Category: youtube

Better than telly

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youtube zero moment

Glad to be back

How to adjust to being back from what may well be the best holiday of my life…? Yes – it was perfect. And so was the company of my sister, brother-in-law, niece and nephews.

Cos sometimes it can be a right downer, getting back to the everyday disorder of life. And I live with people who have decided to torture me on a daily basis with their flagrant disregard for my OCD. Everywhere I look in my house I see things which make me sad.

I do have a choice, obviously – I can give up all notion of doing anything else with my life other than cleaning and tidying after my children. Or I can try to ignore it by writing stories.

(Btw you wouldn’t know I have OCD-levels of tidiness tendencies to look at my house, you’d think ‘what a family of slobs.’)

That’s why I don’t invite people to my house. (A Stygian stables of housework or stories. Can’t manage both.)

Luckily I have a job I totally love – I write children’s books and I’ve just started a new one. A few nice literary festivals coming up – Stratford, Hay-on-Wye, West End Festival in Glasgow.

Joshua 3 (ZERO MOMENT) to revise. Joshua 4 (title under wraps) to write. I met Editor Polly for coffee and cake in Oxford yesterday. We chatted about what needs doing on ZERO MOMENT and then I told her The Entire Plot Of Joshua 4.

That’s right. Someone apart from me now knows what is going to happen in the next two Joshua books.

Ahhh but. I know that some of you are watching this blog for any hints of what is going to happen. Well there’s a lot I won’t reveal because it’s part of the Puzzly Twisty Mysterious side of the story. But maybe I can let spill that the Sweet Lurve side of the story is going to develop over the next two books. And mostly it will be agony for Josh. I’ve been listening to a lot of songs about boys in love with girls they can’t have. heh heh.

Frank (German translator of Joshua) says I am ‘evil’. Or was it ‘cruel’? It’s true. I am. But what am I gonna do? Unrequited love is the only romantic kind.

Been watching lots of YouTube too. Seinfeld, salsa dancing. I hear there’s a bigscreen version of this where the shows go on for ages! Must investigate.

Here’s a YouTube clip of cute Northerner, Anthony Hill, a student who is also a singer-songwriter. Does a lovely line in covers of other songs too. Sings while playing guitar, sitting on his bed.

This is his version of Scouting for Girls ‘She’s So Lovely’. All about a guy in love with a girl – who has a boyfriend. “She’s so lovely…” he sings and wonders, “I don’t know how we’ll make it through this…”

Yep. That’s Josh in the next two books. *evil laff* Can you guess who the girl is?

If you enjoy this, be sure to watch some of Anthony’s own songs. My new favourite is Ode to Sangria.

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cuba raves salsa youtube

Best. Rueda. Ever.


I think, after spending quite some time on YouTube looking for it, I have unearthed a vid of the best rueda ever.

Filmed in one of those shabby, dilapidated-yet-once-grand Havana buildings, it’s easy to miss how great this is (if you didn’t read the title), because of the lack of an audience and the very plain dress of the dancers – just crisp white cotton dresses for women and shirts and trousers for guys.

But watch for more than a minute and you’ll see what I mean. Unbelievably cool, stylish Cuban dancers full of AZUCAR! and SABOR! and incredble choreography.

Watching this, frankly, makes me feel like:
a) I have basically wasted my life so far by not being able to dance like this, with people like this.
b) The rest of my life will be wasted if I don’t drop everything so that I can dance like this, with people like this.

Not saying I HAVE wasted my life, or that I am about to drop anything. I’m just saying how it makes me feel.

If you adore Cuban salsa, you will understand. Also how badly it makes me want to go back to Cuba. WAHHH!

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ice shock youtube

Josh’s state of mind in ICE SHOCK

Okay, since ‘Clues about the plot’ (of ICE SHOCK) is leading in the poll I’ll give you the first one.

I begin each book with thinking hard about the state of mind of the hero – in this case Josh.

How does he feel after the previous adventure? What’s he been through since then? Some emotions might have settled…others have festered. He isn’t in the same emotional state as he was at the end of the last book. Months have passed and when you are a teenager, months can make a huge difference.

So Josh is brooding on what has gone before…and then the story starts when I throw him a curve ball.

Some bit of new information arrives to utterly disrupt his world. In INVISIBLE CITY the news is that his father is dead. In ICE SHOCK too, the news is about his father.

A rumour; something that Josh didn’t know about those last days. Someone comes forward with an astonishing revelation. And that person is a character named Rodrigo del Pozo.

In fact I know a guy called Rodrigo del Pozo and with his permission I’ve borrowed his name and profession for the character. My friend Rodrigo, like the character in ICE SHOCK, is a singer, a tenor who specialises in early and renaissance music.

In real life, Rodrigo’s family and mine became friends when our eldest daughters met at the local Catholic primary school. Then, like the character in the story, they moved back to Santiago de Chile. I thought it would be fun to give Josh’s father a friend with the same name and profession, And then have that character turn up with an astonishing revelation.

But what will it be? Here’s a clue…it’s linked to the last known position of the Ix Codex before Josh’s grandfather, Aureliano, took it back to Mexico.

Meanwhile, if you enjoy music, take a look at Rodrigo’s website or listen to this clip on YouTube, where Rodrigo displays the virtuosity of his voice and range – without every sounding like a ‘screaming drag queen’. As he used to put it.

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writing youtube zero moment

Joshua 3 – Racing for the curtain

‘Racing for the curtain’ is how some screenwriters refer to the increased pace of Act III, when everything hots up as the character, story and plot all ‘race for the curtain’.

In some senses, even the writer experiences the race. As the plot speeds up, climax follows crisis, with last-minute challenges to the escape and everything heads for the denouement, so does the speed of writing. As my pal, author Susie Day put it to me the other day, “You want to be writing it as fast as your readers would be reading it.”

So it’s surprising and gratifying to find that even now, even with a planning freak like me, something can pop out of the subconscious, some last minute discovery of a detail that can be used to work a theme right through the book.

I’ve had it happen before, in every book I’ve written. It usually hits around Act II. This time I’m about just 12,000 words before the end of ZERO MOMENT (current working title for Joshua 3). And on Saturday night, it hit.

I was a little tipsy from my half of the M&S dine-in-for-2 wine. Suddenly I had an urge to write, and to jump ahead in the narrative and write the final scene of ZERO MOMENT. (I did this also for INVISIBLE CITY).

I was listening to some music to get myself in the right mood – the music that would be playing at that point of the story. I looked up the English lyrics for the tune that was playing – the version was instrumental-only. And I realised that they were perfect for the song which has a major role in the story. (Technically it acts as a synecdoche referring to Josh’s sister and father-via-sister). I had previously chosen a different song ‘Dream A Little Dream Of Me’. But in fact the title, the lyric and the composer of this other song made it much more appropriate.

The song is ‘Wave’ by Antonio Carlos (‘Tom’) Jobim, that master of bossa nova. (And if you remember INVISIBLE CITY, ‘Waters of March’ – Aguas de Marco by Jobim is Josh’s parents’ favourite tune) I count ‘Wave’ as perhaps my favourite jazz song (although ‘Stardust’ and ‘Me, Myself and I’ are also contenders). These are the translated lyrics:

So close your eyes
For thats a lovely way to be
Aware of things your heart alone was meant to see
The fundamental loneliness goes whenever two can dream a dream togetherYou can’t deny don’t try to fight the rising sea
Don’t fight the moon, the stars above and don’t fight me
The fundamental loneliness goes whenever two can dream a dream together

When I saw you first the time was halfpast three
When your eyes met mine it was eternity

By now we know the wave is on its way to be
Just catch that wave don’t be afraid of loving me
The fundamental loneliness goes whenever two can dream a dream together

When I saw you first the time was halfpast three
When your eyes met mine it was eternity

By now we know the wave is on its way to be
Just catch that wave don’t be afraid of loving me
The fundamental loneliness goes whenever two can dream a dream together

Dreams and jazz are elements which I find myself repeating in my stories. Partly because dreams and jazz mean such a lot to me, partly because Haruki does that also, to such wonderful effect that I can’t help but emulate and partly because I’m probably not imaginative enough to think of any other way to create the desired effect.

So in Joshua 3, as in INVISIBLE CITY and in ICE SHOCK I’m pulling out the same corny trick. (Yes, I have to face up to the fact that deep down I’m deeply sentimental. For goodness sakes don’t tell anyone.)

‘Wave’. How did it take me until almost the end to realise that this is the song? It even fits in with the Brazilian theme of the novel.

Wah. I am going to miss writing ZERO MOMENT. I can already feel the first pangs of loss (I always feel like this towards the ending.)

Oh – I’ve selected a choice Youtube clip of Jobim performing ‘Wave’ (instrumental version) with the legendary Herbie Hancock. If you like it, look at some others. It’s a real favourite with fans of bossa nova.

Now you only have to wait until March 2010 to understand the context of this post…

Categories
salsa videos youtube

Belatedly, Oscar D’Leon

oscar-deleon.JPG
Around six weeks ago we went to see Oscar D’Leon at the Roundhouse in London. Aged 65, he’s one of the top salsa stars in the world. Which means that despite living in Oxford UK, hardly the home of salsa, I have now seen:

Oscar D’Leon (London)
Charanga Habanera (London)
Manolito y Su Trabuco (London)
Maikel Blanco (Havana)
Pupy y los que Son Son (Havana)
Septeto Santiaguero (Santiago de Cuba)
Los Van Van (London)
Buena Vista Social Club (London)
Afro-Cuban All-Stars (London)
Celia Cruz (London)
Jose Alberto (London)

If you’re not a salsa fan this won’t mean anything to you. But it’s roughly equivalent for an indie-rock/pop fan to have seen the Rolling Stones, David Bowie, Blur, Oasis, Arctic Monkeys, Green Day and whatnot.

Damn I feel lucky. Oscar D’Leon, what can I say? He’s an amazing performer, a formidable dancer and bass player; he sang and elegantly danced his way through a two-hour set without a break, almost without pausing between songs. He can improvise in the most amazing way (but so can all the best soneros I’ve seen).

And he can do reggaeton. Maybe not like a young hipster. But man, he gives it a go.

Here’s a video I recorded that evening – quickly risen to be my Youtube channel’s most popular video. It’s distant – we were far away, but you can sense the energy in the audience. The camera work is a bit shaky for the first 30 seconds because I literally couldn’t stand still, I was so excited.

I mean. OSCAR D’LEON!!!! Jess – espero que te gusta pero MUCHO!