In March 1998, Matt Grady interviewed the short story authors who
wrote for Virgin Pubishing’s Decalog collections. At the time, he was unable to
use the whole interview with me, because I rambled on at length and he didn’t
have space (or lost the will to live while editing it down, or something). He
made it available separately – as have I, below.
Conducted
by Matt Grady
Matt Grady: As a contributor to the
short story collections mentioned above, did you have much say in the project
or, after receiving the guidelines from the editors, was it a take it or leave
it type of situation?
Peter Anghelides: The “Consequences” theme for Decalog 3 was established by Andy and
Justin as part of their initial submission to Virgin. I saw the ideas at that
stage, and I may have made some comments and suggestions, but nothing that
actually made any difference to the book. I produced a fairly detailed outline
for “Moving On”, and suggested where I thought it would fit into their ten-story
structure.
Decalog 4 required three main things, if I recall correctly: each story
must feature a member of the Forrester family; it had to be in one of ten time
periods; and the Forrester family member had to die (this was when they
expected So Vile A Sin to appear around the same time, so it probably
seemed more appropriate).
Were the guidelines fairly liberal, or did you have to make use of a set of key elements laid out by the
editors? Any issues, themes, characters, etc. that the editors wanted to
be avoided?
The Decalog 3guidelines
were broadly: the consequences of the Doctor’s gadding about in space/time
aren’t always obvious—maybe things don’t get tied up neatly after four
episodes, and maybe the Doctor is causing as much to happen as he is correcting
or preventing. With this theme, the overall structure was then to link each
story to its neighbours in the sequence, with the tidy conceit that they were
eventually linked in a never-ending circle of events. Some were trivial (an
offhand comment from the Doctor causes an entire race to change course; a
trinket from one story becomes an important artefact in another.
But the guidelines were permissive enough that they allowed the writers to
negotiate with the editors and the other authors about the links in and out.
Originally, I wanted my story to have a different link to a different story,
but Andy and Justin told me that (I think) Keith R A DeCandido had already
signed up for that one. So I used the same story, but worked a different link
in. Looking back, I’m glad I did because I was able to use the creature
“spawned” by Steve Bowkett’s story and “evolve” it into the villain of mine.
Once they’d commissioned all ten stories, the editors made the ten outline
submissions available to all the writers, along with contact details. I suppose
I concentrated more on the “intro” to my story than the “outro” from it to the
next, and perhaps that shows in the final collection.
One thing worth mentioning is that I wildly overshot the word count for the
story—it should have been 10,000 words, but actually ended up at 15,000.
Fortunately, enough other stories under-ran to allow me to get away with
that... but it was a bit naughty of me. I still got paid the same fee, by the
way!
For Decalog 4, the guidelines were looser—perhaps the editors felt
constrained by the structure of Decalog 3 (they couldn’t move the
stories around into a different order on Decalog 3, they could only “start”
the circle at a different point). The major constraint on me was that they
insisted I came in on the word count! And quite right, too. When they read the
outline, Andy and Justin suggested (mostly based on what technology seemed to
be in the story) which of the time-zones it fitted. I hadn’t decided which in
advance, and wasn’t much bothered so long as I was consistent within the story
itself.
On neither occasion can I recall much in the way of “things to be avoided”,
except for Virgin’s usual practical and pragmatic restrictions for their DW
fiction. There were a couple of “we don’t want such-and-such”, but I don’t
remember what they were - nothing that I wanted to write, anyway, so it wasn’t
a problem.
Was the choice of Doctor (in Decalog 3) for your story on a first
come, first served basis?
I decided I wasn’t going to have the Doctor in my story, so it was probably
less of a concern. If they’d had several submissions featuring Sarah and/or
K-9, maybe it would have been different. I wanted to write about the
consequences of being a DW companion, so not having the Doctor appear
was important. Whenever the companions reappeared in the TV series, they were
like (albeit visibly older) caricatures of their former selves, strangely unchanged.
And although people meeting old friends after ten or twenty years may fall back
into familiar, contemporary behaviours, there’s always the tension that they
(and their friends) have both changed in that time and have a distanced
perspective on their own behaviour at that younger age.
Hence, no Doctor - but a couple of other characters who had changed
while Sarah was away from Earth and since Sarah first met them. And an opening
section which distances the reader from a character they thought they knew.
Did having Roz and her ancestors as the focus of Decalog 4 come as a
welcome change to previous, Doctor led instalments of Decalog?
Not really relevant for me, since I didn’t use the Doctor (though his
character, of course, informs much of Sarah’s action and reactions in Decalog 3).
What sort of time frame did you have to work with?
I think I wrote each of them over several long evenings each week for a month.
Much of my writing is “thinking” time, or mentally rehearsing stuff. I have to
carry a notebook around with me, in case I have an interesting idea. If I’m on
a long journey in the car, I’m sometimes frustrated because I can’t write and
drive at the same time, and may forget my brilliant idea before I can stop and
scribble. On the other hand, looking back at some of the scribbled brilliance
in my notebook, I can see a lot of it is garbage anyway. Or I can’t read my
handwriting.
Do you make use of short stories to experiment with writing styles and
themes normally unsuited or not complex enough for novel format?
I think you should use a different writing style for short stories, that’s the
whole point for me. And I feel it may be rather the converse: there are some
writing styles which may be too complex for the novel format. I like
reading and writing stuff which uses the form of short fiction, rather than
stuff which is merely a “short story”.
One of my favourite stories is a fifth Doctor one by Paul Cornell in the first Decalog:
it plays around with narrative in a way that would be too wearing in a complete
novel (though Kate Orman has some brilliant sections of experimentation in some
of her NAs for Virgin); you have to concentrate to follow what’s happening; the
characters learn something about themselves, and are changed in subtle ways,
which is trickier if you’re writing an MA but works well in the short form. (On
the other hand, I think that Paul’s Tara/Kandyman spoof pentameter in Decalog
2 is quite the opposite - doesn’t use the short form, misses the point
about the characters, and doesn’t scan most of the time. We discussed it at the
time of publication - he doesn’t agree!)
So with Decalog 3 I wrote something
which I hoped would make readers work a bit harder than “The Doctor and Liz
stepped out of the Tardis onto the sparkling glass surface of Zebulon 9”.
There’s a lot of “who is this?” and “what’s really going on?”, which perhaps
people pick up more when they read a short story in a short, concentrated
period - or can more easily scan back and re-read. I should also mention, of
course that I stole one of Andy Lane’s jokes (about the dog), which I’m pleased
to see made an appearance (in an even funnier form) in the film Men in Black.
And, incidentally, if you didn’t laugh at it, well you can kiss my furry little
butt.
I’d wanted to write something in the second person for ages. (After I wrote “C9H13NO3”
and it was published, I came across a section in one of Kate Orman’s NAs
that uses second person, but I can’t remember where now Left-Handed
Hummingbird, perhaps?)
Second-person narration is not a popular fiction form. It’s one thing to use it
in, say, travel writing (“you turn the corner from Broad Street around the
Bodleian, and find on your left the Bridge of Sighs”). However, second-person
fiction is hard to sustain for long as more than a piece of stylistic posing -
even the wonderful novel Bright Lights, Big City has its longeurs at
times (and was itself originally written as a short story for a magazine). To
be honest, there’s less personal investment in a short story, so if it all went
pear-shaped then it only required a rewrite of 10,000 words, not an 85,000-word
novel. It is harder to write (and to justify in the logic of the story, too),
and there is one point in the story where I lapse accidentally into the third
person.
I decided too that I didn’t want to go straight into the story like Jay
McInery: “You’re not the kind of guy who...” So I deferred the reader’s
realisation of the second-person narration until the end of the first page. I
think it works, though I know a couple of online reviewers said that both my
short stories were hard-going (or, less kindly, “boring”). I seem to remember
it was kindly reviewed in the trade press, though. But let’s face it, none of
this is great literature—it’s franchise fiction. And I love it!
One aside: I wanted a title that would stand out in the book, and intrigue the
reader. So I used the chemical formula for epinephrine, which is one of the
leitmotifs (get that lingo) in the story. Of course, I now find it impossible
to type the title properly in simple text in this e-mail [though not on this
web page] to you! Serves me right.
What kind of
experience did you gain from being involved with such a project?
I decided I
liked writing DW stuff enough to have a go at a novel, and the result of that
is Kursaal (BBC books). That is more
”conventional” fiction than the short stories. I spent longer per page on the
short stories than I did on the novel, possibly because you need to spend as
much time on the structure of each piece regardless of its overall length.
I learned to trust my instincts a bit, I suppose. Having liked my Decalog 3 story enough to ask me to
write for them again, the editors agreed to the outline for Decalog 4
and then got chilly (though not cold) feet when they saw draft 1. I didn’t
discuss the story with them both together, and got a lot of feedback via
e-mail. I have to say that almost all their comments were helpful, if
occasionally contradictory. So I learned that it’s worth getting consolidated
comments, and checking that I understand them before I apply them! Both Justin
and Andy were kind enough to say later that they liked the published version,
and I think also they were smart enough to publish a range of good stories in
different styles - not all of which were always their cup of tea.
Based on these experiences, what suggestions would you have for fanzine authors
wishing to contribute to a similar project?
Well,
it’s a great way of doing an “audition piece” for a publisher or editor. You
have to write stuff for yourself, really, because if you’re only writing
it on the premise that it will be published, then you’ll compromise your own
style to fit into what you perceive will get into print. Then, if it doesn’t,
you will have a double disappointment. At least if you write what you want to
in your own style, you’ll have had fun writing it even if it is rejected.
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