Ripperama

I spent an excellent five days in London last week, soaking up the atmosphere of the Whitechapel and Spitalfields areas. It's something I've been meaning to do for a long time, since I was a student there in the late 80's and early 90's. Sadly work and finances have meant it wasn't possible before now.

I've long been fascinated by the Jack the Ripper saga and wanted to spend some time visiting the sights connected to the mystery and its various conspiracy theories. In many ways the east end of London has changed very little over the years. However, there is a lot of new development going on now, which means this could be my last chance to see various places before they are obliterated forever. Sadly, I have already left it too late as one or two areas have already changed radically since my student days. I located some of the Ripper sights back in 1989, but missed others which now no longer exist. Oh what a missed opportunity!!

Although I've always thought of myself as a bit of a Londoner at heart, taking one of the cheesy Ripper guided tourist walks took me to various places that I didn't even know existed, which proved extremely useful. I was able to go back later to visit them on my own and take plenty of photos. Oddly, despite it's bloody history and fearsome reputation I have always felt perfectly safe wandering around the east end, even on my own after dark. The biggest danger is running into huge parties of ripper tourists!

I came home with dozens of photographs and a real eagerness to begin writing. I intend using the setting for a novel which I have had at the back of my mind for some years. I don't want to write directly about the Ripper murders, because that has been done to death in fiction and indeed non-fiction. However, the atmosphere and circumstances of 1888 are just too intriguing to ignore.

Ghosts and Ghoolies

Rather appropriately (given that it was Halloween), I finished my ghost story this weekend. I'm in two minds about the end result. I'm pleased with the style and language, but I think the ending could perhaps have a bit more bite. Having said that, the ending was almost pre-determined because I was retelling a fairly well known type of story. I hope I've managed to keep an element of surprise right up until the last few lines.

It took a little longer than I anticipated to complete as well, considering the brevity of the story. This was because I set out to write in the first person perspective, but mid way through the first draft I found that I just couldn't make it work. Once I changed to the third person it really began to flow. So really my first draft became my second whilst I was writing!

At the moment the story is still called 17 Percent, although this is certain to change. It was a real struggle to work an explanation of the title into the story. I think I've pulled it off, but now I'm unhappy with the title!

I'm hopeless at coming up with titles, which is why I've started picking things out from The Writer's Block. I find that I can't write without a working title so I pick anything, no matter how lame just to get me started. Coming up with titles is probably the area of my writing I would most like to improve. Silly really, because when it comes to publication editors tend to ignore your best efforts and go with their own titles anyway.