Murderati

With A Mercy That Outrides All Of Water

By Ken Bruen

My trinity of sorrow and loss

Barbara Serenalla
Eddie Bunker
Ed Mc Bain

I have been truly grace-d to have counted those people as my friends and no exaggeration, I think of them every day.

I had a completely different friendship with each.

I made friends with Barbara through the warmth of Donna Moore. She had sent me Barbara’s books and when I finally met Barbara, she got right in my face, asked

"How come you never quoted me as a chapter heading in your books?’

I said

"I hadn’t read you then."

At the Edgars three years ago, she gave me that ferocious hug she had and asked

"So, am I quoted?"

She was very ill then and would you know it, not for a New York minute

She treated her illness with humour and style

When she won The Anthony, she was over the moon.

Me too.

She gave me a huge kiss on the mouth and when I must have looked astonished, she laughed, said

"I just won so I’m hysterical."

Few people in the Mystery Community were as loved or respected as Barbara and she was no shrinking violet. She had that edge and granite humour that if you didn’t get it

Your problem

Her books are on my shelf like the saddest line I can utter and all I know is that knowing her, I felt like more than I was.

Eddie Bunker was one of the gentlest men I ever met and he looked like the darkest alley you’d avoid. He came to Galway in 2000, he was the star attraction in the city’s Literary Festival. Dressed in a trenchcoat and fedora, he looked like he just stepped out of a fifties gangster movie.

His opening words to me

"You did time."

He said it was in the eyes and like cops, us of the dark, always checked the exits and were forever scanning the room.

Something I thought I’d hid pretty well, the constant watching I mean.

He drank gin and tonic and back then, you could still smoke in pubs, I’d managed to get hold of a carton of unfiltered Lucky Strike, had to send to Dublin for them. His health was failing but he showed up for every event, and women adored him. When I told him how much they liked him, he
said

"The bad boy gig."

And then that half smile like who the hell knew from shinola.

His favourite country was France, told me they worshipped mystery writers there and treated mystery writers like heroes.

Added

"You need to get you some of that."

I was doing a launch with another writer and when we’d finished, the writer announced he would not be signing any books and Eddie, standing near me, grunted

"The fook is that, gimme the suckers, I’ll sing em."

I told him how much the fedora fitted his image and he laughed out loud, said

"Image is for the muttahs who can’t write for shit."

When he was leaving, I was arranging when I’d next see him and he leaned over, gave me the warmest hug I’d had in a long time.

It was the very last time I saw him.

Ten days after he’d left Galway, a parcel arrived from France and you guessed it, a fedora.

Fit perfectly.

I met Ed mc Bain due to the wondrous help of Bonnie and Joe from The Black Orchid Bookstore. He was in remission from his illness but still had to use a voice box. Very first thing he said was

"Brant is great."

My whole series on that character had been inspired by Ed and when I told him, he asked

"Who is your favourite character?"

No argument
"Fat Ollie Weeks."

He was delighted, said
"Me too"

There was a huge line of fans waiting and he treated each one like a personal friend. The following year, in January, even New Yorkers agreed it was seriously cold and every store I hit, there was Ed before me and I had to ask
"Why?"

I mean, he was beyond legend and going out in such appalling weather, he certainly didn’t need to.

He said

"My readers come out."

Those three amazing people couldn’t be more different in
Style
Character
Appearance

Yet they all shared one thing, the most important person was the reader. And each of them was genuinely delighted to be a writer.

It’s commonly held
"Don’t meet your heroes, you’ll be disappointed."

That wondrous trinity gave the lie to that.

Last weekend I was at a literary convention in Clare, and among the writers in attendance were Roddy Doyle, Joanne Harris, Hugo Hamilton, Brian Keenan, Nuala O Faolain and of course, a whole cluster of poets.

My slot was on the Sunday, high noon so to speak and phew, you let out your breath as you see people come in.

Twenty minutes at the end for Q and A ... a man said

"I knew you when you were a child and you haven’t changed a bit'

Jesus, I hope that’s not true. Muhammad Ali said that if you’re the same person at 50 as you were at 20, you’ve wasted your life.

I don’t confuse having changed with having improved.

Two women and a man seem to have every book I ever wrote, even the pamphlet published by Otto Penzler and after I sign the books, they ask if they could buy me a pint?

The weather is wet, cold and miserable so we head for an old Irish pub with a roaring fire and as we order the drinks, the two women reveal that they are Ban Gardai! Irish Guards and they tell me more about Jack Taylor than I ever realised.

The time goes by all too quickly and as they prepare to leave, they say

"We’d like you to have this."

I open the package after they’ve gone and it’s the gold insignia they wear on their uniform.

I’m deeply moved.

They had told me of various writers of repute who treated them with nigh on contempt and I’d told them about my trinity of late friends.

The man said

‘Colamh sabh le do cairde.’ ... Peaceful rest to your friends.

The title of this blog comes from Gerald Manley Hopkins, The Wreck of the ‘Deutschland’.

I hold the gold insignia in my hand like the most treasured award and stare into the fire, I see the faces of my friends, the charismatic trinity, those Ban Gardai with their stories of patrols on the streets of Dublin and the lines of the above poem seen a fitting tribute

... to flash from the flame to the flame then,

tower from the grace to the grace.

KB

In A Late Style Of Fire

By Ken Bruen

This sounds like an Irish joke and a very sad one.

170,000 Irish blood donors had their details stored on a laptop and on February 7th, the laptop was stolen in New York.

"Not to worry,” say the blood bank.“It’s encrypted.”

Thus throwing down the gauntlet to every would be hacker out there.

And ... all of the donors will be informed by email.

That is a lot of email.

There will certainly be Irish blood circulating for St Patrick’s Day.

Mostly they say, the important thing is not to panic?

My postman who tells me all of the above, says

“Blood will out.”

Is there a response to this, I mean one that bears any semblance of sanity?

The title of today’s blog is from a poem by Larry Levis. If ever there was a poet of connection and separation, he’s it.

He termed “souvenirs," the symbols objects and places by which people interact during their lives.

If you had to name one vital one, what would it be?

For me, it’s always the same, books.

As I prepare to move home again, I gaze with dismay at the mountains of books that cover my study and I can’t take them all with me.

I’m listening to my MP 3, sent to me by Craig and just now, Leonard Cohen is doing “Who by fire."

Pure coincidence, I think, as I finish reading the Levis poem, a line resounding

It is so American, fire. So like us.
It’s desolation. And it’s eventual , brief triumph.

The very essence of the Irish mentality is also in those lines.

I remember at college, a lecturer describing what makes a writer and after a long winded harangue, he finally said
“Fire in the gut.”
Without that, he said,
“Go work in a bank.”

Tony Black, in an email, working on his 2nd book, wrote
“It’s cooking, I’m on fire.”
No sweeter words or better feeling.
God, when it’s hot, when it sings, you think you’ll always have the flame.
Would it were so.

Most mornings, if you can rise to a damp squib, you’re lucky. I don’t think the flame is ever fully extinguished but it sure does dim.

Alex recently wrote an amazing blog about The Price, not only the title of her 2nd stunning book, but the deal we do to get published/reviewed/known.
The price we pay as Bruce sang, and how much you’re willing to give for your craft.

Charles Willeford was asked what was the hardest thing for a writer to do?
“Stay in print," he said.

There was a time I’d thought it would be bliss to be a painter and I actually went to Art college for a year, completed the course and my tutor on graduation asked me
“So, are you any good?”

He was genuinely interested in what I thought.
I told him the truth, I said
“I have a certain technique but talent, no."

He smiled, said
“You’re right.”

I’d done a few paintings and gave them to friends who were gracious enough to say thanks and nothing further.

A month ago, one of them turned up on e-bay and I’d love to say it was going for a small fortune. The only word that really applies is small.

My grumpy priest was round the other evening, one of those bitter cold nights, your breath making clouds of, if not unknowing, certainly of desperation.

Flattering me is not one of his traits but he did manage
“You make a great fire.”

It’s true, turf and the tiniest hint of peat, it lights up the whole room, you could almost aspire to contentment. Throws odd shadows along the bookcases and you’re glad you don’t have any real reason to head downtown.

He said
“I’m perished.”

Which not only tells me he’s freezing but is a heavy hint to get the Jay out.
I make it with cloves and sugar, brown sugar, not of the Rolling Stones type I hasten to add, and the real trick is ensure you have heavy tumblers. Literally add weight to the enterprise.

He gets on the other side of that then picks up my notebook, looks at some lines I’ve scribbled down

... the slightest comprehend If slight-indeed
As such
The comprehension.

He has no compunction about reading whatever is to hand and I’m putting it down to long friendship as well as sheer nosiness. I wait and then

“What does that mean?"

I’m not sure yet and tell him so

He is holding out the tumbler for another and says
“I suppose we’ll find it in the next book when you have another lash at the clergy.”

He is standing in front of the fire, so close that I’m half afraid his pants will burn. Burning a priest will do wonders for my rep but not much for my friendships.

He spots the Louisville slugger in the corner, goes over and takes a swing of it, says

“Now that’s a handy yoke.”

He reads the inscription on it and asks
“Who do you know in Ohio?”
Before I can answer, he says

“Tis nearly as good as a hurly."

No higher praise

And dare I say, he knows I have a hurly because he gave it to me
In lieu of communion perhaps.

Then, as is Irish habitual, he veers off in another direction, asks

“How’s the young wan?"

My daughter
I say she’s doing good and almost like him more till he adds

“I haven’t seen her at mass?"

I go and get him a refill

He nods when I hand it to him and comments

“You’re not having one?"

I say I’ve work and he laughs

“Sure that writing isn’t work.”

I give him my best smile as that usually makes him nervous.

Alex comes into my head and I ask him

“What do you think of the devil?"

I can see by his expression he thinks I mean the government then realizing what I really mean, he tosses off his drink, gets his coat and at the door, leaves me with

“As long as he isn’t thinking about me, I’m leaving him to his own tricks."

I’d meant to tell him about Rabbi David and his latest email where he wrote
‘Shrouds have no pockets.’
But it will keep
I’ll let it ... simmer.

My daughter was going out with friends last Friday and for the first time -- she is fifteen -- she had eyeshadow, lip gloss and it shrieved me heart.
I know the whole gig about father’s not wanting their little girls to grow up and go out into the world and Jesus, maybe run into the likes of me.

I could see by her serious face how essential my answer would be when she asked

‘What do you think Dad?"

I lied
I lied big
I said
“You’re gorgeous."

After she’d gone, I stood in the hall and if I wasn’t such a hard ass, I’d have wept

I kept telling me own self
"This is like a cliché, father’s always react so."
Damn cliché didn’t ease one bit the agony in me soul.

I finally moved and said aloud what I’d promised my friend Lou I would, I say
"The very meaning of the word Grace, is, a free gift."

My surrogate sister, Kathy in New York, is having a real tough time and I resolve to get to the church and light her candle

The email brings Lisa from Delaware agreeing that "The Blessing” by James Wright is her favorite poem by him.

I try to count me blessings and would love to have just one that isn’t in disguise!

Mainly I wish, and I know how selfish it sounds but fookit, I wish my daughter was five years old all over again.

Me home looks like a battlefield in the process of selling it and the killer is the books. I give a ton away but there are obviously signed copies from friends that mean more than money.

To make me smile on all of these shenanigans, C.J. emails to say ... you want to make the sale go smooth, bury a statue of St. Joseph in the garden!

Of course I have St Joseph, and I do have a shovel, one that the troops use in Iraq, sent to me by Craig, I have a garden but do I have the ... suspension of disbelief, vital to burying a saint?

I just know I’ll get caught

See the headline

"OBSCURE MYSTERY WRITER ARRESTED FOR BURYING SAINT IN GARDEN!"

As I pass through the sitting room, where St. Joseph is perched, I can’t look at him, I’m thinking, “I’m on the verge of burying you buddy."

I head for the garden and sure am going to miss the basketball mini court I’d built for Grace.

There is a nice plot (sic) under me one oak tree and as I survey it, I mutter
"C.J. ... hell of a woman."

KB

She Glides Along ... the Solitary Hearted

By Ken Bruen


Dusty, on his blog, wrote an amazing piece on depression and it always takes cojones to write of such. I’ve suffered from clinical depression all me life and when I finally got diagnosed, I tried the medical route and it didn’t suit me. Now, when it hits, I bury meself in work and try … Jesus, do I try, not to let it affect those I love.

Depression is still unacceptable here, you tell someone you have it, they go

“You need a hobby to take your mind off yourself!”

Maybe fooking knitting, you think.

I can certainly knit me brows.

One bright spark, a life coach, told me and I quote

To “get a grip on meself!”

Through gritted teeth, I asked him

“Which bit of me should I grab?”

As a child, I learned to turn anger inwards, the classic cause of depression, recently, I’ve tried to do the opposite and not that I’m now a latent fuse but I reply faster and more openly to abuse.

You call me out, I’ll reply.

Dusty raises another oft discussed topic, if you had the choice, would you be happy and not write or … unhappy and writing.

No contest for me.

Writing is what keeps me going.

When I was asked recently, are you a very dark person? … I told the truth, always a no brainer, I said

“I write dark, I try to live in the light.”

My Rabbi, David Wolpe, in Floating Takes Faith writes

“Sometimes a mitzvah is seeing for yourself and coaxing a smile from the darkness.”

I ran that line by the grumpy priest I know and he sighed, his eyes expressing

“God almighty, here he goes again.”

He said

“Be more in your line to follow the faith you were raised in.”

But I knew he wouldn’t leave it alone and sure enough, later in the day, I was watching Boston Legal and he phoned, said

“I’ve been thinking about those Zen things you read and I’m now convinced, you’re a holy terror.”

I was delighted.

You get the clergy to actually come back at you, you’ve certainly got their attention and he finished with

“I can only hope it’s not true that the new book of yours isn’t, as I hear, taking a shot at nuns?”

I said

“Nuns, why would I do that?”

He said he’d pray for me.

The title of today’s  blog comes from the poem ‘She was a Queen’ by Hartley Coleridge and has as a second line, “a smile of hers was like an act of grace.”

Few moments as shining as when you see a person’s face light up in pure delight.

The Hilary/Obama duel gets huge press coverage here and yes, we have found an Irish ancestor for Obama, as we did for Reagan and, whisper it, Nixon.

Last week, I was at a function for Down syndrome and it ran late, I was walking home along the canal and a guy was calling a girl every obscenity under the sun. Plus, he had a grip of her hair and not gently. I’ve sworn so many times to mind me own business but his language was beyond belief so I said

“Could you ease up on the language?”

He let her hair go and she faced me,  called me every kind of bad bastard under the Galway sky and, bottom line, to go fook meself.

I wondered if that was in the neighborhood of  “Get a grip on yourself?”

I don’t see her having that smile of grace but maybe I caught her on a bad night.

When I got home and was making some soup, I realized me hands were shaking, doing a veritable full on jig.

The line in me head

She walks in darkness.

It’s been that kind of week, full of twists and turns, it started with the revelation that Gerry Adams driver was a double agent, followed by the announcement that for the coming student Rag week, they were handing out 65,000 condoms and I can’t wait to hear what me priest has to say about that.

Me doorbell went early on Valentine’s Day and no, not a bunch of heart scented cards, god forbid, but a package of books I’d been waiting on. The postman,  I’ve known for longer than I care to admit, gasped

“Jaysus, what happened to yer hair”

I said it was a buzz cut and thinking, I haven’t even had me coffee and I’m explaining me hair?  … or lack of. He said

“It’s fooking brutal is wot it is.”

But the ones who know you, they lash you and then try to leave you with a little something, if not uplifting, at least less harsh, he said

“You look fooking dangerous, you know that.”

Try telling that to the girl on the canal.

I get me coffee, tell meself

“Two months to Noir Con, plenty of time to have the hair grow back.”

I open the package and the day brightens considerably

Among the gems

Gutted … by Tony Black

The Cold Spot … the Picc himself

Damnation Falls … Ed Wright

And Will Thomas


Few authors quoted as often as Mark Twain but I can’t help but think of him and

Good friends

Good books

And a

Sleepy conscience

This is

The ideal life.

I’d trade a lot for that sleepy conscience

As I sit before the blank screen, I read a quote I’ve put aside for a chapter heading

… above the roar of the wind, Hector hollers,

“If we survive this, bud -- if you take those cocksuckers out -- well, then I’ve got a hankering to head into the high country.”

If I could only quite figure out where the high country for me is?

If I could take on board what my friend Lou Boxer says

“To let go

No seeking, no striving

No stewing

In my own juice”

I receive a query as to where is the best place to start with Louis MacNeice and ‘Autumn Journal’ remains as fine as ever and you have to love a writer who described his own race as receiving from their country

… neither sense nor money

Who slouch around the world

With a gesture and a brogue

And a faggot of useless memories.

Lest all of the above tends more to the dark than the light, I remind meself of the following:

“Why have you come my son?”

Pause

Then

“To seek truth

To ask salvation

But mainly … to have a good laugh.”


KB











‘

The Urgency of Shadows

By Ken Bruen


The title of today’s blog is from an email by Louise Ure.

Yes, our very own.

Louise was home in Tucson, on book tour and letting me know how it was going.

Describing being back in Arizona, she mentioned she’d forgotten the urgency of shadows. Apart from it making a hell of a title for a book, it describes her new book, The Fault Tree, too.

Rarely has blindness been better described.


It’s three years since I lived in Tucson, we’d brought my daughter there and she was entranced by the desert and cowboys.

The only cowboy she’d ever known was me, and in Ireland a cowboy is not
am … flattering.

The locals were mesmerized by this tiny wee thing with an Irish accent who had a mouth on her like Bart Simpson. Like me, she loved America and it never ceased to surprise her.

Our very first meal, in a steak house, when they brought the food, we were stunned.

Enough on the plates to feed Galway for a week.

We did our best but there was a mighty pile of food still remaining when we
cried … we’re done.

The waitress, asked if we’d like a doggy bag.

Grace said

“We don’t have our dog with us.”

I explained to Grace that you can bring the food home and she asked

“Why?’

I said you could have it later or even the following day.

Her look was beyond skepticism.

Took her a week to realize that chips were called French Fries.

Mostly, she was taken with the dry heat and not having to wear coats, jackets or search for umbrellas.


Paul Theroux gave what I think is the best advice to writers

“Leave home.”

In every sense of the term.

My previous visit to Arizona had been on tour, and in Scottsdale I finally got to meet Craig Mc Donald. We were staying in a hotel that was closing in two days. When we ordered a beer, we were asked what brand and we rattled off various fine ones only to be told

“You can have Miller or Miller Lite.”

I did a reading at the wondrous Poison Pen and got to have dinner with Patrick Milliken, Dennis McMillan, James Sallis, Craig and Debbie. We didn’t drink Miller.

It was one of those magical evenings where the company is as fine as it could be, the weather was amazing and I thought … all of this bounty because I sat down and wrote.

Craig told me he was planning a book titled Head Games.

If you’d told us then it would be nominated for the Edgar, we’d have drank a crate of Miller.

I have been truly graced with the writers I’ve met and mystery writers are the best of all.

See the sheer volume of care and warmth extended to Patry Francis on January 29th.

As writers, we might work in the shadows but when we come out in the light, watch the glow.

Which brings me to The Legacy

A poem, for Judy, Bill Crider’s wife, the way I see Bill talk not only to her but with her.

Bill’s blog, despite the harsh shadows on their lives, remains upbeat and yes, life-affirming, no matter what comes down the Texas pike.

They are usually on my mind with the urgency of shadows

… leave you
 
   The leavings of

… an inarticulated thanks
 
   Will to you

… the echoes of the lines
 
    As yet unwrit

… term you the keeper of my conciliatory heart

    That heart

… as mortgage

    Hold.

I heard my daughter say her prayers in Irish last night.

She began, as we do, with Mhuire an Gras (Mary of Grace) and then she prayed for all the ones I’ve asked her to pray for and I’m just about to go answer the phone when I hear her add

“And God, will you let Dad get me a Big Mac today and no doggy bag.”


I’m thinking of three wondrous ladies I have the blessing to know

Susan Smiley

Honora Finkelstein

And Lisa from Delaware

All three have sent me warm and warmest emails just after I’d been castigated on a German mystery site for not responding to fan emails or readers queries.

As Honora expresses it, Hands on a healing heart.

What else do I need to know?

On Elaine Flinn’s blog, I’m laughing out loud at her responses to the comments to her Edgar remarks and she is all I love best in women

Feisty

Funny

And oh so full of true grit.

Louise Ure adds a terrific line, which applies not only to depression but to the insecurity most writers I know undergo

… I have a black belt in self-recrimination.

C.J Carpenter sends me a piece about an English coin I’d given her and mentions St. Jude, Patron of Hopeless cases and I want to phone the priest I know and tell him.

But like the true Irish he is, he’d ask

“Are you saying I need to pray to St. Jude?”

Lou Boxer reminds me of the wondrous question posed by Merton

“What can we gain by sailing to the moon if we are not able to cross the abyss that separates us from ourselves?’

I’m about to end this entry when Bukowski’s collection, "Poems Written Before Jumping Out of an 8 Story Window", catches my eye and I open at random and light on this fitting end line.

… the only thing needed

    Is a little more strength

    Visions on bad film seldom

… repeat.

Exactly.


KB

Shards in Desperance

By Ken Bruen


                      Jan 29th is PATRY FRANCIS DAY

Here be ... grace under fire.

Battling with a serious health problem, she stands as a shining example of:
“She may have the illness but goddammit, the illness will never have her.”

Her debut novel, THE LIARS DIARY was and remains one of the highlights of the year.

She has true grit and heroism doesn’t always have to be writ in neon, sometimes it shines brightest from the most unassuming of people.

Her novel sits on my desk and her sheer spirit rests in my heart.

I’m not often associated with gratitude but today, I give thanks for a world that has such wondrous people as Patry in it.

For today, I hope she will know that she is deep and deepest cherished.


                                           ______


February is looming, dark and rapid. Here, that means the Feast of St Brigid, and I know, we have a Saint for most everything but St Brigid has her own cross.  You’re thinking

“Don’t we all.”

Like the drunk staring up the crucified Christ and muttering

“Any chance of me getting a turn up there?’

St Brigid’s cross is made of reeds, and beautifully interwoven and naturally, if you hang her cross in your home, the house will be blessed.

A close friend of mine from the UK moved here recently and rented a house near the ocean.

So, to keep things green if not downright Irish, I got hold of one of the very old St Brigid’s Crosses and gave it to her.

I ran into her a few weeks later and she glared at me. I went

“What?”

She said her house had been broken into, all her valuable stuff taken. I felt it was more St Brigid’s fault than mine but am I going to lay it off on a Saint?

Me life has enough dark shadows without having a Saint pissed at me. I muttered some half-arsed apologies and commiserations. She let me run me course and then delivered her blow, hissed

“They took everything except that bloody cross!"

Had I an answer?

No.

I could have told her the burglars must have been Irish as they’d never steal St Brigid.

That would be like ... mi-adh ... which is Irish for serious bad karma.

You can take it as gospel , to coin a phrase, that I won’t be sending any crosses to you guys in the near future.

My doctor friend was round yesterday and is one of the few remaining Irish people to still drink tea. Now that we’re prosperous, we’re into designer coffee and tea is rare and rarer.

You can’t fob him off with a tea bag, he wants the whole nine yards, the leaves and the tea pot heated, plus the cups, left warming on the stove.

He also likes scones with lashings of butter. He’s a doctor so am I going to mention cholesterol etc.

He wouldn’t listen

He’s the one who gives the advice and when I finally get the tea gig arranged, he sits back, asks

“So, what changes have you made for the new year?"

Apart from not handing out any more St Brigid crosses, there isn’t a whole lot of resolutions I’ve made. Before I can answer, he says

“Course in your case, change is not to be confused with improvement.”

He can bring his own damn scones next time.

Here are some lines I recently came across

The bluebird of happiness

Sits upon your shoulder

It used to be afraid of you

But now

The bird

Is getting bolder.

For some bizarre reason, I read these lines aloud to the Doc and he goes

“What do they mean?"

I think they’re self evident and say so.

He sighs and among my least favorite sounds is the sigh, especially when it’s directed at me, he rolls his eyes and I had thought that rolling your eyes was something they did in sitcoms.

I ask him

“You don’t like it?”

He gives me his medical look, the one they instill in training, it’s a blend of pity and artificial sympathy with just a tiny hint of impatience and he asks

“Can we expect that you’re now going to be happy?"

God forbid

True to my heritage, I answer a question with a question, go

“Would that be so startling?"

His mobile shrills and he answers then turns to me and says he has to go.

At the door, he leaves me with

“I think those scones were a tiny bit stale.”

I had a scathing reply to this but alas it didn’t occur to me till an hour after he left.

It’s that time of year I give my lecture in the college, twice a year I get to do this and it’s on my doctoral subject.

I get a real buzz from those occasions as it keeps me in touch with my teaching days and I get to stalk the podium, if not exactly like Rilke’s Panther, then at least with a certain amount of glee. The Head of The Department was going to cancel this year as the last time I gave the talk, it was mystery fans who turned up.

I’d been reading David Wolpe’s wondrous book, Floating takes Faith and trying to get my tongue around beautiful words like

Tzaddik

K’dushah

Hayatzer hara

And a line that sings to me

“God” says the Kotzker, “Has plenty of angels. What God needs is some holy human beings.”

My priest friend is beguiled at my friendship with a Rabbi and my fascination with the Torah and tells me

“Every time I think I have you nailed down, you go off in a new direction.”

As a recovering catholic, I tell him

“The more I learn, the less I know.”

I am aware that will piss him off.

It does

He mutters

“No wonder you write such dark books.”

He’s a priest so I let him have the last word, call it my good deed for the day.

The ferocious winds continue to batter the city and when I wake this morning, no kidding, my gates have been blown clean off, I find part of one a few hundred yards down the road and the rest, is, if not ... gone with the proverbial wind, then certainly headed towards America.

In truth, I’m not even thinking about gates or replacing them, my mind is focused on

Patry Francis.

My hand rests lightly on her novel, my heart sends out its warmest wish.

KB

Ghosts Must Do Again

By Ken Bruen

AND GHOSTS MUST DO AGAIN …

Those lines by Auden continue with

WHAT GIVES THEM PAIN


What brings those lines to the forefront of my mind are the posts by Dusty and Alex about sometimes hating writing. Oh horror, heresy etc. A writer not always loving their craft. Arthur Miller, well into his 70's, said every morning he sits in front of the blank page and

Feels … terror.

I don't think any of the writers I respect ever said it was easy.


There are mornings, when I see a ton of email, I give a sigh of relief as it means I can defer actual writing for a bit. If I skip a day, for whatever reason, and don't actually write, I feel guilty and no rationale will eradicate it.


There's no real mystery, pardon the bad pun, to writing. You just sit down and do it.

Right.

How hard can that be?

And writers block … they say, think of your bank manager, and you'll be back on track.

The days of blankness, when I really don't have a single thought in my head, I just barge and blitz through it.

Blood from a stone.


Above my desk is a quote from Somerset Maugham. Now I don’t think he meant it as a curse but that’s how I interpret it, it goes

“The compulsion to write and no talent.”

Jesus wept.


I had always believed that if you wanted to write, you must have some talent, however vague or latent.

One of the finest books on writing is, Becoming A Writer by Dorothea Brande and a passage in there goes

… an inclination to reverie, a love of books, the early discovery that it is
not too difficult to turn a phrase – to find any or all of these things in one’s first adolescent consciousness is to believe that one has found the inevitable, and not too formidable, vocation.

Wow, is that ever the road to ruin

As in … I want to, therefore I can.

Fook.

Malcolm Bradbury makes a wonderful point

“Good writers are generally, first and foremost, good readers.”

Amen.


In my experience, the best writing comes at a personal cost, when the words have to be gouged from your very soul and for that reason, they ring true.

There are the bleak dark days when you write and think

“Christ, this sucks.”

You do it anyway.

Then sometimes, not too often, you hit on magic, the words jell, the writing sings and you don’t need a critic or another person to tell you it’s good.

You know and there is no better feeling on the whole planet.

In its very rarity, lies its conviction.


Recently, finishing up a new book, it was the usual slog, the uphill battle and then, voila, I hit paydirt, a whole page of dark alchemy. I didn’t stop to wonder where it came from, or what put it into play, I just went with it.

Then the acid test, how did it read the next day.

God almighty, it was even better than I thought.

After more than twenty books, I’ve had that feeling maybe three times.

The edit came back a few weeks later with that whole passage deleted and the comment

“This doesn’t work at all and is not up to your usual standard.”

Deflation?

Take a wild guess.

And then you have to shrug, mutter, however darkly

“The hell do I know?”


The end question

“When is a writer done?’

Like, retiring?

For me, it’s when they prise my cold dead fingers from the keyboard.

My wife used to say, on being asked what it was like to live with a writer

“It’s not a problem as long as you know you’re only part of the plot.”

Is there anything else I’d rather be doing?

No.
                                 

January has come in cold and wet, no surprise, it’s expected. But on Jan 4th, I was up at the crack as usual, had me first cup of coffee, got stuck into my writing and didn’t actually raise the blinds till nearly 7.15 and went

“Holy hell.”

Snow.

And heavy snow.

We don’t do snow in Galway, unless you mean one of the many terms for cocaine.

My daughter is 15 and she has never seen snow, apart from movies, Christmas cards and her Geography books.

But the real deal, never.

We went out into the yard and her eyes, lit up in wonder, truly enchanted at it.

She was lit up for the whole day.

Next day, it was gone and her face, like she’d lost something truly precious, and she asked me

“Will it come back?’

I didn’t know

I said

“It might.”


Like the snow, you never quite know what any day will bring.

Lou Boxer, undefeatable organizer of Noir Con sent me a beautiful card with the greeting

Leaves tremble

Roots remain still

Blessed be.

Later in the day, I meet with an ex –nun, who used to work at The Magdalen and after she left the convent, she wrote a superb play on the laundries. She is a fine poet and we went for coffee to celebrate her new book of poems. They are quite extraordinary, and later, I’m still so taken with them, that I write her a long email , extolling them. She phones me and asks would I be willing to write an introduction to the collection.

I would.

And did.

Because of the nature of my books, I am perceived here as anti-clerical, despite the fact that I taught my daughter her prayers in Irish and one of my closest friends is a priest. It seems incredible now that when I attended Trinity, Catholics had to secure permission from the bishop.

I went to meet with him and he was a notorious bully. I asked if I might have permission to attend and he snapped

“What’s wrong with our own Universities?”

I tried to explain that the course I wished to follow was only available at Trinity.

He refused me permission.

I went anyway and I remember a friend commenting

“You’re like … excommunicated.’

Woe is me.

On the outside, which is a place I think writers thrive.

Least I do.


The final word I’ll leave to my Rabbi, David, who shared with me, from The Talmud

“Learning is more important than action-

When the learning leads to action.”

And lest I got too deep, he added

“Logic is neat

Life is messy”


This morning, I was up earlier than usual and you guessed it

Praying for snow.

A line of Bruce from Thunder Road uncoiling in my head, jelling with Auden

“The ghosts of all the girls you sent away."

KB

Footsteps Darkly Past

By Ken Bruen

And with new days
You slip
Another faded trace
Of joy, they deem as yours
And in the dying envy
They grasp so near
You’ll catch a fleeting glimpse
To conjure back
A clear but solemn day
That sees you thread, an
All too known path
Through words that
Never mean again
Unless
To veil
Your fitful pride
That leads to my but softer curse
Of being forever damned
In troubled fate

I hope you had a wondrous peaceful holiday

And the New Year brings everything you would wish for those you love

The above poem was written in extremis.

Meaning, I was in bits.

And my agent fired me, telling me, the best you can hope for is cult status, translate as

No reviews

Discouragement hits me two ways

One … initial depression

Then

Defiance

The voice in me head that asks

“Are you going to quit?”

The answer that thankfully comes

“Like fook.”

I’ve been reading Tom Piccirilli … he has a whole shelf on my bookcase

And one of his titles could sum up my agents/publishers theme song

… Fucking Lie Down Already.

Tom has wondrous stories about the publisher’s reaction to that title.

Such writers as Tom are the true grit of our calling.

In Irish there is a saying

“Is maith an t-alannan an ochras.”

Hunger is the best sauce.

No truer words.

I hope you had a wondrous Christmas and you received everything you could wish for and then some.

Our Lotto was the 2nd largest in it's history, 13 million Euros and a farmer in the West of Ireland scooped it, no need to ask how his Christmas went.

One of Ireland's top models, aged 24, died from cocaine and two days later, three young men, none of them yet 20, died the same way. They were just ordinary guys and what this showed that coke was no longer the drug of the rich or the privileged. The papers and Goverment went into panic mode and a survey showed that  all the public toilets in the country tested positive for cocaine usage. Used to be the working stiff's form of coke was Vodka and Red bull but now they had the, excuse the pun, access to the Real Thing.

The Irish Times proclaimed

'Country awash in cocaine.'

A few days before Christmas, I was asked to speak at the Public Libraries party. Sweet irony this as for years they refused to stock my books, citing, “Crime writers are not our brief!”

Any notion I had that librarians were conservative and staid went right out the Christmas window. They party … like devoted banshees and when I tried to take my leave at 1:00 in the morning, they said they were only warming up.

The Head Librarian saw me to the door, asked

'Did you know your books are the most stolen ones?”

Long as she didn't think I was the thief.

I dunno if the title of most stolen author is a compliment or a lash.

Christmas Eve, I had a jar with The King of The Tinkers, I gave him a bottle of Black Bushmills and he gave me one of their hand-carved crosses with the inscription, in charcoal, NA BAC LEAT.

Literal translation … 'don't mind them' or ‘don't give them a second thought.’

He was referring to a recent onslaught of personal attacks and I told him, I was well accustomed to that. He took a long swallow of his Guinness, looked at me, said

“In the final analysis, it is between you and God”

Paused,

added, with a froth mustache from the pint, giving him the appearance of a sage

“It was never between you and them anyway.”

Which by one of those wondrous coincidences, happens to be one of my favourite lines from the prayer of Mother Theresa.

David, my Rabbi, in his newsletter had written about dreams and how we should treat the dreams of others.

I imagine getting The King of the Tinkers, David and Tom Piccirilli together for a pint and you know, I think it would be near as perfect a trinity as I can envisage.

I had told the King about Tom's two dogs, named Lord Byron and Edgar A. Poe and even showed him a picture of them. He said

“You have to love a man who loves dogs.”

Shane Mc Gowan was 50 on Christmas Day and he gets my comment of the season vote, when asked what he thought of the Spice Girls, he said

“That's what happens when you allow free speech.”

It's this time of year my Mum and Dad died and it ties in with my drink with the King.

Day of my Dad’s funeral, the tinkers came to the funeral and gave me a horse as a mark of respect … Jesus, of all the times I wish I had a field.

Christmas Day, the main crib on Eyre Square was torched by persons unknown and all that remained was a smouldering misshapen manger.

The locals blamed coke.

Me, I'll try to think he needed the heat, rather than 'What Burns Within'

Warm mighty welcome to Zoe Sharp and Brett Battles to the crew of Murderati.

As this is Jan 1st, may I borrow from Tony Black, Donna Moore, Al Guthrie … and wish you Happy Hogmany.

We believe here that whatever you do on New Year’s day is what you'll be doing for the rest of the year. Guess I'll be blogging then.

To paraphrase Yeats, may I wish you all that whoever treads on your dreams … treads very lightly and that what you wish for the ones you love most, you receive your own self.

The final line I'll leave to Tom P.

“He always stressed the truth of love, but never understood what that meant. The truth of love is that you accept what's wrong and ugly and tainted in your lover.”

( From The Fever Kill)

KB

Bronach Agus Bringlodi

By Ken Bruen


We’ve been having storms like you wouldn’t believe. On the seafront, the waves have reached heights of near 45 feet, that’s 13.4 m. I’ve stood transfixed at the ferocity and sheer magnificence of them. And of course, two surfers went out there and the Coast Guard had to risk their lives to rescue them. Down at the docks, another fishing boat was lost and the wives keep a lonely vigil. The fisherman don’t learn to swim, believing if the sea wants you, it will indeed claim you.

Fatalism?

All I know is that the sight of those women devastates me.

The title of this piece translates as

                           Sadness

                                    And

                                        Dreams

Bronach, pronounced … Bro-knock, is so much more than sadness though. In Irish, it’s like a soul sickness, a melancholia that reaches down over hundreds of years and Bringlodi, pronounced Bring-load-e, is simply dreams.

In so far as dreams are ever simple.

I was telling Elaine Flinn about these words recently and she loves them as much as I do, they have a resonance that is beyond articulation.

Which led me onto me gig of lighting candles.

As I do for friends who are undergoing pain, stress or trauma. Alas, there is only one church remaining in the city where you can light the candles in the old style. The rest have gone, if not digital, certainly electronic. You put your Euros in and press a button and a light comes on. Reminds me too much of a celestial slot machine, Vegas without the noise.

I need the traditional route, the long taper, you light it then put it to the wax candle and the whole ritual is strangely comforting. They say a candle is a prayer in action.

No debate from me.

If it’s a really special case, I light a green candle, no, not because I’m Irish but the green candle has deep significance in Irish history.

I did that recently for a friend who said

“I don’t believe in all that crap.”

I said

“I believe for you.”

I’m thinking of Sandra’s novel, What Burns Within.

Didn’t fly.

She scoffed, said

“You’re the last person I ever expected to be religious!”

I tried to explain that I believe religion is for people who are afraid of going to hell and spirituality is for  those who’ve been there.

Said so

And she countered

“How do you know if someone is spiritual?’

Usually, if they firmly believe they are spiritual, they’re anything but.

And heaven knows, I seem to be a constant target for the spiritual muggers, they figure I need saving and they’re right, I do.

From them.

Like humility

You claim to be humble, you ain’t.

There are three simple questions to determine if you’re spiritual:

1.    Are you wanted
2.    Are you needed
3.    Are you loved

It’s quite astonishing the number of people who will deny one or all of those.

But lest I get too deep here, there is a wonderful song by Amy Winehouse with Mark Ronson titled, Valerie. Sent to me by my close friend Tony Black. His novel, PAYING FOR IT, has a line of true Bronach, a dying father saying to his son

“I thought I could win you round by being hard on you … it was all I knew. I got what I wanted by being hard, a hard player I was … I thought you needed the same.”

My daughter and I jive to Valerie.

You guys call jive, swing.

Her sheer gurgles of delight as I swing her round the kitchen is as spiritual as ever I need to know.

One of my close friends here, said

“Jaysus, I can’t picture you dancing.”

I want to ask

“And why should you?”

Plus, it’s a given that Irish guys don’t dance, way too macho for that shite.

Few things give me more joy than watching people dance. Time back, when line dancing was hot here, I was in me element.

Few years ago, in Mexico, I was with some friends who asked me how I’d like to spend the evening?

I said

“Line dancing.”

They told me it was passé.

I said there must be someplace that still had it and they finally admitted that a biker joint, just outside Cancun did but it was a risky venue.

Just what I wanted to hear.

It was certainly atmospheric, the Harleys outside, one particularly beautiful Soft Tail custom, gleaming in the lights from the bar, and inside, a motley crew. We found a table and got the Tequila with the worm in the bottom of the glass.

We didn’t order it, they brought it over, plonked it down and gave you the look.

There were actually two types of drink available.

You could have it with or without the worm.

There was a heavy vibe in the air, I felt like I’d wandered onto the set of “Dusk till Dawn” and asked my friend if there was ever any trouble?

He said no as everyone was packing.

I said

“Except me.”

He shrugged it off, said

“Act like you are, swagger when you go for a leak.”

Right.

And knowing my history, someone would surely call my bluff.

I skipped the swagger.

The band were terrific, a blend of Cajun, Tex Mex and Country.

If I could have just got an Irish lilt to it, it would have been awesome.

Just recently, I’ve had a recurring dream. I’m walking with a lady and Ye Gods, I’m happy. I wake and I can’t recall her face, her name, just the feeling.

Craig Mc Donald in his debut novel quotes a line,

“You’ve got to find what you love and let it kill you.”

Head Games indeed.

Phew.

My wondrous Rabbi in Beverly Hills emails me about the nature of love and the true spirit of the human condition.

I think of that as I re-read Louise’s blog about her amazing gesture for her dying brother.

All of this drags up some lines from a poem I never finished

In distance- once

Your face, I might
 
Untied
 
From complications
 
Have gentle
 
            Almost touched

My wish for 2008 is that Bill Crider’s wife is healed and well.

You guys say, Happy Holidays

We still say, Happy Christmas.

It’s so much more resonant in Irish and so, to you all

La Nollaig leat go lear

Thing is, I truly mean it.

Sin an sceal

KB

Forlorn Angels

By Ken Bruen


It’s lashing down with rain, sleet, wanna be-snow, and I’ve just left my daughter to school. She was laughing as I left her.

No better sound in the whole world.

I get home and the builders are here, knocking a wall that the local authorities have informed me has to go.

I make them coffee and Fintan, the leader of the crew, both hands wrapped around the steaming mug, wanders in to my study and goes

“Jesus wept, how many fookin books have you?’

A lot.

He asks

“Have you read them all?”

Jig time.

I want to tell the truth

“Some of them twice.”

But I go with

“Naw, they’re for show.”

He looks at the open laptop and is fascinated, says

“Is that the new book?"

I nod and he drains the coffee, comments

“You seem too ordinary to be a writer!”

I take this as the height of praise.

Fintan got me the very first dog I had in the new house, a collie, named Houston. And no, Charlie, this is not a shot at you, it’s in fact, admiration.

William James wrote that if you want to see spirituality, look into the eyes of a dog.

Houston was a pure bundle of affection.

I loved him to bits.

He caught that virus we had last year and it killed him.

Broke me heart in smithereens.

Even now, I put me key in the door, I expect to hear him come bounding to meet me.

I’ll never get another.

Their loss is too hard.

I’m listening to The Cowboy Junkies, the track, Misguided Angel, now there is a song to make you yearn, but for what?

It’s that time of year for Tax Returns, artists don’t pay tax in Ireland, and like an Irish joke, Def Leppard have lived here for 20 years purely because of that. I was granted the exemption after submitting my first novel, titled Funeral. But you still have to fill out the forms, see if you are liable for PRSI.

This goes towards your eventual pension.

I’m going through the various papers, singing along to The Junkies and out falls an old poem, the writing is barely legible.

I can hear the builder in the kitchen, making more coffee and he has expressed amazement that one cup is my limit. I’d easily drink a pot but my heart rebels.

The last few lines of this old poem go

... You breathe

The very content here

Towards where

Each future lilt

Will move me

Most of all

Will see you

Song–disguised

... as yet

And then I remember vividly when I wrote it, I was living in Japan, smitten with a Japanese girl and dreaming impossible shite. I was top of my game with the teaching gig and truly enjoying it and of course, TEFL, depends completely on results and at that time, by all that’s Holy, I was on a streak, batting them out of the ballpark.

Time too when I believed that the world was not as it was, but as I saw it.

Mika, the Japanese girl was always giving me presents, it’s what they do and I had given her a Celtic Cross to wear around her neck. I was already preparing to leave, Saudi Arabia was paying top dollar for teachers and I had the years of experience they wanted.

Mika know I was catholic and was trying to understand the intricacies of it, I had told her, it’s simple

Shitload of guilt

And

Anything that is fun ... is a sin

The night before I left, we were drinking hot Sake, and those babes go down smoother than a priest's promise.

She gave me my going away present, beautifully wrapped.

I’d a nice buzz building and opened the package, an exquisite carved Dark Angel.

And she said

“Dark like you.”

She knew me better than I’d figured.

Later, in some rough times, I was standing on a bridge, and the dark angel held tight in my hands, I unclasped my fingers and the angel slowly fell into the torrent below, bubbled on the surface for a moment and then was swept away.

Rilke wrote

                   Each angel is terrible

I forgot about angels and yeah, alas, Mika too, and was packing me battered bag to move yet again, from India at that stage, and my mind was, if not cluttered, at least full of schemes. The bus to the airport was jammed and I was squeezed beside a very robust woman.

She got off first at the terminal and I saw on her seat, a black angel. I called after her, said

“You left this behind.”

She looked at it, shook her head.

I’m not saying the angel was returned to me ...

Two years ago, I placed the black angel on the grave of my beloved Aine and a woman kneeling at the next grave, looked at it, said

“What a forlorn angel.”

I said nothing.

Back to now and the builder messing round in my kitchen, turned on the radio, it was an Abba tribute show and yup, here they came with

“I believe in angels.”

I went out to hear the words more clearly and asked the builder,

“You believe in angels?’

He gave me the look, scoffed

“Are you fookin codding me?’

A priest once told me, that angels walk among us.

I thought he was full of it.

Now, I see ordinary decent people with the most horrendous lives and yes, they are the one’s who walk among us.

Burdened, hurting, and in every kind of bad situation, the one thing you could never say is

“They are forlorn.”

I won’t be listening to the Junkies for a while again.

Fintan is preparing to leave and I’m reading the lines of Eramus

“It is the chiefest point of happiness that a man is willing to be what he is.”

Fintan’s picked up a book on my desk, The Devil’s Right Hand by our own Dusty Rhoades

and he asks

“Any good?’

I say it’s just mighty and he goes

“I don’t read fiction.”

I dunno about Dusty but I feel that is a crying shame.

KB

Credited on Clapham North

By Ken Bruen

The very first short story I had published was about a young man returning to his home town for the funeral of his father

Cheerful eh?

And as you no doubt have realized, I’ve come a long way since

In the joy stakes

It’s a very Irish story -- funeral, hypocrisy, priests and loss

How far I’ve traveled from such preoccupations

The narrator’s sister is one of the main loves of his life

Tess, she’s called

And he is convinced she loves Club Milk

A chocolate bar, popular back then

Now we have HERSHEY'S … as we have

Gap

Mc Donald’s

Starbucks

Etc

The story was based on my own childhood, titled

Releasing The Jackdaw

The father is a tyrant, for example, a framed Home Sweet Home is cracked from his fist

Not exactly your Waltons

There is of course the wake and the neighbors gathered around the bed, leaking homilies

Rosary beads are wrapped round the corpse like celestial cuffs

All speak highly of him, no disrespect for the dead and all that good horseshite. You want to be praised in Ireland?

It’s real simple

Die

Ireland back then was shite poor, you had no choice, you emigrated, that was it, and if you were lucky, you got to America

The Promised Land

If you were bad fooked and truly skint, you got the cattle boat to the UK

Jesus, did they love us

Right?

The Bed and Breakfast kips had the sign

No colored

No dogs

And

No Irish

Gary Phillips never tires of me recounting that story, especially when we were in London honoring Richard Widmark and trying to re-write Mannix!

He’ll kill me for saying, but when they finally wheeled Mr. Widmark out

Gary whispered to me

“When they gonna plug the dude in?”

But all in the past

We can travel to the UK now without suspicion … almost

I did one of those charity gigs recently, they asked a whole bunch of people and were delighted to get me, as I don’t ask a fee and to be honest, I was number fifteen on their wish list

I know, the lady calling told me … twice

She knows I have a sense of humor and by fook, times like that, I need it

So I did the spiel and for some odd reason, probably Halloween in the air and poison in the water … yeah … still, though they re-assure us that half the city is safe!

Which half?

I spoke about my time living in the UK

Some of the best writers I know live in the UK

Zoe Sharp

Margaret Murphy

Cathi Unsworth

Nick Stone

Martyn Waites

Bill James

Ray Banks

Charlie Williams

I’m afraid to mention Al, Tony Black, or Donna, as the Scots they have that Celtic take on stuff, like meself

And I regard them as close and cherished friends

So after me rap, a woman comes up and goes

“Why are you so angry?”

Am …

As opening lines go, I like it, say

"I only spoke about what it was like to be an Irish teacher, teaching English in London.”

She’s seriously angry now, says

“But you made sarcastic remarks about Hampstead.”

Jesus

I had made one brief reference to Kingsley Amis’s wife, Elizabeth Jane Howard, entering the fray/fracas about Martin Amis’s comments on Islam, so asked her

“Have you read any of the above three?”

Suspecting a trap, she said

“I read Irish writers …  but I haven’t read you, they say you’re very dark.”

I said

“No dogs or … ”

She was about to go when I said

“I wrote a poem about the UK, won me a hundred pounds back in the 80’s, when that was serious money”

She was openly antagonistic now, asked

“Title?”

Yeah, exactly in that tone

I said

“Credited on Clapham North.”

She was delighted, finally, victory!

and times such, I wonder why the fook I bother,

I’d given way too much time to this crap already but as my dear Dad used to say, in for a penny, and she pounced as I knew she would, asked in a voice, laced with vitriol, I’ve always wanted to use that  … vitriol … makes you sound learned with a trace of decency and proves how shallow words really are, she went

“And what would you know about Clapham?”

I finally got the chance to smile, not something my ex-wife says I did much of … so I grab the  opportunity, said, sans-vitriol

“About as much as you do about Hampstead.”

She took one last fling, tried

“You’re not even a poet.”

Gee, that really hurt

Like the time in boarding school when the superior told me I wasn’t being considered as one of  the candidates to be a priest

God, the trauma

Sometimes, you just gotta … Get fookin over it

I did

I said to her

“Thank you for sharing.”

See, manners never let you down

She didn’t give me her phone number

Which brings me back to the beginning, that poem I wrote, when I won the hundred quid,

I sent the money to my Dad and he wrote back, asking

“When are you going to get a real job?”

And in the that first published story, the father does one really nice thing, almost noble

And the question I wanted to ask was … does one decent gesture wipe out the all the other acts of senseless cruelty?

Go figure

The end of the story, the narrator, his heart shrived (and I’ve learnt the true meaning of that word from Rabbi David Wolpe, Rabbi of the synagogue in Beverley Hills,  my dad would say, "at least that man has a decent job!")

He is getting on the train, back to the UK, and no, not to Hampstead, he gives Tess what he thinks she most loves, he gives her a Club Milk and she goes

“I always hated them.”

L’chaim