INCREDIBLE COMPETITION!!!

i recently went to america accidentally, and, in a trance, bought two american copies of chris killen's novel, the bird room.

i want to give away these two copies, as i already own a copy of the book. they are no different to the english version except they have a completely different nationality.

there are some things about these two copies that are very special.

1. They are signed by Chris. They are the only American versions that he will sign because he is unlikely to go to America to sign any more of them.

2. They are annotated by Chris. In one copy the annotations are about the sections of the book that Chris is most happy with. In the other copy, the annotations are about the sections of the book that Chris is least happy with.

here is what you have to do to win this 'unique' prize.

1. Decide which book you would like to win.

2. Write a fictional review of the book, without having first read it. If you would like to win the 'happy' book, write a glowing review. If you would like to win the 'least happy' book, write a 'scathing/blisteringly devastating' review. Keep the review under 500 words.

3. Send the review to socratesadams at gmail dot com by Friday the 2nd of April.

4. Wait until the the following Monday for the result.

these copies are excellent, premium-grade copies of 'the bird room' which is, in itself, a premium-grade novel.

lovely story

i wrote a little story about Steve Stiffler. you can find it here, along with other stories about great fictional guys.

current thoughts/aims

writing the great british novel. writing an excellent novel. my aim is to write the one unifying novel that will unify and inspire the great british public. giving the great british public something to believe in. trying to make the great british public see for once and for all just how pathetic/wonderful everything/everyone is. trying so hard to write with character and my own voice. trying to enunciate effectively using my own voice which i haven't borrowed from any other great british novelists who already wrote the great british novel. trying to write a novel that makes every person in the world join forces like the music from bill and ted wyld stallyons. trying to think of how i can make a band that is as good as wyld stallyons. playing my ukulele and hoping that someone outside will hear and think that wyld stallyons are a real band and that person will somehow help me to unite the world in appreciation of wyld stallyons and humanity. trying to dress and act like rufus from bill and ted to try and create the band wyld stallyons by going back in time to find the constituent members. trying to write my novel with the story from bill and ted but more ironic and deadpan. i am so keen on making everything just so god damn ironic and deadpan, like the music of wyld stallyons, but more ironic. typing and imagining that my hands are doing the 'special sign' that means wyld stallyons.

200th post

i thought this was the start of a new novel and then realised that it definitely wasn't

(i am very interested in fear of death)

I am afraid of dying.

I am sitting and looking out of the window. I think that a sniper is going to shoot me at any second. There are football fans staying in a hotel over the road. They are whistling out of their window at a Chinese tourist at ground level and then getting their knobs out and laughing at the Chinese tourist. Their knobs are flailing about all over the place. The Chinese tourist is looking at the knobs waving about and thinking, 'What a dreadful place.' I feel sorry that he is being treated like this. Who wants to have a football fan's knob flailing about near them? The football fans are both pissing out of the window all over the place. The piss is landing near the Chinese tourist and he is moving back and thinking, 'I don't want this piss to land on me.' The knobs look like little fleshy tumours. The football fans are jumping up and down and hugging each other and pissing on each other and they are singing great football songs to each other. They have put on some music and are prancing about. The Chinese tourist is looking up at the prancing football fans and thinking, 'I wonder how long it is before anyone realises that I am lost.' The traffic is getting quite a bit thicker. There are people getting out of their cars and getting into fights with each other because they are in such a bad mood at the end of their day. A man in a Mercedes Benz car is assaulting the bonnet of a man's Audi car. He has ripped his shirt off and he is jumping up and down on top of the car. He has taken his tie off and is erotically asphyxiating himself on top of the car as he jumps up and down. His penis bursts out of his trousers and then it ejaculates all over the windscreen. He is still jumping. The football fans look at the man and start jumping more. They piss and piss all over the ejaculating man. The man in the Audi car gets out and starts having sex with the man who has been bouncing up and down on his car. There is a crowd of people watching. The Chinese tourist is taking pictures and thinking, 'These pictures are not for my personal sexual use.' Two students are walking next to the cars and they are carrying guitar cases and singing to each other while taking drugs. The students are saying about the fact that they are independent thinkers. The two car owners are lying tenderly in each others arms. They are curled up like wonderful life partners always loving each other. A man walks by in a suit. He is smoking ten cigarettes. He takes one puff from each cigarette and then drops it on the ground. A tramp is following him and picking up every cigarette that he drops. The tramp puts the cigarettes out by carefully grinding the end of the cigarette into the pavement. He is moving more slowly than the man. The suit man occasionally looks behind himself and shakes his head. I look back at the Chinese tourist. He is lying on the floor and the two football fans are pissing into his mouth. There is a small flood beneath the football fans balcony. The streets are filling up with their piss.

I turn away from the window and walk into the kitchen. I am going to make a cup of coffee. I take the coffee from the pouch in the cupboard and pour it into the correct part of the coffee machine. I put the machine onto the hob, after filling it up with water. I wait. I am drinking a delicious cup of coffee. I check my e-mail. There is an e-mail from one of my friends who is trying to persuade me to invest money into a scheme. The scheme is something about money being easy to make. You just put all of your money into something and then you get more money. Everyone is doing it these days. It is so god damn easy to make a load of money. All you need is a load of money to begin with and a great friend to make all of your money with.

I take a trip down to street level. I bob between arguing and fucking people and make my way to a café. Inside the café is the barista. Barista is what you call the man who makes you a coffee. I order a coffee. The barista quickly makes me a cup of coffee. I have a sip and then let the coffee fall out of my mouth onto the saucer of the cup. The coffee is a joke. I say to him, this coffee is a fucking joke. He looks taken aback. I say, I just made a coffee that was one hundred times better than this. I made it with a domestic coffee machine. I don't even have a gaggia brand coffee machine. Then I chill out and say, don't worry I know you tried your best. I don't pay and then I get out of there.

I go back home and reply to my friend saying that I don't have money to invest in his idea but that he should get in touch with some other people because even though I don't have much money there is a chance that other people might have some money. I try and make it as clear as possible that I am not exactly the same as everybody else. It's difficult.

For dinner I eat a huge amount of food while watching a variety of televised events.

trying to sleep

all i can do is listen to my heart beating and think about whether it will be beating in the morning. it's just fear i suppose.

expertly written short story

I sit in bright sunlight on a bench in a park and I wait for a man in an attic to shoot me through the head with a bullet from a sniper rifle. My hands rest on my knees and I am thinking about all the events that have happened in my life. I think that I won't be aware of the shot when it comes. Everything will quietly stop. I wonder if there is any way for me to know whether everything has already quietly stopped. I think that there isn't.

People walk past and some teenagers are playing music on a mobile phone. There's the sun. It's not a warm day. A breeze makes it colder every now and then.

The teenagers are laughing and joking together. I think about what the teenagers are made of.

The teenagers are strutting around and smoking joints and cigarettes. They are wearing hooded tops and are having a great time all together. The male teenagers are looking at the female teenagers and vice-versa. All of the teenagers want to have violent and passionate intercourse with each other. Seconds and minutes pass by at the normal speed.

I am part of a rambunctious and vibrant scene that is typical of life. The park is bisected by a concrete path. I think about lying down on the concrete path and pressing my face up against the path to make myself warmer. Concrete is usually warmer than the air that surrounds it.

It is dark and rich and thick and wonderful. It smells wonderful.

Human beings love concrete and everything else that is like concrete. They like tarmac more than anything else. All human beings wish that their entire house was made of lovely rich and thick dark tarmac. All human beings want to have sexual intercourse with warm and lubricated tarmac.

The bullet hasn't come yet. It is a matter of time before the bullet comes and knocks my skull apart and my brain falls out. I look straight ahead and try to do an impression of someone who's brain has been blown out of their head. I don't move my face at all and look straight ahead. I think about my brain flopping around on the floor like a fish. I think about my brains gills being useless outside my head. My head is full of blood, by the way.

When it finally gets shot apart the blood will fly all over the place and splash all around.

There is a small chance that the blood from my brain will drown some kind of insect, maybe a low crawling insect. Stupid insects I think. I wonder what kind of insects eat blood. Probably snails. A group of snails will eat all of the blood and move towards my brain. My brain will become their leader and make all of the decisions for all of the snails from now on. They will carry it around everywhere and it will get to make out with all of the hot female snails. My brain is a snail.

After a long time waiting I begin to get restless. I think that maybe I should go back to the office.

It is one thirty and my lunch break is over.

entertainment

even more rejection

check this week's out.

it's the 'best ever' edition.

here