Athletic by the visiting potentates of Mancunia Global in the Third Round of the FA Cup.
Wilfy had his ticket in his pocket and Genevieve had hers too. For now, though, both were absorbed by the contest before them and by its many dissonant resonances.
'Well, Wilfred?' pressed Genevieve, towering gorgeously above him. 'I await your insights.'
'It's all bollocks, intit?' Wilfy replied."
So, do you like it? If you do, tell me so. If you don't, sod off. More soon.