A novel about the connections between things, about the inextricable links which exist between us all, Our actions, their consequences and the hidden power dwelling within each of us.
I began to 'write' this novel with sequences about dreams in 1987, when I was twenty years old and living in Lancaster. I knew then that the idea would grow into a novel, but never imagined that I would finally finish it in February 2003. I wrote the novel under the working title of 'The Domino Effect' .The idea of the Domino Effect was a simple one, and I even pictured the cover artwork for the novel to be Magritte-like figures toppling one another. Actually, the initial dream sequences I wrote didn't make it intact into the final version; I found they detracted too much from my main focus. In the final analysis, the novel is called 'is'.
The novel has been published through Adlibbed Ltd. It is available now through Amazon and Barnes and Noble.
snippets
"A southern Cornish beach. Rocky. Sandy. Small children with bamboo fishing nets and plastic buckets inspect and torture crabs, shrimps and periwinkles: whatever they can find. It's too windy for the beach really. People are huddled behind their variously coloured, but uniformly garish, windbreaks. Wind-broken. An optimistically raised beach umbrella - for the sun here, for the threatening rain there - now dances crazily along the shoreline. It is chased, not-chased, by a sunburnt man in his mid-twenties, self-consciously trying to run without seeming to run. The tide is out but turning. Seagulls populate the sand flats, mug-worming when the myriad children, oblivious to the wind, allow them a few seconds' peace. Now and then a lone gannet joins the feast, its black-tipped wings scattering its smaller rivals, but never for long."
"But if you use it, believe in it, and practise, you'll find that it is you in charge of your happiness. It's a state of mind you choose, the same as depression, loneliness, and fear. We choose those too, but they are easy and they grow of themselves. Happiness, contentment - enlightenment, if you want to get all spiritual - they are harder and they take practice, practice and more practice."
"I wonder if that's not what God is. Not the Biblical bullyboy dictator, but simply a state of mind, an acceptance of what 'is' and the ability to create your own feelings and existence. To become more at peace with who we are. Maybe even to recognise that who we really are is simply who we choose to be, each day, and every day."
Sunday, September 24, 2006
