Chris Stanley's Bazaar

I don't think that writers should write a blog post about how difficult it is to write. I think it's the equivalent of second-album syndrome, where all of your songs are about what a terrible ordeal it is to be in a band touring the globe. We get it, mate: you're Nigel Tufnel, explaining the problem with the olives and the tiny, tiny bread . But writing a blog post at all has been playing on my mind, because it's over three months since the last one, and even if you're not expecting my face to imminently show up on the side of a milk carton, it might be germane of me to tell you where I'm at, not least because this gap will make a shite chapter in the unauthorised biography otherwise. I finished draft two of The Sad Club a few months ago now, and after a short break I've gone back to it to re-edit. At this point I was going to write a humorous calendar of my writing process because I've had a couple of people cock their heads in puzzlement at w...

Leo reached across the table to a paper cup full of wooden stirrers. His hand met long, slender fingers tipped with candy apple red. ‘Sorry,’ he blushed. ‘No problem,’ she said, her mouth widening into brilliant white. She patted his arm, running her hand down to his wrist, where her touch turned to electricity. ‘You’re new here. I spotted you when you walked in. You have a very sexy stride.’ She smiled again, placing her hand on her hip. ‘I’m Beatrice.’ There was an acute on the “a” in her name. This complemented the question-mark of her black cocktail dress. ‘Leo,’ he murmured, looking down at the floor. His trainers were scuffed and he could see the frayed hems of his jeans had been muddied by a hundred unnecessary journeys.m  They turned from the refreshments table and Leo looked around the room. Others were beginning to take their seats. None of them looked particularly friendly, but they all seemed wary of one another, as if one of them – nobody could tell who – w...

So, welcome back to my world. It’s debatable whether or not it’s better than the real world, but trust me, I wouldn’t have voted for him, so there’s that. People use the phrase “in a perfect world”, but it seems like 2016 was fuckin’ Nirvana compared to the shitshow this year is looking to be. Naturally, I’m back online to spread a little sunshine on proceedings, because my Smiths blog went really well (sample review: ‘you’re talking shit’). There are people better qualified and give a toss more than me about international politics. The Falklands Conflict was memorably described by Jorge Luis Borges as being “like two bald men fighting over a comb”, and the world has become a more spiteful and petulant place since the chilliest days of the Cold War. All I can say is that historically you don’t know you’ve lived through a crisis until you see it on a documentary. I watched some Channel 5 thing about 1990 the other day; turns out it was full of barricades, resignations and civil d...

There’s ice on the ground outside, and the days have a nip to them that only the night can challenge. As you can probably tell, I’ve been listening to a lot of miserable music. Actually, that’s not strictly the case. To be honest, I’ve been listening to a bit of everything as I edit my novel. I think that’s a standard requirement to editing anything. I’m going to sound like a complete tool, but I always cut to music. Sometimes it works; sometimes it can help you pace a scene which is flabby, or back-loaded with action, or it allows it space to breathe as you take the rhythm into your subconscious. I used to be a music writer, and this is one of those rare times when I blow my own trumpet. It was only after I listened back to my introductory podcast  that I realised I’d forgotten completely to mention that I used to edit a music section in a newspaper, or that I’d been allowed to interview some pretty well known people, and that I’d authored about three hundred record reviews a...

It's Autumn, and traditionally it's a strange time in my life. Like a lot of people, I don't take too kindly to the clocks going back, with the attendant dark mornings and evenings. I wouldn't go so far as to label it Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) because a) I don't believe it exists as a condition in and of itself, and b) it doesn't manifest itself in me as a condition which holds me back. I just eat more, yearn to stay at home and watch telly, and convince myself that I'm too done in to write. The only difference from the summer months is that I don't get to wear shorts. As it was half-term last week, me and my girlfriend took a city break to clear our heads of work and see some culture. We went to Krakow, which is a great city (not that picturesque outside of the Old Town and Wawel Hill, but it had its charms all the same). There was a pleasant nip in the air, it didn't rain apart from a single evening shower, and meals for two cost abo...

It's becoming a bit of a feature on this blog that I spend most of the first half of each new entry apologising for my tardiness in coming up with a new blog post. This wouldn't normally be a problem, but after my last entry, which read pretty much like a suicide note, I did get some people advising me to take a holiday, or failing that, treat myself to a KitKat Chunky with peanut butter. In the event, I did both. I feel much better for it, but as we know, these things can't last forever. I can destroy a KitKat in less than four seconds. So as I'm coming to the end of my jollies, what's new in the world of Stan? It's been a productive break. The Sad Club is well into draft two, which is a place I'd never imagined it would be, and on my off days, I've been working on another project which I'll keep secret for now. It's another novel, a much shorter one which I'm looking to have 1500 words a chapter. It's vaguely plotted in my head, but ...

It's been a while since I blogged, mainly because writing has been going pretty well for me over the last few months. My major work, which is my novel , has been first-drafted, sat on, re-read and annotated with a fine-tooth comb in preparation for a major re-edit. There were times in the last twelve months that I didn't expect to be able to say anything other than "I'm writing a book", so to have one should be excellent news. But it isn't any more. Because I've had another piece of work rejected. You may recall in my podcast and from an earlier blog post that my and my friend Tom, who runs the Thank Book For initiative, wrote a spec script of a sitcom years ago. Well, BBC Writersroom had open submissions for sitcoms back in April, so we spruced it up, crossed our fingers, and waited. And waited. And now, after four months of our work being 'in progress', it's dead in the water. No matter how much we told ourselves it would never get pick...