Ask the Author: Mick Kelly
Answered Questions (11)
Mick Kelly
If you could travel to any fictional book world, where would you go and what would you do there?
What is a fictional world? There seems an obvious division into the worlds of science fiction / fantasy and the ‘real’ world of other fiction. We make the assumption that the ‘real’ world of (say) a detective novel is the world we live in, but just somewhere else and (probably) at a different time. But one can argue that a world with imaginary characters is just as much a fictional world as Dune or The Discworld.
However, widening the field of possible destinations makes my job in answering this even harder. The only way to answer it is to consider the many books I have been reluctant to leave when the final page has been read.
What keeps me in a book is not so much the trappings of it’s world - the shiny metal of the spaceship, the fetid alleys of the magician’s feudal town or the tarnished Hollywood glamour of the thirties ‘tec - it’s the people, the characters and the way they interact.
Many of Iain Banks’ novels have left me wanting a ticket to their world - and not just the SF books. ‘Whit’, for example, is set in the mundane world - but Isis Whit may (or may not) have healing powers. So it just about counts as a fantasy. I have read it twice, and have a great love of the characters and the way they live.
But I am going back to my youth with my definitive answer - the world of the Jerry Cornelius in the novels of Michael Moorcock. Science fiction based in a version of the 1960s that is askew from the real one. It’s a place of machines that can hypnotise you, or give you schizophrenia. A world where a psychedelic drug can call up the memories of the animals you have evolved from. Where gender is fluid and morals never an impediment. It’s a fascinating, often horrible, always dangerous, grubby place that managed to be both out-dated and futuristic.
Interested? Here’s a link https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...
What is a fictional world? There seems an obvious division into the worlds of science fiction / fantasy and the ‘real’ world of other fiction. We make the assumption that the ‘real’ world of (say) a detective novel is the world we live in, but just somewhere else and (probably) at a different time. But one can argue that a world with imaginary characters is just as much a fictional world as Dune or The Discworld.
However, widening the field of possible destinations makes my job in answering this even harder. The only way to answer it is to consider the many books I have been reluctant to leave when the final page has been read.
What keeps me in a book is not so much the trappings of it’s world - the shiny metal of the spaceship, the fetid alleys of the magician’s feudal town or the tarnished Hollywood glamour of the thirties ‘tec - it’s the people, the characters and the way they interact.
Many of Iain Banks’ novels have left me wanting a ticket to their world - and not just the SF books. ‘Whit’, for example, is set in the mundane world - but Isis Whit may (or may not) have healing powers. So it just about counts as a fantasy. I have read it twice, and have a great love of the characters and the way they live.
But I am going back to my youth with my definitive answer - the world of the Jerry Cornelius in the novels of Michael Moorcock. Science fiction based in a version of the 1960s that is askew from the real one. It’s a place of machines that can hypnotise you, or give you schizophrenia. A world where a psychedelic drug can call up the memories of the animals you have evolved from. Where gender is fluid and morals never an impediment. It’s a fascinating, often horrible, always dangerous, grubby place that managed to be both out-dated and futuristic.
Interested? Here’s a link https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...
Mick Kelly
Sorry for the late reply, Steve - you need to apply to Goodreads to be accepted onto the author program. See...
https://www.goodreads.com/author/program
Good luck with that.
https://www.goodreads.com/author/program
Good luck with that.
Mick Kelly
Lots!
I'm currently in the middle of 'The Best SF and Fantasy, Book 8' and 'Kenneth Williams' Diaries' and just about to start 'Irish, Catholic, Scouse' - a history of the Liverpool Irish from 1800 - 1940. And a few more...
But 'Summer Reading' implies the long languid days of lying in the garden and ignoring the sound of mowers and the smell of barbecues while lost in a good thriller, riveting novel or some worthy piece of literature that you always meant to read but always managed to overlook. So my nominations will be...
'The Glass Room' by Anne Cleaves (the good thriller)
'Oranges are Not the Only Fruit' by Jeanette Winterson (riveting novel)
'Dead Souls' by Gogol (worthy)
amongst many others including Brian Cox's 'Human Universe' and Peter Hook's 'Substance' .
Oh, and proofs of my latest novel, of course.
I'm currently in the middle of 'The Best SF and Fantasy, Book 8' and 'Kenneth Williams' Diaries' and just about to start 'Irish, Catholic, Scouse' - a history of the Liverpool Irish from 1800 - 1940. And a few more...
But 'Summer Reading' implies the long languid days of lying in the garden and ignoring the sound of mowers and the smell of barbecues while lost in a good thriller, riveting novel or some worthy piece of literature that you always meant to read but always managed to overlook. So my nominations will be...
'The Glass Room' by Anne Cleaves (the good thriller)
'Oranges are Not the Only Fruit' by Jeanette Winterson (riveting novel)
'Dead Souls' by Gogol (worthy)
amongst many others including Brian Cox's 'Human Universe' and Peter Hook's 'Substance' .
Oh, and proofs of my latest novel, of course.
Mick Kelly
I think that one of the things that makes an author is the absence of drama in their own life!
My life is full of the ordinary adventures - love, birth, death - things that are deeply affecting and the major stations on the journey from birth to death. But as for mystery - I draw a blank.
Even the things that are unknown to me are prosaic. Why did a girl I loved so callously fall in love with someone else? Did one of my student friends ever conquer his alcohol problem? Did I?
Alas nothing on which the fate of the world depends - or even the fate of me.
So I make things up. Stories in which minor events become the pivots on which characters can pin-point where it went wrong or right.
Never mind - plenty of time left for me to find the murder victim / cache of explosives / drug haul.
I’ll keep you informed.
My life is full of the ordinary adventures - love, birth, death - things that are deeply affecting and the major stations on the journey from birth to death. But as for mystery - I draw a blank.
Even the things that are unknown to me are prosaic. Why did a girl I loved so callously fall in love with someone else? Did one of my student friends ever conquer his alcohol problem? Did I?
Alas nothing on which the fate of the world depends - or even the fate of me.
So I make things up. Stories in which minor events become the pivots on which characters can pin-point where it went wrong or right.
Never mind - plenty of time left for me to find the murder victim / cache of explosives / drug haul.
I’ll keep you informed.
Mick Kelly
This is a very difficult question. Most books represent couples in a 'will they / won't they' story, which means they are not really a couple until the last chapter and we get left with a 'they lived happily ever after' ending (or not!). So we never really learn anything about them as couples.
Usually the fully-fledged couples are secondary characters, in which case they are sketched rather than fully formed - the happily married, the just about to divorce, the philandering friends etc etc.
So to answer the question one has to consider two single characters rather than a couple per se.
So I am going to nominate Gabriel Oak and Bathsheba Everdene in Thomas Hardy's 'Far from the Madding Crowd'. Why? Because they are both strong and complete in themselves but you feel that when they join together they will be happy and harmonious and people you would love to meet and spend time with - though I dare say they might have the odd row or two.
Usually the fully-fledged couples are secondary characters, in which case they are sketched rather than fully formed - the happily married, the just about to divorce, the philandering friends etc etc.
So to answer the question one has to consider two single characters rather than a couple per se.
So I am going to nominate Gabriel Oak and Bathsheba Everdene in Thomas Hardy's 'Far from the Madding Crowd'. Why? Because they are both strong and complete in themselves but you feel that when they join together they will be happy and harmonious and people you would love to meet and spend time with - though I dare say they might have the odd row or two.
Mick Kelly
Write something else.
Mick Kelly
The office location, the musical soundtrack and the holidays!
Mick Kelly
Write! I've got a computer full of stories - and a head full of a few more. You have to get them out onto the screen to see if they are worth working on. Even if the answer is no, it's still a valuable exercise.
Mick Kelly
I have an almost finished novel about a keyboard player in a 1980s 'New Romantic' band.
Mick Kelly
Usually a particular scene will flash into my mind - then I have to answer the questions of 'how did we get here?' and 'what happens next?'. In this particular book the opening scene was the first to appear and all the rest followed without my seeming to have much input!
Mick Kelly
The truth is that this started out as two separate books - one about small town politics and another (which is now the main theme) about the different paths people take though life. Why does one person become married, employed and respectable and another become a drifter and unemployable?
This makes it sound a bit heavy - but the book is actually quite light-hearted.
This makes it sound a bit heavy - but the book is actually quite light-hearted.
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