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|date=31 December 2012#

Guy Booth: It's It’s a neat question: actually, as an artist I actually never close my eyes : I look at everything in as an artistmuch detail as possible. I set-out, as As a student of Architecture, in that great city, Liverpool - , I was 19 - trained myself to open my eyes and 'look' ‘look’ at Life from 'A ‘A to Z'Z’. I learnt all about people (as well as the environment and Nature): I learnt to see how ‘how we areare’. And I'm still learning!

My readers are ''you; '': I target no specific readership group. You can be 16 (I wouldn't wouldn’t give ''The Arthur Moreau Story'' to anyone a youngerperson) to 106. I want you to enjoy my story as I see myself as a ''Storyteller''‘Storyteller’, as of ancient times. I come into town, you all get to know hear about it, and you assemble in a hall or a field and sit round everybody gets together, sits in a big semi-circle: and I tell you a story.

My aim is to lead you gently You will venture into the depths of my imagination. I aim to astonish you, to thrill you, to put the fear of God into you, to delight you ... and so on. I lead you by the hand into a palace of Dreams ... a forest of Fears. But a All really good story includes the stories include our daily round that we all understand, the silly mistakes we make and laugh about, the humour of our lives. I know that life Life is not fairly ordinary and : I want to entertain you with the extraordinary side of the business.

GB: A wedding in France in : August 1998. Actually, it was the journey, by car, to the wedding that took place in Bordeaux (- the lunchtime guests had drunk the place dry), when we . How does that link with Arthur Moreau’s funeral? It was the car journey to the wedding that inspired the ‘kick-off’ idea. We stopped for the night at a hotel in the town of La Roche-sur-Yon, Napoleon's military the Emperor Napoleon’s headquarters in that region of France to prevent curb the antics of bolshie locals from upsetting his plans for Social reform. We returned from the wedding came home and I though thought nothing more of the ventureoccasion.

At the time, late 1998, I was at a loss by the end of 1998: two years on, into my attempt to become a writer . The mission was not doing going well, the ; my television direction was also at a low ebb Tide ... but It happened that I was reading an amazing book by historian, Alan Bullock (the late Lord Bullock), ''Hitler and Stalin: Parallel Lives''. The book gave me a horrible understanding of just how hideous those men actually really were. I looked at the biographies of other dictators. I didn't didn’t get hooked: I wanted to understand something of ''why. Nobody, of course will ever know exactly why '' such people monsters succeed.

About a month after the French wedding trip I had a clear idea for a full length story. It goes like this: an innocent man <u>An ordinary Englishman is invited to an ordinary a funeral in France and turns up like we all turn up at funerals. The deceased body appears in a glass coffin. That was the idea: but the French wedding trip, especially </u> That’s it! The town square of La Roche-sur-Yon, glimmered in the background.

My first working title was, ''The Glass Casket''. But I set off writingfound that an ''object'' presents problems for a story. The object (a class casket, there a sword in a stone) must <u>get</u> the characters to <u>perform the action of the story</u>. So who’s in the casket? Harmless, charming Second Hand book dealer, Arthur Moreau. The ordinary man invited to the funeral becomes Johnny Debrett, Moreau’s young business partner before Arthur retired to France. Nice: but what triggers the mystery? Sir Frederick Appleby is certain that Moreau was no point in delaya criminally insane maniac, founder of a weird terrorist sect.

The first working title for The Arthur Moreau Story was ''The Glass Casket''. But I soon found that an object in itself presents problems for a storyline. Wow! You need the object (in this case a class casket) have to get the characters go to perform the action of the story. The innocent man invited to the that funeral came into focus as Johnny Debrett, and because : I am interested in second hand books, he was an Antiquarian book dealer. Who had asked Johnny to go to the funeral, and why? Sir Frederick Applebyfascinated.

What was going-on? Johnny's question: my question: the reader's question. That is how it all began. Can you link From a real wedding in France with to the fictional sinking of The Eocratic in the Atlantic at 17-30hrs, Ocean on July 18th, 1994? ... there is a link. In summary, I didn't wake up one morning and say, ''Today, I will start writing <u>The Arthur Moreau Story.'' If the idea works: start writing jigsaw puzzle was out of the storybox</u>.

GB: I come from a family of architects, a great grandfather was an inventor and designer. We never 'talked‘talk-shop' shop’ at home, my father considered the architectural profession - apart from a few greatly respected fellow architects - rather tedious. We were but are always interested in every aspect of creative ''design''. Building styles and periods, interiors, furnishingsfurniture, the History of Architectureand Civil Engineering, of fashion, engineering (. I am also interested in my case, Letterpress printing and graphic design): Presentation is all.

I am as compelled by a A dress shop as I am by , a 1930s concert hall, as I am by Blackpool Tower, a seaside bungalow, by a gothic cathedral, by the tat you find in the department stores ... a violin, a rock boulder, a country lane with its hedgerows awash with wild flowershedgerow, a limousine, up-to-the-minute modern Architecturekitchen blender: all of interest. When I know about the Modern Movement that peaked in the late 1920s when walk down a city street I read it was like a crime to be comfortable in your modern home. You need a sense of humour when it comes to design: less than one percent of what we design is really amazing, most is average, and the rest is interesting until it's ripped down and replaced. In list order take: St. Paul's Cathedral, Buckingham Palace (the Mall Front]), The 'Gherkin' in the City of Londonconductor reads an Orchestral Score.

In my stories ambience and architecture, what people are vital: the reader must <u>be in that place<//u>. What characters are wearing and , how well they are wearing itor badly, even tells the reader much about them. Peter Tyndale’s ridiculously uncomfortable, hyper expensive City penthouse suite ; the detail of Peter Tyndale in the opening section his honed torso almost leaping out of the novel: it all mattershand tailored executive shirt, because gives the reader a feeling that we shall meet this is what we see, live in, experiencestrangely sadistic ‘Public School Hero’ again. When I walk down a city street I read it like a conductor reads an Orchestral ScoreAlfred Hitchcock, and I want my descriptions to enable youtalking of his famous films, my readerssaid, to do the same“Every frame counts”.

GB: Arthur is a <u>very </u> creepy commodity: of all the characters in the story, Arthur Moreau is the man I know least! He is the an essence rather than a personality. The essence of evil and corruption. When the story first took shape, the character was not the central inspiration, that is, I didn't didn’t start-out with the idea of portraying a genocidal maniac. Arthur came gradually into focus - he was created after Johnny Debrett, Thomas and Sir Frederick, and he had that weird aspect of being covert. A wonderful 'Old Queen' ... yes, Arthur was. And I have known some wonderful 'Old Queens': the case of a party in Hong Kong (pre-1997) when a very senior person 'at Law' arrived sluiced in 1920s ladies' underwear and wearing a Bowler hat ... and the morning after the same person had his Chinese chauffeur stop a huge official Rolls to wind the window down and wave convivially, saying merrily - he was now wearing Morning Dress with the Bowler hat and I had just come out of a bookshop - ''Hello there! Wasn't it a marvellous party last night?'', and I agreed, and the Rolls slid-on towards the Hong Kong Central Courts. Arthur Moreau had to be more than a wonderful 'Old Queen'. He developed into the Hitler/Stalin/Mao model; monsters that controlled our lives. How did they do it? How do their successors do it? ... A central theme of my novel.

Moreau is not inspired by anyone A wonderful ‘Old Queen’ ... yes, Arthur was. I knowhave known some, they suit stories. I remember a party in Hong Kong around 1982. He is A very senior person ‘at Law’ arrived sluiced in 1920s ladies’ underwear and wearing a collage of horror, Bowler hat. The next morning the same person had his Chinese chauffeur stop a collage of gold brocademagnificent Rolls to wind the window down and wave convivially, saying merrily - he was now wearing Morning Dress with the Bowler hat - I had just come out of bloodied bandagesa bookshop - ''Hello! Wasn’t it a marvellous party last night?'' I agreed, of slime that lines every sewerthe Rolls slid-on towards the Hong Kong Central Courts.

My task, having made Arthur Moreau seem harmless, was to convey the horror of his personality to the reader. There comes much more than a point in the story when the reader must be brought to understand just how horrible Arthur Moreau iswonderful ‘Old Queen’. This had to be done so bluntly He vied with Hitler, Stalin and brutally, Mao: a monster that you rock back in your chair with revulsioncontrolled and poisoned our lives. Moreau is not inspired by anyone I had know. He is a number collage of horror created out of ideas before the 'handgold brocade, blood-written notes' idea was triedsoaked bandages, and slime.

These notes, that Johnny discovers by accident in Joe Debrett's libraryHaving made Moreau seem harmless, require you how was I to read them, as Johnny reads them. What Moreau writes is shocking, revolting, hideous. But it does convey the trick: for the rest other side of his insane personality? Not easy, but the story reader must be brought to understand so bluntly and brutally that you know, as Johnny Debrett knows, that we are dealing rock back in your chair with an extremely dangerous madman<u>revulsion</u>. Three or four ideas were scrapped before the ‘hand-written notes’ sequence appeared.

It took over twenty re-writes to get Arthur's give Arthur’s notes exactly as I want them to bean authentic warped ‘feel’. As a matter of technical interestGetting into his mind took some doing. Yuk! Interestingly, conveying in prose the act of sexual intercourse or murder, the deed state of murderlunacy, demands the most a skilful writing technique. So too does the evocation in prose of kindness, mercy and Love.

# ''Principal characters (usually the principals but not always) that emerge with the central idea for a story '' at the outset. These characters, e.g. Johnny Debrett, come came into focus pretty much complete in their general personality and appearanceat the start. Johnny He is the good-hearted, well intentioned, refined, arty, cosmopolitan . Upper Class individual (- his father was a German aristocrat, an academic that had to get out of Germany before the Second World War, his mother was a Yorkshire born opera singer) - but by ''no means snobbish, that will constantly tell friends and colleagues that Arthur Moreau is a perfectly innocent 'Antiquarian Book Dealer' until, . We all get-on with horror and revulsion, he - Johnny - discovers that Moreau is a monster. It may be interesting to know that Unique in himself, Johnny has a 'root' ‘root’ character that stems from a living person (this is rare with me, normally I like to 'create' my characters from my imagination): the root for Johnny Debrett is based upon a ''performance '' of an English actor portraying the principal character of a novel by an English author, as that novel was adapted as a movie by an English film director. Note, I say, the ''performance'', <u>not </u> the actor himself. I leave you to guess what the root of Johnny Debrett is, though Johnny was moulded by events in the story and has a unique personality.# ''Characters that the storyline demands, as I write''. The Kadets are the best example for ''The Arthur Moreau Story''. When I began the story with its working title, The Glass Casket, began I had absolutely no idea, not even the faintest notion of an artificial race, of and the Friedemann Five Year Progenic Cycle, or of Friedemann, though Von Stotz had been created along with Nina and Jeff Burdet (see point 4 below.) The storyline began to sag and I realised that a glass casket in an ancient cliff-top church on . A mystery, yes, but the coast mystery didn’t carry enough ‘power of Normandy (fascination’. OK, change the funeral location from a little old church is just down from near Dieppe: worth a visit) was not going to blow my readers' minds! The idea simply didn't carry enough 'power of fascination'. The the big, ugly, eerie basilica of La Roche-sur-Yon got my imagination going. OK, change Call the location to the west of France, make La Roche-sur-Yon town ''Yonroche and locate the funeral in the ugly basilica''. Fine! but who Who would Johnny find in that the basilica? It would be was packed with identical people ... nearly all young men, all young, all 'film‘film-star' star’ handsome, all identical, and the few women amongst these young men would be there were blokes in drag. And the The casket would be was out of this world, and the priests would be were Drag Queens, and ... Johnny starts thinking, What the ''heck’s'What the heck's going-on!'' ... <u>Exactly what I was Johnny is thinking</u>. So I stopped the story, sat down, and invented the Friedemann Five Year Progenic Cycle, designed the Kadet Precincts, dreamt-up the Château of St. Christophe, and got back to the keyboard. By I now, I could sense sensed that the story had the allegorical potential to be allegorical: the kadets are a represent our Society that has been leeched of all individuality, controlled by governments and the ubiquitous Personal Computer, is made to conform unquestioningly to a Politically Correct lifestyle, and nobody can see any of this going-on: we cannot see the tyrannous pyramids of State Control right in our midst: the Kadet Precincts are vast systems of State -run hypocrisy warping the minds and souls of billions. ''Guy!'' When people often exclaimsay to me, ''What an imagination you have, Guy!'' ... I reply, ''Look out of the window!.''.# ''Characters that 'walk ‘walk into the room' room’ as I write. When the storyline is powered-up at full steam, my mind works on two or three levels at once''. Situations will often demand characters 'on tap'‘on tap’. Jock, the steward on the Eocratic is a good example (. He wasn’t planned, he takes charge of Johnny as he boards the ship . The Eocratic, by the way, is based upon the 1930s White Star liner ''Britannic of the 1930s'', its interiors of the Grand Saloon are inspired by CunardCunard’s ''s Campania'', launched in 1892, and interiors of an 18th Century a French palace). Johnny meets Jock and King George VI’s railroad carriage, preserved in the First Class Main Entrance of the Eocratic (based upon the Aquitania, gobbed with crippling kitsch by Moreau's interior designers)Glasgow. Jock is typical of old time stewards that I remember on trains and ships up until the late 1960s. Jock could appear in more storiesway back. Stanley Casper is another the character that literally walks into Jo Debrett's Debrett’s library to meet Johnny. He was created in 2005 because I needed three heroes because . Johnny and Thomas <u>as a duo began to </u> put limitations on the actionedited story. Like ''Batman and Robin'', you cannot have them separated. With a third hero you can chuck one of the trio into in a dungeon, leaving and let the other two to sort it all out. Dumas was no fool with ''The Three Musketeers''. Stanley also gives me a chance to inject another decent, good-hearted, healthy-minded personality into a story seething with sick, warped villains. Stanley's triplet daughters get to marry Thomas, Panno and Kyla, and they all appear in the sequel with bairns. There is one problem with characters that walk into the room as you write; the story can get too crowded. A crowded story is unmanageable.# ''Characters closely based or wholly modelled upon actual people, living or dead''. Rare with me, but and beware risking libel. Nina and Jeff Burdet are two friends alive today in Minneapoliswhere Gracewood is located. Sir Frederick Appleby combines two people I know Minneapolis, one a great friend -St. Paul and have set Gracewood in this beautiful city. You need to be very careful when basing characters on real people, alive or sadly dead (the dead can have legal Estates): libel. Even - who had a blind eye he would wipe with the usual legal disclaimer on the verso of a Title page, blatantly derogatory descriptions must not apply to living person, or to a deceased person that enjoyed a benign public reputationsilk square. If Ramona is a person should recognise the description as applying tribute to him/her, or the descendents of a person no longer living should recognise their ancestor, you could find yourself in court. However: if what you say can be demonstrated as the truth, this is not libelElizabeth Taylor and another lovely lady I’ve known very well indeed.

Characters, once I have created them live, breath, think, have wills and minds of their own. They get up and constantly do things as you watch them. Far without my leave: <u>much</u> more interesting things than you planned I plan for them. When this happens, and it happens all the time, I follow them round with a notebook and a camera (so to speak). Who, then, writes the story? I sometimes wonder.

GB: We never learn because Tyranny is part of the way we are; the Human Nature of the Human Beast. Human beings We love to be bullied, threatened, belittled, having their have our homes, towns, cities destroyed in wars by war ... and there are born all the time individuals tyrants that - somehow - get themselves into positions of supreme power and tyrannise millions.

It is the The higher levels of petty tyranny that fascinate me; for example, . Faceless civil servants with great powers enjoying power that can change our lives, while the 'System' ‘System’ of State that so artfully conceals their actions and decisions from ordinary people. Worse, those employed to cook-up the hideous Propaganda we tend served out to believe: lies and us that is nothing less than deception painted varnished as Truth and Sincerity.

A central theme of The Arthur Moreau Story is the insidious nature of 'Control'‘Control’. We never know what is really happening to us, we are told we are Free, in fact we are ensnared. All through my story nobody, not even Even Sir Frederick, who is something like God, really never knows what is going-on: a bizarre, apparently Surreal situation is happening! Friedemann's . Friedemann’s serum is silently destroying millions, the Kadets infiltrate the highest realms of State and Society. Nobody knows! Or if they suspect When Johnny, Thomas and Stanley witness Atlas One, they are told that they are imagining things, treated with suspicion as if they were have imagined it; Stanley is considered insane.

Everything One of the reasons why we never learn is being orchestrated from a hidden control zone. Is this the stuff of Science Fiction, of Fantasy? Joseph Stalin was real! The misery, suffering, genocide that one man caused by his Will alone can there exist in every State system officials that make sure we never be quantified. Yet people on the way to their deaths said, ''If only you will let me speak with our leader, if only I can speak with Joseph Stalin. He will understand me, he will know I am innocentlearn.'' It was Stalin that had sent the poor wretch to SiberiaRead my story.

GB: In simple Net time-span terms, a year. But this This included stopping to invent the Kadets and other activities, and you should take into account that I had not written a full length piece of fiction - i.e. There was also a story - before‘learning curve’. So there was a 'learning curve' and that included finding out how I write best, for example, do Do I get up at five in the morning and start by six? Do I set a target of so many words a day? Do I edit each input before continuing with the new pieceas I write? As for combining two levels, a horror story and a mystery, I did not find this difficult. Perhaps this is due to my training as an architect and For me the process of designing buildings when the designer has answer to think on many different levels simultaneouslyall three is no.

What Combining two levels, a horror story and a mystery. I found very do not find this difficult was my first attempts to edit the completed typescript in early 2000 when the story came to rest at 183,000 words. That Perhaps this is a BIG story. In fact it was three stories in one, and two stories had due to be ripped out of it. (They can be used so nothing wastedmy work as an architect.) When I thought I had done quite well at editing I then discovered the jungle we call The Publishing Industry. After you design a building you have to think on many rejections from Literary Agencies, I put the typescript in a drawer for five years. I wrote television synopses: good training in the skill of editingdifferent levels simultaneously.

What I did find difficult was to edit the completed typescript in early 2000. The draft totalled 183,000 words; that’s a BIG story. In fact it was three stories in one. Two stories had to be ripped out of it but I didn’t know how. I then discovered the jungle we call The Publishing Industry. After many rejections from Literary Agencies, despondent, I put the typescript in a drawer. It was to stay there for five years. Writing television synopses taught me how to edit. I took the typescript out of its the drawer mid 2005 and, with a machete, I slashed away the two extra stories, burnt-off the choking gorse of sequences that made me would curl-you up, dredged the slurry that clogs good action, streamlined the characters: ''then did it all again, this time '' on hard copy rather than the screen. Amazing to experience the difference between screen prose and printed prose. Finally, I did it all again to land with The final story is 99,500 words: what you read, a good ‘commercial length’. I now am very experienced, so the sequel isn't taking the same 'rollerGross time span? Give-or-coaster' routetake: three years.

GB: I love travel: it inspires me. Even small trips inspire. I take the car out after my morning writing and each journey morning’s work, this inspires and relaxes me. I enjoy to walk, hopefully about three miles a day, in the country, on the fells, in towns, cities: all inspirational. Watching people living their lives goes with looking at the billion details of buildings and in urban spaces. I enjoy relish long journeys. If I'm I’m not driving (Europe) I will be looking out of the windowof plane, train, ship. I <u>never</u> write - use a laptop or tablet - in transit.

I find that I am excellent at research, no boast. Research is an ability that cannot be taught: you can do it or you can’t. It is like being a police inspector, a scientist and a pathologist (- of Historical events rather than corpses) - rolled into one. I discovered as a student that I am good at research - ; a methodical process that many find tedious that involves in-depth analysis. My biggest research programme so far was undertaken when writing the biography of the Victorian architect, Sir Charles Barry (that's another story!).

The Arthur Moreau Story contains much 'static' ‘static’ research, that is information readily ready to hand, from my own library, or locally. This can be scenery, pictures in books, photographs of previous travels, rather than setting off on a specifically aimed GBWT (: GB Writing Tour). The amount of research a story demands depends upon genre. Historical novels require big research programmes. If your main character is Elizabeth the First (of England) you need to get into her mind as well as to and know exactly what she liked, hated, wore, said, did .If you are a busy writer, you will probably need to hire a professional researcher.. at a personal level and at State levelSo far I do all my own.

GB: I write in my studio, here at Silverdale (a village in north Lancashire). I have always been used to a studio, rather than a study. So the The room is full of tables and , photographic lamps, objects of inspiration, the walls are hung with my drawings and designs, and . I surround myself with items that always interest me. There are two old Two bookshelves that contain works of reference, and books that my eye catches: my library is in another part of the house. I keep records of all I write, and all inspirational material, in wire filing trays, that are always visible and always ready to riffle-through or to sort out. There are cupboards full of objects of interest: Venetian You will find glasses bought from by a young artist bought in Venice in 1981 ... loads of road maps ... the ancient 78 rpm gramophone record playing of ''Only a Rose '' and ''Love Me Tonight'', sung by Winnie Melville and Derek Oldham (WMDO) so important in The Arthur Moreau Story ... prehistoric flint tools from France ... a collection collections of old post cards ... and so it goes onlots of tat. If I move, my My studio will evolve evolves where I goam. A studio is nomadic, a study is not.

I write on a PC, using Word for Windows 7 at the moment: Windows Word, a simple, internationally recognised electronic writing tool. I write from around 8-30 a.m. to - usually - 1 p.m. I aim to create, each session between 800 and 1,800 ''good '' words. When I say 'good' ‘good’ I mean publishable words, subject to my editing of the complete typescript and the eye of a professional editor. For the next story I will engage the services of a professional editor before I submit the typescript to a publisher.

800 - 1,800 good words does not sound much, but you have to remember that these demand every session demands my <u>full </u> creative power, nothing less. An average of four hours a day at top whack is the equivalent of a full working day in an office and more. You get fatigued, so every month, maybe . Maybe twice a month, I take a full day off. Usually when I will go to the Lake District because not . Not everybody has a world class beauty spot on their doorstep. I write seven days a week. I don't take lunch, but walk in the afternoons, then have a good dinner and - as often as not - will go to bed by nine p.m.

<u>It's It’s not everybody's everybody’s cup of tea!</u> Writing involves relentless discipline. Parties and socialising don't go with the businessSocialising doesn’t mix well. This is why I like dropping-in at a pub, or going to a restaurant after my working morning: you keep in touch with folk. Very easy Easy to become a recluse, especially when my imagination does not need people to feed it. I never write with music, or any distraction. It's There’s me, my creative energy, the desire to tell a story, never failing staying power and the puritanical integrity of a true artist.

GB: People, having enjoyed that enjoy '''The Arthur Moreau Story''', kept asking constantly ask me where Moreau came from. I said, ''Does ‘Does it matter?'' ’ I reply. Apparently, it does. I find myself writing a sequel to the story - the unusual angle came to me on a walk and I was fascinated: a good sign. I'm I’m not telling anyone about the sequel because giving anything away; you will have to read it. An acceptable commercial length at present is around 100,00 words. The sequel will be about that. At the moment the story is 98% complete and stands at 106,000 words. There will need to be a 'burning-off' ... probably of the opening sequencespublished this year. I was, up Up until May of , 2012, commencing January 2012a year since, I was writing a much more complex novel: ''Epic '' in scale. Four years of notes went into the foundation of the story that is set in the not too distant future when there has been mayhem ... but the results for Humanity are not as we would predict. Two characters provide the opposing poles of the plot. I shall resume this project when the sequel This will be completed by Spring, 2014: and more to The Arthur Moreau Story is wrapped and 'in the can'.And beyond that .come.. Exciting, Life, isn't it?

* '''BB: It That sounds like a very appealingfull life, Guy. Thank you for chatting amking the time to chat to us.'''