New Year, New Decade, New Jacko?
Posted by Jacko | Filed under ManChat
Hey guys. Haven’t been on here for a while as I’ve been away visiting family over Christmas, and since then I’ve been putting the final touches to the second volume of The Great Right Hope series, A Fistful of Rubbers, which is now with Zetta Brown, the editor for LL-Publications. Finally, it’s done with, and now I have time for some more blogging and let me start by saying Happy New Year.
Yes, folks, a new year and a new year decade. In April, I will say goodbye to my twenties, too, and say hello to my…erm…thirties, yes, that’s the one.
Shit.
I don’t want to really talk about that. Nope, I don’t want to talk about the future, it only brings old age, boredom, kids playing on your lawn and a life-changing increases in the price of ham, and possibly global warming and shit.
So, let’s look backwards, and let’s take a look at the decade we said goodbye to, the noughties. What happened in the noughties? We (England) lost at a lot of sporting events; terrorism reached sickening heights; Usain Bolt ran really, really fast; and the first ever film about bumming cowboys was released. I ain’t really much cop at history, and I can’t be bothered with researching owt, either, as that isn’t my style. To be honest, I can’t be arsed to talk about the past, as that’s in the past, and the future is the only thing that matters, right?
What I will say, is that on a particular supernatural day in the noughties I experienced, for the first and only time, what can only be classed as divination. Unfortunately, my foretelling wasn’t the kind that would ever bag me a lot of money, or any, for that matter. It would not put me in a position where I could make a difference to the world. My vision came to me when two girls danced and sang (technically questionable) their way on to my television screen. Those Transylvanian girls were cheeky little things, indeed, and they were indeed, The Cheeky Girls.
The cheeky girls hit our screens in 2002 when they auditioned for Popstars The Rivals, and from that came the song, The Cheeky Song (Touch My Bum), and even though in 2004, it was voted the worst pop record of all time in a Channel 4, it still got to number two in the UK charts. Number, f***ing two, can you believe that? This country. This f**ing country. To summarise, they’re mum writes their songs; in 2006 they filed for bankruptcy; and in 2007 they had tit jobs.
I was convinced my 2002 prediction would come true, and everything was building up to its ultimate fulfilment. Even up to the end of December 2009, I was convinced that I couldn’t be wrong. I told the world, my friends and loved ones, as a 22 year-old kid, that it was a guaranteed dead cert that one of the cheeky girls would become a porn star by the end of the decade.
And they didn’t!
So the title of this post was “A New Year, A New Decade, A New Jacko?” So is there going to be a new Jacko? Well, probably not; not unless I win the lottery, or someone gives me a multi-million quid book deal, but one thing I will say, is that I predict, that by the end of this decade, by midnight, December 31st 2019, one of the Cheeky Girls will be in porno, somewhere on the internet.
Mark my words.
Tags: A Fistful of Rubbers, divination, England, getting old, global warming and shit, Happy New Year, LL-Publications, mark jackman, Nostradamus, Popstars, porn, sport, The Cheeky Girls, The Great Right Hope, the price of ham, The Rivals, thirties, twenties, UK Charts, Usain Bolt, Zetta Brown
Review: “Pit Stop” by Ben Larken
Posted by Jacko | Filed under Jacko's Reviews
I was hoping to have reviewed more books by now, but, alas, no. I’ve been caught up writing A Fistful of Rubbers. Now that is done, or at least, a draft has been handed into my publisher, I am free once more to roam, to play, and to frolic.
To begin my season of frolicking, I am going to review an award winner. Pit Stop is Ben Larken’s debut novel, and it won best horror in the Eppie Awards, 2009. The Eppies recognise outstanding achievement in the world of electronic publishing (Pit Stop is available both electronically and as a paperback), and to win one with your first novel is something special indeed. So, I am going to read it and I am going to review this “award winner.” And let me warn you, Ben Larken, I am one jealous bitch…
…who was very impressed, very entertained and ultimately enthralled by your work.
Pit Stop follows the journey of ten individuals…actually, no, first line in and already I’ve misguided you. Pit Stop is not about a journey, at all. It’s a story of waiting; ten people, waiting for their last voyage, a one-way ticket to Hell. Impressively, everyone is dead from page one. It’s good to start on a high.
Ten souls wait in purgatory, and they’re waiting, strangely, in a service station. The Pit Stop, on Route 66 in Arizona, is somewhere I really wouldn’t fancy a coffee. The trip to Hell is not a pleasant thought, and if I was to use my deepest and darkest grey matter to concoct an image of the being that would guide me to the only place worse than Great Yarmouth, I’d be thinking spikes, tentacles, mucus, blood and possibly a little faeces. Bearing in mind the horrible nature of Larken’s warped mind, I was expecting a monstrosity from the very bowels of Hell…oh yeah, that’s sort of obvious, as it technically is something from the bowels of Hell. Still, I was expecting something a little scarier than a bus. However, as I got to know the bus and its psychopathic, ultra-powerful driver, Ramsey, I hoped that the bus would stop being so damned nasty. The bus and its driver are desperate to take the ten occupants of the diner straight to Lucifer and Pit Stop is the tale of their bid for freedom.
Pit Stop is unquestionably horror. It is gruesome, vile and disturbing in its imagery and Larken makes sure the reader not just sees the horrific violence, they feel it too. On top of that, with a set of characters lined up to be royally buggered in Hell, you know you are going to be in the same company as some rather unsavoury beasts. Paedophiles, murderers and prostitutes are the order of the day, but we have some heroes to make this a wonderfully eclectic mix of the damned. Scott Alders and Dustin Calloway are the boys you’ll be rooting for. Dustin’s a bad man with a talent for avoiding any heat that’s coming down on him (death not included). However, his heart is questionably in the right place. Scott Alders is the interesting one. He’s a straight down the line cop who puts his job first. From the start, you’ll be wondering what Office Alders did to earn a trip to Hell, possibly my only point of contention in the story.
Is Pit Stop scary? Pit Stop is a slasher tale with a beautifully evil stalker, Ramsey, who is roguely charismatic for someone who doesn’t really say much, and whose main role is to maim, torment and torture. Personally, I don’t find slashers particularly scary, even though I love them, and I get my kicks from the inventiveness of the violence and my affinity to the characters. Pit Stop had me routing for Scott and Dustin who are wonderfully linked. The book also appealed to my carnal instincts and my desire for bloodlust was well and truly satisfied. I desperately wanted to see some of the characters torn into a thousand gory pieces and Mr. Larken gave the mob what they wanted. To answer my initial question, I didn’t find Pit Stop particularly scary, but that wasn’t in the slightest bit detrimental to my enjoyment of the book (incidentally, I’ve just picked up his latest book, The Hollows, and read the first chapter and that scared the bejesus out of me. I’m hooked already).
Is Pit Stop worth reading? Oh yes, undoubtedly so. It’s an exceptionally good read from start to finish and Ben Larken should be extremely proud of what he has achieved. If you read this, Ben, not many fictional bad guys have quite grabbed my attention as much as Ramsey, the bus driver, and if you ever base a book solely on him, I’ll camp outside the bookstore, the night before, to get hold of it.
Listen out for Ben Larken. I won’t be the least bit surprised if you hear the name in the future.
Pit Stop is available direct from the publisher, LL-Publications, and is also available from Amazon (UK and USA
Find out more about Ben Larken on his website.
Tags: Ben Larken, e-book, Epic, Eppie, horror, Jacko, Jacko: Author, LL-Publications, mark jackman, paperback, Pit Stop, Ramsey, review
Getting Published
Posted by Jacko | Filed under Jacko: Author
This is the follow-up to my article Writing’s Brilliant. The title of my last piece wasn’t devilishly clever or witty like this one, and that was the intention. Writing is simply fun, and if you write for the pure enjoyment of creativity, you will find it a fulfilling venture. I also alluded to the business of authoring and how making a living is a tough ol’ game, hence why I have a day job where I use not a single cell of my creative grey matter.
However, you can’t go from writing to authoring in one fell swoop. There’s quite a big hurdle in the way, and one that is probably the most frustrating of all: getting published. I’m hoping that this article doesn’t come across as “Oh, I’ve been published, don’t you know, and this is how you might be able to do it.” If it is, I’m a shitter writer than I thought. I’ve had one fiction book published, The Great Right Hope. Book 2 in the trilogy should be out next year, and the final part is being written when I’m not doing stuff like this or working, so I’m hardly an expert on the matter. I’ll just tell you what I think is the best course of action and how I managed it.
Make sure your story’s good.
“Of course it’s good, my mum thought it was mint!” I’m sure she did. You need an honest viewpoint from someone who is not afraid to kick you in the nuts and watch as you collapse to the ground waiting for Hell to swallow you up. That’s why I gave my first ever draft of my first ever story to the missus to read.
You must have seen the auditions on X-Factor or American Idol when tone deaf, scabby horrible scrotes scream the house down with bastardisations of Britney, Robbie, Madge, Whitney, etc, and, then, when the judges slate them, these delusional idiots are genuinely, and I mean genuinely, shocked.
The mother of the scrote usually kicks off and security is forced to interject. Every time I see it, and it happens at least ten times a series, I can never quite believe it. Surely they know they stink? Surely their parents’ rose-tinted glasses aren’t that rosy? My old man sees it as his God-given right to tell me that I am shit at everything, and he does this with gusto and twenty-nine years of practise (although, for some reason, he’s got it into his head that I excel at swimming????). I wouldn’t have it any other way.
But that’s human nature isn’t it? “Everyone is a hypocrite except for me.” It is hard to see your own flaws, and that’s why you need people who will read your work from a completely independent viewpoint. People as in plural, as opinions are like arseholes, and they’re often dirty (I think that’s the saying). It is vital that someone tells you if your novel needs more work, or there are flaws, holes or rubbish characters. Hopefully, they’ll give you some positive feedback, too. You need to give the manuscript the best chance possible when you submit it.
Do you remember the first time?
The art of writing is a little bit like sex. Remember the first time you had sex? The first draft of your first story is going to be similar, and unless your story is half a page long and the hero wakes up and it is all a dream, it probably isn’t what you were hoping for. Even though the thirty second roll in the sack was technically rubbish, you still enjoyed yourself and were immensely proud, but you knew that you needed to practise before trying something real freaky. It’s the same with writing. You have to practise and learn grammar, tenses, building atmosphere, etc, and anything outside your comfort zone before you take on the publishers. To put it another way, anyone can do the pretty ones.
If you can do that you can do anything!
What I’m trying to say is that you should hone your skills as a writer, so that when you eventually submit your novel you want the guy or gal reading your first chapter thinking you’re technically sound. Then, they can concentrate on the story. If the reviewer turns to page one and notices basic mistakes, they are going to assume that you can’t write, or tell a story…even if you can.
As you get better at your art, you’ll constantly see ways to improve what you have written. Sometimes it’s good to finish the draft and forget about it for a month, before having a look at it fresh. You’ll pick out mistakes that you skimmed over, a habit that is unavoidable. Finding mistakes in books from big publishing houses is not uncommon and those would have been edited and proofed countless times, certainly more times and more expertly done than my attempts, sitting at my computer with The Best Rock Album Ever volume XXII blasting in my ears.
First impressions are everything
So you’ve got a great story and you’ve got a well-written manuscript. Job done. Sadly not. You ain’t the only one.
When sending out a manuscript, there’s no point sending it somewhere where it’s doomed before it arrives through the post. I wrote a novel full of gratuitous violence, torturous vampires and a lots of attempted sex (yes - attempted sex), so it wasn’t worth me sending it to Christian publishers or publishers specialising in biographies, evem though my own history is chequered with impressive quantities of attempted sex. Contact publishers who deal with your sort of thang. Don’t take a scattergun approach. You’ll know what they publish from their website. Opposites don’t usually attract in the publishing world.
Sometimes they do. I’m conscious that my last two articles on writing have included pictures of weird animal sex.
You need to send the right submission. What do I mean by this? Each publisher will have a submission criteria on their website and it’s there for a reason. It shows them that we can follow instructions and are at least half-intelligent. It also presents our work in a way they want to review it, making it easier for them. The first way to get bypassed is to not follow these, usually simple, instructions. It can be a pain in the arse to write slightly different submissions every time, but that’s the way it is. Publishers are really good at supplying information about what they want. It’s in both parties’ best interest that you send a good submission as you don’t want to waste your own time and publishers have a pile of manuscripts that can be seen from space.
The covering letter is an important part of the submission and this needs to be as exciting as your opening chapter. The reviewer has to want to read the story, otherwise they probably won’t ever bother looking at it. Be confident, but not cocky.
Get knocked down, and then get up again
Was something Chumbawamba unfortunately told us in the 90s. You will have read the stories of J.K. Rowling being turned down eight hundred times, etc, and, most people can expect a number of disappointing emails and letters. Keep at it, making sure you’re sending it to the right places and just try, try again. The first place I ever submitted a manuscript to was MacMillan New Writing. They take on unsolicited manuscripts and is an instant ticket to the big time, so I thought I’d give it a go. My rejection letter, which was swiftly deleted in a raging keyboard battering, said that my work was not accepted because…it then listed every single possible reason under the sun, from my “manuscript may have been rejected because we aren’t taking submissions” to “it was shit.” I have no idea why it got rejected, and that’s often the way. It’s frustrating, but if you want it, you have to be persistent. Don’t take it personally.
How did I do it?
I’m only speaking from my own experiences, and it’s worth trawling the web for guidance from as many authors around the world as you can find. There are a hell of a lot of people out there who know a lot more than me…but they’re not as hunky. Other writers have got lucky first time with massive publishing houses; some have taken the e-book route (my publisher issued The Great Right Hope as an e-book, six months before releasing it as a paperback); some authors self-publish; some have signed up with agents, first; some, unfortunately, never get published, but remember, if you love writing, is that necessarily a bad thing? I love playing golf, but I’m not planning to win any Majors soon.
I tried about twenty-ish agents and publishers before I got lucky with LL-Publications. “Lucky”? Yes. You need a certain amount of luck. I can’t think of many occupations where success isn’t partially determined by being in the right place at the right time. Jim Brown at LL-Publications saw the potential in the story and the humour was all there, even if not all the correct punctuation was, so he gave me some advice on how to improve my manuscript. This turned out to be a complete re-write and a huge amount of work, but I got there, in the end. I wrote in Writing’s Brilliant that it doesn’t matter about the grammar and spelling and shit, and that is true when you start as I believe the important thing is to create. If you get held up with every other sentence, writing and re-writing, you are going to get sick of it, dead quickly. It would have been less work in the long run if I had learnt a bit more about commas and things, before starting, but it would have quelled my creative juices.
I built my blog and website after I was published, but this is something that is good to do before you try your luck. It gives publishers or agents a chance to find out about you and your style. You’ll need the content, such as the biography, for the covering letter, so you may as well stick it on a webpage.
I hope this was helpful. Best of bloody British getting published, and if you do, remember to plug my work if you make it big. Hope you do…but if you and I are competing for a Christmas number one spot, then let me tell you this, I will cut you. I will cut you up real bad.
Any questions or comments drop them on the bottom of the blog, or mail me at jackhammer@mark-jackman.com
Tags: advice, american idol, anyone can do the pretty ones, author, Britney, cats, dogs, fiction, Jacko, Jim Brown, LL-Publications, macmillan, Madge, manuscript, mark jackman, novel, published, Robbie, sarah jessica parker, submission, The Great Right Hope, virgin, Whitney, writer, x factor
Win a Sony E-Book Reader!
Posted by Jacko | Filed under Competition Time
Winning stuff is bloody fantastic.
I’ll tell you something else which is bloody fantastic, and that’s The Great Right Hope. Yeah, OK, so I wrote it, and I’m biased, but there really is no other book like it. It’s about a drunk Northerner who punches vampires in the face. How good is that?
If you haven’t read it then
a) You should have but b) I forgive you.
Actually, it’s for the best that you didn’t as now you can win a £180 quid ebook reader, and all you have to do to enter is buy the paperback or ebook between the 12th December and the 12th January.
LL-Publications are running the competition and you can buy any one of their titles to enter, and you can enter as many times as you like.
Competition details are here: http://www.ll-publications.com/win_a_sony_reader.html
You can buy The Great Right Hope from Amazon. Links to both .com and .co.uk are at the bottom of my webpage dedicated to TGRH: http://www.mark-jackman.com/GRH/GRH_main.php
or buy direct from LL- Publications: http://www.ll-publications.com/greatrighthope.html
Even if you don’t win, you still get to read one of the funniest books in fiction. It’s certainly one of the funniest books I’ve written.
Everyone likes winning stuff.
Picture depicts what Usain Bolt might look like if he won a Sony ebook reader after buying The Great Right Hope.
Tags: Competition, e, ebook, in it to win it, Jacko: Author, Jim Bowen's sciatica, Jim Brown, LL-Publications, mark jackman, paperback, PRS-300, sony, the fastest man on the planet, The Great Right Hope, Usain Bolt, win
Look-a-likees! Robbie Williams and …The Crazy Frog
Posted by Jacko | Filed under Lookalikees
After pointing out the now glaringly obvious similarity between TV Supernanny, Jo Frost, and porn sensation, Ron Jeremy (blogpost), a few of you sent me other unlikely look-a-likees (tonguetwister, that), and I thought, why not use this blog as a place to share this important and often hilarious knowledge.
If you have any look-a-likees, that you can see, and no-one else can, or just any that will get us rolling with laughter, please drop me a mail at jackhammer@mark-jackman.com Include a bit about yourself and I’ll post it up on the blog. Once I get a few up, I’ll run a competition for the best one.
Zetta Brown, author, and half of the double-act that is LL-Publications, publisher of The Great Right Hope, came up with this unexpected, but highly amusing couple. Robbie Williams, from Take That fame, and The Crazy Frog.
I pissed myself when Zetta sent me this picture. For discussion though:
1) Which one is the most annoying?
2) Which one has the most psychological problems?
3) Which one will live the longest?
4) Which one should go back to the slime from whence they came?
Send me your look-a-likees, people. If you can do your own art work of a combined version of the two, then there will be bonus ponits.
Tags: Jo Frost, LL-Publications, lookalike, mark jackman, porn star, Robbie Williams, Ron Jeremy, Supernanny, Take That, The Crazy Frog, The Great Right Hope, Zetta Brown
