RIP Diana Wynne Jones.

Diana Wynne Jones died today, and I feel like I've lost a friend. I've been reading her novels for over thirty years. I love her work so much that I bought Enchanted Glass the other day at the school book fair, (allegedly for my daughter, but I'm enjoying it a great deal thank you very much).

I can still remember the first DWJ novel I read. I was in the school library one lunchtime when I came across  Power of Three. Browsing through the shelves I picked out a nice chunky book, with an enticing front cover - a grey shape emerging out of the water. I sat down and began to read and was immediately drawn into the atmospheric world of Otmounders, Dorig and Giants, and the story of how the curse of a dying Dorig has to be undone if the three communities are going to survive. I couldn't put it down, and though I haven't read it for years, I have never forgotten it. As a gawky, unsure thirteen year old, I completely identified with the central character Gair, who is the only child in his family to lack a special gift. I loved the way Gair learnt to believe in himself, to act courageously and that the very thing he thinks makes him useless, is in fact the best gift of all. It took me a couple more years to develop my self-confidence but books like Power of Three were a great comfort to me in the mean time.

After Power of Three, I read The Homeward Bounders, a  somewhat dark tale of children trapped in a virtual gaming world that seems enormously prescient now. Next was Wilkins' Tooth, a group of kids responding to bullying by trying to set  up Own Back Ltd with disastrous results. In The Ogre Downstairs, two families come together when their parents marry, creating conflict between the children. When they are given magical chemistry sets, chaos ensues, and they learn to understand each other better. Then there's Dogsbody ( I love Dogsbody) which tells the story of Sirius the Dog Star, who loses his powers and comes to earth as a dog, in order to find a Zoi. The trouble is he can't remember what a Zoi is, and is too full of doggy thoughts to work out how to find it. Eight Days of Luke rewrites Norse mythology when an unhappy boy curses his relatives and releases the God Loki from his prison. And of course, there are the Chrestomanci stories, Charmed Life, The Lives of Christopher Chant, Conrad's Fate,The  Magicians of Caprona and others, set in a parallel world where magic is part of every day life and managed by the government post of Chrestomanci.

My absolute favourite has to be Hexwood which I picked  up at my Mum's house, my sister had brought it for our nephew and he had left it behind. It is a stunning book, not really for children at all. It starts with a girl, Ann Stavely sick in bed, watching the strange comings and goings of people to the Hexwood Farm opposite, whilst she talks to four voices in her head, The King, the Prisoner, The Boy, The Slave. Then suddenly, we are transported to another planet where a group of shadowy leaders are trying to rectify a virtual game on Earth that has gone awry. Various characters are sent off to see what has happened, without resolving matters. Meanwhile, as Ann recovers from her illness, she decides to visit the Farm  where she meets a strange character called Mordion and a boy called Hume. The story is told in a complicated time frame with Ann encountering the two of them at different stages of their lives, and then reaches a startling revelation about half way through which completely changes everything you've read up to that point. A very complex narrative structure is wrapped up with a satisfying ending in a story that has explored issues of power, corruption, child soldiers, and slavery. It's fantastic, I can't recommend it highly enough.

Overall, what I have loved about Wynne Jones all these years was her ability to create believable authentic fantasy worlds, tell stories with wit, compassion and heart. But her stories weren't just about magical worlds, they all had a message: the importance of reconciliation; self discovery; overcoming fear, standing up to bullies. But she did it in such a subtle way, that I never felt she was preaching and I always learnt something.

Coincidentally, I learnt of Diana Wynne Jones' death just as I reached Hyde Park today at the end of the anti cuts march. The middle of a good humoured crowd of people, standing up for what they believed in, seemed a good place to mourn the loss of a writer, who has inspired me for years.

So thank you Diana, for all the wonderful books and characters. I know I'm not alone in saying I'll miss you. The world is a duller place without you.

Red Shoes #fridayflash

The girl totters on the edge of the pavement. The heels on her red stilettos are high enough and thin enough that if she moves one inch forward she'll fall in front of the cars racing past her. I feel like yelling, "Be careful love," but she won't hear me from down there. Instead I watch her trying to put her umbrella up. It looks like one of the crap ones from the 99p store - it ain't no wonder,  it keeps blowing inside out.  Despite the weather, she's wearing next to nothing - a thin white cardigan over a low cut blouse, a short black skirt, bare legs. She must be freezing dressed like that, yet she don't seem to notice. She just teeters on the brink of danger. Looks like she's trying to decide something.

I used to dress like that, not caring about the wind and rain, so long as the look was right. I even had a pair of shoes to match - ruby red and glistening with fake diamonds. The were magic - my red shiny shoes - just one click of the heels and off we'd dance on other adventure  - clubs, parties, concerts, we went everywhere together. Why, we even once tripped off with a fella up to Blackpool to see the lights. Fantastic they were, and so was he. And he wasn't the only one, neither. My lucky shoes took me dancing, night after night, bloke after bloke.Lovely days they were. Till we danced into George. And after that, I didn't need no more excitement, I had enough right here at home. Life was like that for ever such a long time.

Of course, we don't get up to much these days, George and I. There's not much scope in this tiny flat. And who wants to go out in this wind, when you need thermals just to go to the post office? I'm not like that girl in the street no more. Those days are long gone.

The rain has eased off and  the girl's put her brolly down. She turns her head slightly and gazes back this way. Perhaps she's looking at someone, her eyes rest on the flats next door. I'm probably making it up- but it seems to me she's saying goodbye. She turns back towards the road, as if she's come to a decision. Yes, she's taking a step onto the street. There she goes, dashing across the traffic on the dual carriageway. I watch her trip her way towards the tube. You go my girl - I think - click your heels and be off.

The clock strikes five. The sun comes out from behind a cloud. Perhaps there'll be a rainbow in a minute. I don't have to wait though. George needs his tea. He don't like it when I keep him waiting. I slip my red slippers back on and head to the kitchen. I think we'll have chops tonight.

Writing Heroes (1)

It being World Book Day, it seems like a good moment to celebrate my Writing Heroes (and answer my daughter's question as she asked  me this the other day).

So here, in no particular order, are SOME of them.

Virginia Woolf - I find it comforting to share my name with such a literary genius. She wrote stream of consciousness like no-one else can, and made it accessible too. I love the inherent sadness of the passing o f time in To the Lighthouse,  the rollercoaster exuberance of Orlando but my all time favourite is Mrs Dalloway.  A masterclass in stream of consciousness, she makes it look so simple, as she hops between the minds of her characters, panning out to take in huge scenes and then back to tiny, intimate memories. And it goes without saying that her seminal lecture - A Room of One's Own  will always be my inspiration.

Charles Dickens - Victorian fiction is sometimes seen as a little old fashioned these days. But I ADORE old fashioned. Good, straight narrative with passion and heart. Dickens is fantastic at creating memorable characters, from the "ever so humble" Uriah Heap, in David Copperfield,  the cold, but conscience stricken Ralph Nickleby in Nicholas Nickleby, the uptight, violent school teacher Bradley Headstone in Our Mutual Friend, hard-hearted mercenary Estella in Great Expectations, and her slightly kinder sister, Bella Wilfer in Our Mutual Friend, Lady Deadlock and Mr Tulkinghorn in Bleak House.  I could go on, and on. He's also brilliant at creating atmospheric landscapes, the marshes in Great Expectations,  the river in Our Mutual Friend, the mean streets in Oliver Twist. He's funny and ironic, and his writing burns with a passionate rage at the social injustices of his day. What's not to love?

Charlotte and Emily Bronte - As I said, I'm a sucker for Victorian fiction. I like most of Charlotte Bronte's books, but obviously, Jane Eyre is the favourite.The opening scene where sensitive Jane is locked in the Red Room by her cruel aunt packs a powerful punch. The hypocrisy of Mr Brocklehurst at Lowood Orphanage, the burgeoning relationship with Mr Rochester (bordering on the sadistic from his point of view), the chance of happiness ruined by the secret he harbours. And Jane's finest hour when she refuses to be Mr Rochester's mistress, and then later St John's wife, in order to be true to herself. Wonderful stuff. Equally wonderful is Emily's Wuthering Heights (I refuse to rate one above the other). I love the way she describes the landscape and how storms rage outside and within the character's lives. And though it's often painted as a love story, in fact the central Heathcliff/Cathy romance is more a tale of terrible obsession and how it destroys everything around it. Emily is ahead of her time in showing how the cycle of abuse is created from generation to generation, but can be broken in the end by true love, as the burgeoning relationship of young Cathy and Hareton demonstrates. Love them both.

Graham Greene - I blogged at length last year about Graham Greene's skill. So I'll just say here, he's a great storyteller, with fine novels on good/evil/hope/despair/faith/politics, and creates fantastic landscapes and characters with the sparest details. Particular favourites are Brighton Rock, Stamboul Train, The Power and the Glory, The Heart of Matter, The Quiet American, Our Man in Havana, The Third Man.

EM Forster - At his best EM Forster is peerless, quietly and humorously debunks the mores of his time. In A Room with A View he attacks English lack of feeling and hypocrisy, in praise of experiencing real emotion and living life truly. A Passage to India challenges the very notion of the British Empire, not only giving the Indians a voice, but allowing them to laugh at the British too. He's also a fine story writer, with my favourite "When the Machine Stopped"  envisaging a world where people stayin their rooms underground speaking to each other on video machines. But his best work has to be "Howard's End" a brilliantly crafted novel highlighting the clash of the personal and political, the emotional and practical, the spiritual and logical selves, and how we have to  unite them, if we are to live as full human beings.

Margaret Atwood -  Atwood's first novel, The Edible Woman, ends with the main character eating a cake of herself in a wedding dress, after she realises she is selling herself short with the man she was going to marry. Her early novels follow on the theme with her heroines breaking out from stultifying lives in a hygienically clean Toronto. I particularly like the writer in Lady Oracle who keeps running away from her life, changing hair colour and faking her own death at one point. But the wonder of Atwood is she keeps trying new things. There's The Handmaid's Tale a terrible dystopia where a woman's lot is decidedly unhappy, The Blind Assassin (a writer remembers the real story of her youth), The Robber Bride (three friends unite to defeat the woman who stole their men), Alias Grace (the mind of a possible murderess) and more recent forays into science fiction, Oryx and Crake and After the Flood. Atwood is in England tonight, reading to 10,000 people in Trafalgar Square. Lucky them!

And that's just the start...Looks like this will have to be a regular feature.

Happy World Book Day!

Blast from the Past #fridayflash

It is all a bit different from her last visit. Way back in the '80's when she was experiencing her summer of love. A personal rebellion against the constraints of South London surburbia - living in exciting sin with Oz in his Liverpool bedsit. A complete success in the appalling-your-parents stakes, made even more so, by her refusal to return home and get a job.  Instead, she and Oz slept all day, and spent the evenings among the pseudo-anarchists he called friends. The men dressed in black trousers and roll-neck jumpers, wore National Health glasses and smoked roll-ups. The women had long dark hair, wore flowing dresses and hennaed tattoos on their arms..They talked till the small hours about the Contra rebellion, the miner's strike, the virtues of free love. And every Thursday, they queued up with the rest of the unemployed in the foyer of the smoked- filled  dimly-lit dole office. The concrete floor was covered in discarded chewing gum, the rug in the corner, marked with cigarette burns. Grey paint peeled from the wall, and the unsmiling staff gave out the weekly cheque from behind reinforced glass. It felt authentic. Real. That they were living the rebellion already.

It's not like that today. Dole in the twenty first century comes courtesy of IKEA. Bright blue sofas adorn the foyer, air-fresh and cleanly-lit with white striplights. The walls are painted pale yellow, the carpet, a soft fawn. The reinforced glass has been replaced by cheery security guards, who take her details and tell her they'll call her for her appointment. She might as well be at the doctors.

Back then, she and Oz convinced themselves they were on the side of the oppressed. Claiming the dole brought them into contact with Thatcher's victims. By opting out of the capitalist labour market, they were refusing to prop up the corrupt system. They were young,  free, in love. They were going to change the world.  Till she came home one afternoon, and discovered Oz practising free love with one of the dark haired anarchistas and realised there was more to life than revolution. She returned to her studies with enthusiasm, graduating, much to the relief of her parents, with a first that propelled her ever upwards.

Until now. It's unreal and unsettling, but here she is. With the redundancy money gone, her savings eaten up by mortgage payments, what choice does she have? She looks around the room, and for the first time, sees her fellow claimants. When she and Oz queued up in the old days, they never thought about the preoccupations of their fellow unemployed. Now, Oz is too busy being a media darling, he wouldn't be seen dead here. It is left to her to look across at the bald man with the bewildered air, and wonder whether he has just lost his job, or has been coming for a while. And is it stereotyping to think that the young mum trying to control her toddler has never had a job?  Or the lads coming in from their quick smoke out the front are boasting about skirmishes with the law? But most of all she wonders about herself. No lover, no parents, no end of degree to fall back on. What is she going to do now?

The security guard calls her name and indicates the lift. Second floor, third desk on the right, Ellen Chapman. She picks herself up with a slight sigh and follows his pointing finger. If this is going to be her life from now on, she'd better get used to it.

The Devil's Detail #fridayflash

"Morning Melissa," he smiles, and not for the first time, wonders how much longer he'll have to put up with her catatonic grin.

I should have looked at the small print, he thinks, as he does every Friday at eleven o'clock. He pulls up a chair for her and brings her a cup of coffee. Dad always said the devil's in the detail. But at the time, there just wasn't time. We had to get the deal struck and I relied on my team. I had more important things to do.Maintaining a media presence. Looking statesmanlike. I had to trust my boys would get the best deal. What else could I do?

Melissa tries not to wince at his faux-chivalry. How an earth has this happened? A year ago, I was riding high, now I'm just a laughing stock. She smiles, hiding her disdain for the smoothness of James' chin behind a sip of coffee. I shouldn't have left it to the boys. I thought they'd put the party first. Think of the good of the country. It didn't even cross my mind that the real ties that bind are formed in the playground.

"What's the latest Whip count?" his teeth glint in the morning sun.

"Sixty yeas, ten abstentions, ten nays. On your side?"

"Two hundred and forty yeas, six abstentions plus 11 from the other parties."

"So we're safe then?"

He resists the impulse to add, "No thanks to you." Instead, "It would help if you could rein Mark Townsend in."

Melissa stares down at her coffee spoon. The bastard, the total bastard.

 "He's making waves you see,"  his eyes gaze at her with fake sincerity, "And I believe you have some influence?"

She stirs her coffee.  Leave now, and the party is destroyed. Stay and I ruin every relationship I have. But once you make a deal with the devil, life becomes a series of increasingly unpalatable choices.

She smiles back, his equal in sincerity, if nothing else. "Of course, James. Now tell me, what is it you want me to do?"

After He'd Gone

After he'd gone, all that was left in the bedsit was:
A half emptied bookcase.
The stain of brown whisky at the bottom of the glass.
Rumpled sheets on his side of the bed.

After he'd gone, she lay on the sofa, coiled cobra-like, listening for the step of his feet returning up the stairwell. The click of his key turning in the lock. But the only sounds were the shuffle of Marjorie-next door making her way to the bathroom; the thunderous descent of Dec from upstairs and his friends heading out to the pub.

After he'd gone, each second that passed expanded longer than the last. The glowing red numbers on the digital clock moved the evening forward in freeze frame. The sodium-glare outside her window shone on a world of revellers, singing  and dancing through the night.

After he'd gone, all that was left in the morning was a rumpled emptiness. The stain of betrayal of their life that never was. All that remained was a half-life. But since that was all she was left with, she uncoiled herself from the couch, and took herself to the shower.

A life half-lived is better than none.

#FridayFlash Nobody's Fault

It cain't be my fault. I weren't even there. You cain't blame me. So I made a few off-tha-wall comments. I painted a picture to make ma point. Every right-minded individual knows I weren't serious. T'aint nothing to do with me.

Don't look at me. I'm a teacher,not a social worker. I'm just glad if they make it into school. I can't be held responsible for what they do outside. That's their parents' job isn't it?

How is this my fault? With my slender majority, I can't afford to ignore public opinion. I'm too junior to have a voice. If I speak out on controversial subjects too soon, that's my career down the pan. Besides, it's impossible to legislate for this sort of thing isn't it?

Whatcha  looking at me for? All I did was serve him. I've got a business to run. Gotta feed my family haven't I? I only give the public what they want. What they do with the merchandise after is up to them. So don't you come round here and point that finger at me.

Don't you go saying it's my fault. I gave that boy everything he ever wanted. Love and kindness, all the toys he ever needed, a gun to celebrate reaching manhood. Sure he's spend the last few years in his bedroom in front of the computer. But doesn't every kid? What can you do about it?

Why does everyone always look at me like that? Like I'm a fracking alien? Mum and those bastards at school were always on my case. The politicos pretended to help, but they lied. The Radio Lady was right, Cylons are real. I had to stop them. So I went to the only man I could trust, got what I needed, and hunted them all down. You're too blind to see the truth is'all.

It's not my fault. You can't blame me.