Well, I'm not seriously writing it, man - not yet. But I've written a full page, and polished it. I'm very pleased with it. It took me a couple of hours.
It will be like a Louis-Ferdinand Celine or Henry Miller novel. An exaggerated version of my own life, like. 'Like Papillon, boss!' Yes, Voice. The greatest true story of escape and adventure ever written. Ha, ha, ha!
Music comes first, of course. If I can record my demo, Christ! If I can finish my BIG TEN, Christ! Then I might have the time to work on my book. Or I might forget all about it.
Plot? I'm not much interested in plot. The important thing will be the concentration of the writing. Martin Amis' Money is a good model for this - which I think is the best novel in the last fifty or so years. Amis squeezes about four times more "entertainment" into each page than your average author. I think Money is around 450 pages long, so it's more like 1,800 pages. 'It's just like those washing-up liquids, boss, that put more into a bottle. You know, concentrated.' Yes, I know what you mean.
The last time I seriously tried to write a novel was ... er ... way before starting this blog, actually. 2004? 2005? I can't remember. BUT ... the words didn't flow, and it took me longer to polish. I only wrote five or six pages then. NOW ... it's easy, after ... how many words in this blog? Well, my files are on my other laptop, but I would say, roughly ... 1,300,000 words of this sort of writing plus ... er ... 2,200,000 words of conceptual writing. It all helps, you know. My novel will only be eighty or ninety thousand words.
But don't get it twisted, kook(s)! It's my music that matters. I think The Future is going to be a really exciting rock song. Obviously, it needs a lyric. 'How many lyrics do you need now?' You're my manager, Voice. 'Well, okay, you need four lyrics, which will give you a total of seventeen songs.' Thank you.
Yeah, yeah.
It's nice to have the idea of the novel in reserve though. In case everything turns to shit. Henri Charriere only started work on Papillon because an earthquake destroyed his nightclub.
And I won't even need anything as serious as an earthquake, believe me.
Bye!
