The Guns of August: “During this present portion of my life cycle I generally read books that deal with history and they’ve ranged from all of Barbara Tuchman’s works, e.g. The Guns of August, to her depiction of the calamitous fourteenth century in Distant Mirror.”
The Guns of August is a military history book, about the first month of World War 1. It starts with the declaration of war, and follows the start of the Franco-British offensive to stop the German advance into France. It won the Pulitzer Prize for general non-fiction for the publication year 1962.
Distant Mirror covers 14th century events like The Black Plague, the Hundred Years War, the papal schism, mercenaries and peasant uprisings.

The White Goddess: “I’ve also enjoyed the historical myths found in Robert Graves’ The White Goddess, which left me convinced that the need for religion seems to be genetically coded into a large swatch of civilization, which is expressed in their need to find assurances of a continued life after death.”

Marcus Aurellius: “The book Marcus Aurellius was a marvelous introduction into practical philosophy in that it teaches the need for generosity and compassion.

“Ancient Rome’s political and military history along with that of China and Japan’s has always fascinated me. So does any work that can shed light on the human condition and reveal something of a historical juxtaposition to current world events and those that are now obscured by time and distance. If asked to define the essence of my literary searching I’d first say it is to trace the often painful but inexorable march of mankind towards ‘self-realization’, and all which that implies.”

Worlds In Collision: Mr Mercy said this was one of the most influential books he’d read. He quoted a review on Immanuel Velikovsky’s Worlds in Collision: “A stupendous panorama of terrestrial and human histories” and “nothing in recent years has so excited the human imagination.”

Mr Mercy said it “made understandable many of the planet’s geological mysteries, ancient mythologies and histories of antiquity.”
I had a quick look through this book recently, and it had a skeptical view of some events in the Bible, so it wasn’t really my cup of tea and might not grab other believers in the Bible.

Worlds In Upheaval: The follow-up to Worlds in Collision. He said they were “primary indicators of the human mind’s limitless potential. Both texts activated in me a quest to absorb more knowledge.”

This led to Mr Mercy reading Robert Grave’s The White Goddess and The Golden Bough by Sir James Frazer.

The Golden Bough: Mr Mercy said he read “wide swathes” of Sir James Frazer’s The Golden Bough. This is an anthropological type book, quite a large volume, about mystical practices around the world. I bought this book a year or so ago, and you can open it anywhere and read about rainmakers, for example, or how say a warrior will jump over a slain panther a few times to absorb its spirit.

The Alphabet Versus the Goddess: A more recent book which Mr Mercy described as: “a groundbreaking study that explored the rise of alphabetical literacy and fundamental configurations of the human brain”.

“It was written by a practicing Neuro-surgeon who thoroughly explains the good and evils that came from human development of linear left brain thinking, which gave our species the ability to write among other things.

“He argued a case for an inner-psychic equilibrium of the hemispheres through colorful historical anecdotes that called for the retrieval of those right brain virtues that revel in beauty, compassion and the veneration of “The Goddess” that graces the book’s title.”

The Origin of Consciousness and the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, by Julian Jaynes: “This was truly a fascinating read in that the author believed that human consciousness was not a ‘natural evolutionary development’ but one that had been stimulated by a series of catastrophic events, which he examples during the course of millenniums.

“His revolutionary concepts are pure genius and a genuine thrill to read.”

Mr Mercy had also read a lot of other literature on psychology, psycho-analysis and psychiatry by practitioners like Freud, C.G. Jung, Otto Rank, Ferenczi, Wilhelm Stekel and others. He also had read books by contemporary practitioners of dream analysis.

-continued next page

-copyright Simon Sandall.

ROBERT MERCY: All things being relative I would say that I’ve always been curious, and from the age of twelve on “psychic phenomena” struck a resonating cord. This was the result of a Reader’s Digest article on “how to analyzing people by their sketching of a tree.”

Soon I asked everyone I met to draw a tree and was more greatly surprised than they by my nearly always correct interpretations. However, from my earliest recollections, as the opening chapters of my book reveals, I was mesmerized with the idea of soldiering, which of course was a direct result of war movies.

In truth my raison-d`etat for life was in becoming a soldier and anything learned was to enhance that goal. Most people never have their fantasies fulfilled—and perhaps for good reason, because in doing so they are often left void of any other motivating desire, dreams, and/or interests. Hence the adage: “One must be careful what they wish for.”

What personal close-quarter combat did teach me, though not immediately, was the value of human life. The miraculous intricacies of the human body and its uniqueness only became clearer to me when I delved into the medical aspects of Dermatoglyphics, which we might touch upon later. Once departed from the military I could have followed the historic employment route taken by most young Middle-class men of that generation and opted for a civil service job.

Circumstances and the residual affects of being so heavily influenced by film lead me into acting, which in turn afforded me the luxury of having a lot of ‘free time’ to pursue my budding interest in art, psychology, dream interpretation.

I eventually opened a Drama Workshop on 5th Avenue in NYC and drew upon those modalities to turn out some very successful actors. It seemed that walking through one door led me through another…and another. Now my concern is that there isn’t enough time to accomplish more.

RV: Had you done any writing before this memoir and if so, what?

RM: Not really, except for one attempt in 1963 in writing a shooting script for the very popular MGM TV COMBAT, in which I’d periodically acted as an SS officer. I submitted an unusual plot-line and was literally shocked when they stole the manuscript under a subterfuge then aired it a few months later. I was both flattered and disheartened by the event and didn’t write again until the late seventies when I started on I Hear No Bugles. [To be fair, I cannot absolutely verify this - ed.]

RV: I thought the book was honest. I also thought it was a page-turner; I read the 400-plus pages in two days. What sorts of feedback have you got from people, especially any that were in the Korean War?

RM: Thank you for your appraisal of my book as being “honest,” for I strove to keep it so by avoiding “dramatic license.” My motivation was to contribute a factual day-by-day history of a combat soldier in the Korean War.

I’ve received many letters from former GIs who identify with each step the protagonist took in Bugles. Often as not, too, I’ll inevitably hear, “Wow, I didn’t know that so and so was killed or wounded”.

When talking to soldiers from my own unit it’s as though we’re piecing together a puzzle; and they’re mostly grateful that someone put it all into words that they couldn’t find for one reason or another.

RV: It would be hard to forget some of the things you described about your battle experiences during the Korean War, but did you ever have trouble remembering anything, or details of missions, and how did you clarify any of these details?

RM: I credit the clarity of my recall to the fact that since boyhood I’d so conditioned my mind and body for those events that their occurrences were indelibly seared into my psyche; to the degree that sixty years later I still occasionally dream about them. I nevertheless did use our Regiment’s documented history (army archives Washington, DC.) for accuracy of given dates and times.

RV: There are many disturbing scenes in the book. The one of the G.I. wounded in the legs who wanted to die rather than face enemy torture was horrifying. I was wondering if the writing of the book helped deal with any bad memories or trauma you might have had.

RM: I’d say that it did—to a degree. I’d worked over three weeks on that one passage, during which I cried, got drunk, relived every second of his terror then lighted candles, offered prayers to Buddha and begged the soldier’s forgiveness.

-continued next page

-copyright Simon Sandall.

ROBERT MERCY: Yes, both have read Bugles and appreciated the honesty of the text. In reviewing the story chapter by chapter each of us learned that certain recalled events happened differently than we remembered.

For example, Robertson’s encounter with the Chinese in the chapter, The Battle for Uijongbu, was different from what I recalled. Robertson was compelled to shoot down a line of a dozen GIs that the Chinese had used as shields as they made their way towards his OP. They had not been “pounced upon as they tried escaping up our slope”, which is how I stated it in the book.

All these years later I discovered his moral dilemma was more complex than I’d imagined. My brother thought the army and former regimental officers wouldn’t like the story because I was too critical of the officer corps—even though he agreed that all the stated events were true.

RV: Does your brother Richard still run the private detective agency and what sort of cases does he take on?

RM: Yes, but recently he’s limited his cases to high profile murders and robberies. He has become the bane of the local Long Island police departments because his experiences allow him to recognize their often illegal and draconian ‘expediency practice,’ which seeks to convict the most immediately available parties—that may not be guilty.

[To be fair, I'm in Australia and have no practical way of investigating these allegations, so I have to say this is the opinion of Mr Mercy --ed.]

Richard still champions the same ideals he held as an MP at seventeen.

RV: When the armistice was signed in 1953 at the end of the Korean War, what did you think the future of communism would be? What do you think of its future in the world now?

RM: I instinctively felt that ‘peace’ was only tentatively paused before hostilities resumed.

Korea was the beginning of a long national trend of fighting wars for objectives other than a sustaining victory, but like a chess game, to maneuver and whittle away at your opponent’s resources until the board is swept clean.

Big Wars have been designed “out of fashion” by the new global power elite of Corporate-America. The forces it will soon field, in lieu of its exhausted National Guard reserves, will be those ‘mean & lean’ mercenaries. Nor will this greatly disturb or trouble the rapidly diminishing Middle class segments of a world that are slipping into financial bankruptcy.

As a student of history and human psychology I suspect, despite periodic illusions of universal tranquility that human conduct will not alter from what it has historically demonstrated. It would take phenomena of Biblical proportion to avert what might occur when resources and tolerance diminish in an over-populated world that’s estimated to be fourteen billion by 2050. There will be no utopian land to escape to.….

RV: There is a lot of good background historical information in the book, about battles going on around you in Korea, and disturbing facts about the numbers of massacred and tortured G.I.s and Korean civilians. Where did you get background information for the book?

RM: In addition to the massacre site I personally came upon in Taejon there were well documented cases recorded in both our Regimental & Divisional daily activities logs for the 24th Infantry division.

I also researched the divisional histories of other UN units, plus the New York Times, The Christian Monitor and numerous other books and periodicals.

I did extensive cross-checking to maintain high accuracy. I suspect the actual number of atrocities might be far greater if all the possible undetected rampages and killings of individual soldiers or small units could be recorded.

For example there are eight thousand American soldiers alone who are still listed as MIA, or missing in action. How did they and the tens of thousands of other missing South Korean, Australian, Turkish troops die?

RV: You talk in your book about your lifelong love of movies. The Korean War is relatively unexplored in the movies, except for MASH maybe, and Gran Torino (A great movie by the way). I was wondering why you thought this was, and if you thought I Hear No Bugles might be turned into a movie?

RM: If I could co-direct and/or advise the filming I’d show, via the thoughts and actions of the protagonist, how films influence young receptive minds and plant seeds that bloom out into unconscious desires for the noblest of fulfillments—a heroic death.

It would also show the anomaly of that time-period when the US military deliberate under-trained its troops so they’d become peaceful “Ambassadors of Good Will” in the countries we had conquered.

That and our cultural ritual of honoring sports contributed to the army’s near total destruction in the opening days of the Korean War. Another component that would give the film a psychological twist was my need to create, in order to fight more effectively, the pseudo guise of my country’s most recently defeated foe —a Samurai sword carrying Japanese officer. It would be a multi-faceted film.

-continued next page

-copyright Simon Sandall.

ROBERT MERCY: This could be the basis for another book. Perhaps because of my unusual dream history and having studied the process for so long I’d somehow evolved to the point that while asleep, I could analyze my dreams AND selectively call up ANY past dreams of a similar or opposite nature to make comprehensive comparisons.

I could simultaneously see both as though they were on a split screen; and, like a projectionist, put one on hold while I viewed the other.

For more than a decade sleep was my most creative work period. Unfortunately the capacity lessens as we mature, but dreams still capture my full attention.

To conclude, the current clinical consensus of dreams is that they’re translations of “repressed daytime thoughts and actions” that are released as “psychic energy” in a pictographic form. Severe inner ‘conflict’ will produce nightmares.

RV: What is dermatoglyphics and how did you become interested in it and the profiling of personality?
RM: Dermatoglyphic translates into Derma=skin & Glyphic= writing. It literally means “Writing of the Skin” and is recognized by AMA (American Medical Association) as a diagnostic tool in the study of human genetics.

I’d dedicated myself to a seven year study of clinical texts at the NYC Medical Library on 5th Avenue in upper Manhattan.
Not surprisingly my quest started at age twelve as a result of seeing a 1940s film entitled Flesh & Fantasy, in which Actor Thomas Mitchell played the role of a psychic palmist with limitless insight into the human psyche. This planted seed came to fruition in my late twenties and after years of scouring every published book on palmistry I inherently knew that hands held deeper secrets.
By the early seventies I was a noted palmist who, like the film character I fashioned my interest on, attended social soirees, made appearances on radio talk shows and was invited to celebrity parties. Knowing there was more to learn, I meditated for days on end, which led me to the NYC Medical Library.

There impulse prompted me to select a single book from the shelves that housed thousands. I trustingly fanned the pages till they automatically stopped on, Dermatoglyphic indicators in pancreatic cancer. It was pure magic.

RV: Did your interest in psychology help you in writing I Hear No Bugles? For example, in knowing what readers would like. Or is it just a good story.

RM: Not really, because I think that only fiction can be written from a perspective where each step a character takes is calculated to illicit a predetermined response that will justify the author’s concepts and draw the story to a logical conclusion—but war is illogical; and Bugle’s power lies in the absorbed-reader’s inability to predict or perceive what might happen next.

As the cliché has it, “Truth is stranger (and more compelling) than fiction.”

RV: How did you get the job acting on Combat! ?

RM: I was called in to audition and asked to improvise a scene in German and imagining myself in their army my residual military bearing and attitude did the rest.

RV: Did you give them advice on military matters? What are some of your memories of working on the show, and the actors you met?

RM: I did advise the director, the late Bob Altman, on sketching out a tactical map overlay for use in the Cat & Mouse segment we were shooting that day. The star Vic Morrow always remained removed from the other actors, unlike his co-star Rick Jason who was social and gregarious.

I was still comparatively new to the business and had only been in one Hollywood play Stalag 17, in which I had portrayed Reed, a captured airman who’d been a former comedian that could do vocal impressions of popular stars. It was that very gift that got me that role, which then led to a MGM contract.

The one depressing discovery was the near desperation many of the “bit-actors” displayed in their desperate attempts to be noticed by the director on this and many other shows.

RV: Was it eerie acting on the show after your war experiences?

RM: Actually I enjoyed being back in a uniform and the simulated combat and smell of burnt cordite did revive some vivid memories, which activated a whole chain of conditioned responses more quickly than I imagined. Nevertheless it did feel odd to fire at American uniforms.

On another plain it offered insight into the universality of soldiering and how fate and geography alone dictates what side we are compelled to fight on.

The more I surrendered to my image the more real I became; and could forget my actual self, which is the great joy of acting.
RV: Is it dangerous to mix psychology and the arts, in your opinion? Some think of art as therapy, but I’m not so sure it’s that good for you.

RM: Perhaps if you’re working with personalities who are clearly psychological unstable that could present a problem, but generally speaking its not. I’ve had some excellent results in my acting groups by applying certain exercises designed to stimulate and/or reactivate internal needs that may be dormant or frozen within certain individuals.

An actor must develop his or her sensitivities in order to believably express the raw emotions of love, lust, hate, fear, etc. Simply “thinking” these passion will not work, but genuinely “feeling’ them will. There’s a professional truism that says “you can not lie to the camera,” which in fact sees through everything.

Most performers, singers, authors and painters are neurotic to one degree or another, which is why they are drawn to those respective modalities of expression; and when their personal pains are applied to their specific articulation it is always enhanced.

RV: Acting is a tough path to follow. What sort of advice have you given people following this path?

RM: A simplified solution would be to quote the great Broadway producer David Merrick: “If you can do anything else—do it!” I would strongly suggest that any artist should continue their academic education and not make a ‘do or die’ commitment to acting.

Only one per cent of the total Screen Actors and Theater Guild memberships make a living wage. However, finding a truly good drama coach to develop your abilities of expression will prove an asset in any career, or relationship, you might eventually choose.

One of my promising students gave up the business and became, due to her training, a spokesperson for a major NYC Pharmaceutical Company. I’d asked Henry Fonda’s advice on this once and he said, “Well…if it doesn’t pan out after seven years…its time to move on;” and then added, “I reckon,” with a wink.

-I Hear No Bugles by Robert Mercy is published by Merriam Press.

-Copyright Simon Sandall.

READERSVOICE.COM: How much detail in the planning of your book did you go into, as far as plot goes, and did you stick to the plan?

LEA SCOTT: Writing for me is a very right brain creative process. Planning is more logical and I never wanted my writing to seem like ‘work’ because it’s something that I enjoy so much. I began with a beginning and an end in mind, and a rough idea of what would happen in the middle (ie. one by one the characters would be murdered).

The process I take is to map out very briefly the next two to three chapters ahead, then let my subconscious mind work out the rest while I go about my usual day.

Any ideas that come to mind I jot down in my notebook, then work into the story when I have the time to sit down to write. So it almost seems as if the story writes itself. Or should I say, the characters in my subconscious write it for me.

As to sticking to the plan, the characters often develop a mind of their own and go off on all sorts of tangents that aren’t in the plan. I find it best to let them have their own head and generally write down what my mind comes up with, then work out a way to get them back on track from there and keep the story moving in the direction I want it to go.

RV: I like the way the book progressively plants suspects into the story. Are there any other plot tips or structuring techniques that you’ve come across that you can give?

LS: Thank you. The technique of planting ‘red herrings’ is something I learnt in high school from a very passionate English teacher while deconstructing Daphne DeMaurier’s novel, Rebecca. Full of red herrings, this book remains one of my classical favourites.

I wrote a lot of these into the Ned Kelly Game after I had completed the main story, thereby creating suspicion aro und a number of the main characters to keep you guessing ‘whodunnit’ to the very end. Another technique I like to employ is to leave a ‘hook’ at the end of a scene or a chapter to keep the reader in suspense and yearning to continue reading.

A lot of the feedback I’ve received from people is that they found it difficult to put the book down. Constant suspense, however, can be draining so I’ve tried to balance this with slower descriptive passages and historical information.

As chunks of history can be boring to read, I’ve tried to include most of the historical information from the characters’ viewpoints.

I’ve structured the plot in a fairly linear way, with the story starting in the present and moving forward in time. All the past events are set as flashbacks. This keeps the reader in the present of the story and makes it easier to follow. I had originally structured it chronologically, starting when the characters were teenagers but I found it more difficult to relate to them as adult characters and felt my readers may have the same problem.

-continued next page

-.

LEA SCOTT: The Road by Cormack MaCarthy has to be one of the best written books I’ve read, hence it won the Pulitzer Prize. Despite the horrors of the post-apocalyptic story, the writing style carried me along in a melodical way. I read it reviewed as a ‘lyrical account of horror’. The movie premieres today, but I’m not sure they will capture on screen what the book has achieved.

I recently read The Dead Path by Brisbane author Stephen M Irwin who I met at an ABC Radio function. It’s worth a read for the colourful description and metaphors, alongside the familiar Brisbane setting. Not for the lighthearted though as it centres around witchcraft and child murders.

RV: In your novel The Ned Kelly Game there is a reference to Ned Kelly fanatics on the internet. How heavilly are you interested in the Ned Kelly story, for example have you been to many Kelly Gang locations; do you still read up on latest developments?

LS: I think the reference you refer to is Ross’s statement that he is not sure if they were fans or fanatics, which is more a reference to the internet in general than Ned Kelly followers.

There is a small but strong and passionate following for Ned Kelly and I have followed a number of discussions on sites (some of which are linked on my website).

I have participated when I have felt strongly about the subject being discussed, most recently when WA farmer Tom Baxter handed over the alleged Ned Kelly skull he has had in his possession for some 10 years or more (which many do not believe to be genuine).

I have visited and researched a number of Kelly Gang locations over the years.

I try to keep up to date with the latest developments and I also have a bit of a fan base who send me any Ned Kelly related information that they come across.

I have set up a group on my website and Facebook to help locate the ‘real’ skull to be re-united with the rest of the remains, however it has been hard to generate much interest in this way. The Melbourne Herald Sun did pick up on some advertising I placed over the weekend of the Ned Kelly festival in Beechworth and ran a story to try to help locate the skull.

While Ned Kelly has always stirred mixed emotions, from the reader comments left for this story it seems that the current generation view Ned Kelly as little more than a common criminal and that sadly the Australian legend of our origins as the bush battler is fading.

RV: If so, what is the latest regarding Ned Kelly, or any mysteries about him?

LS: I have a list of articles on my website in the News section, which chronologically follows the disappearance and search for Ned’s remains. I try to update this when I come across new information.

The latest story arose in November 2009 when WA farmer Tom Baxter handed over the skull he has claimed to be Ned Kelly’s for the past decade. This was prompted by the discovery of the missing remains in March 2008 at Pentridge Prison.

RV: What locations did you revisit for the book to get the atmosphere and setting right, or did you write from memory?

LS: I re-visited Melbourne several times and Old Melbourne Gaol while writing the novel. I set the remainder of the book from memory and research and photographs from the internet. There is a wealth of information available on the Ned Kelly story on the internet for anyone interested in finding out more.

-continued next page

-.

LEA SCOTT: There is a mild psychic ability passed down through the maternal side of my family. From an early age I recall my grandmother and mother talking of ‘knowing’ when bad things were about to happen, in a general sense. I, myself, have experienced clear visions and dreams of events and accidents which have occurred to people close to me since I was a teenager.

In my mid-twenties I became aware of my abilities as an empath when I began to experience the emotions and physical pains of those around me. I have since learnt methods to block some of these.

My experiences with supernatural presences are extensive – in fact I could write a whole book of real-life ghost stories about the presences I have encountered.

RV: Do you believe in ouija boards and seances and the like? Do you think it’s best people stay away from them, and what are any bad experiences you’ve heard people have had?

LS: To believe in ouija boards and séances, one must first believe that a person can exist outside their physical form. Because of my own experiences, I have always remained open-minded on the subject.

I have not actually directly experienced contact with a spirit using a ouija board or séance because of the stigma attached to it. Quite frankly, I’ve never had the nerve to invite a spirit to communicate with me because, particulary when I was younger, just seeing and sensing them frightened me. The only actual communication I have had is with my grandfather just after he died.

I’ve never known anyone to be ‘followed’ by evil spirits after using them. We’ve all heard such stories but perhaps it’s a case of the Urban Myth at play. While I’ve come across presences that have felt angry, I have to admit that I did once came across a ‘spirit’ that I felt was inherently evil.

I was in an old Queenslander that we were inspecting for sale. I was physically shoved as I stood in the bedroom alone, then as I left the house I had a vision of the whole house turning into a ball of fire from which a face screamed at me to leave (and no I hadn’t been drinking!).

It was one of the most frightening things I’ve ever experienced. Suffice to say, we didn’t buy the house!

RV: You’re also interested in psychology and I was wondering if you think psychic phenomena and psychology are the same thing, like there’s a rational psychological explanation for everything, or if you thought there was some spiritual or supernatural reality apart from people’s perceptions.

LS: This is an interesting argument and I like to read about the subject as I am a very analytical person and have studied some psychology at university.

I am currently reading a novel called Superstition by David Ambrose, which deals with this very subject.

The argument at one end of the spectrum is that ghosts exist and the other that people psychologically create them through powers in their mind that they are not even aware of, such as telekinesis and telepathy. I’d probably have to say that I sway toward the former.

Often when I have seen or sensed a presence, I get a sense of how they died as well, without any prior knowledge of their existence. In most cases, I have been able to obtain information after the fact that confirms their existence and death in the location. It kind of blows the theory out of the water that I made them up in my mind, if I had no previous knowledge and the event had actually occurred.

Then again, another theory exists that people leave behind a sense of themselves. It could be my abilities as an empath picking up their residual emotions.

-continued next page

-copyright Simon Sandall.

LEA SCOTT: I worked in Insolvency in the height of the Skase and Bond days and they were very busy and dare I say exciting times.

On the whole, everything went smoothly but we always took security guards with us on the first day of a takeover on the off chance that something went wrong.

One time I recall we even took guards and rottweiler dogs to a rural location. But despite precautions, there were invariably cases that got a little out of control.

Briefly, here are a few: My group had a gun pulled on us by a large Maori employee on the second day of a takeover. The business owner managed to talk him down.

While in another room my partner was physically confronted by a well-built Greek franchise owner who threatened to ‘beat his head in’. I had the phone in my hand ready to call the police, but he managed to settle him down.

I had to take possession of some vehicles from a family business, and the son phoned and threatened to firebomb the cars and come in and ‘put me up against a wall’. The same person was removed a few weeks later by security from a meeting of creditors for physically threatening me. He screamed he would ‘get me’ all the way to the lift. Luckily he never did.

I was threatened by a Gold Coast property tycoon prior to giving evidence against him in court. His attitude in the courtroom was very unnerving and I was looking over my shoulder for a few weeks.

We received serious threats from an ‘organised crime’ group while attempting to take possession of a multi-million dollar yacht.

RV: What books or stories are you working on at the moment?

LS: I am currently working on a crime novel set on the Gold Coast and far north Queensland. Eclipsed is a psychological thriller with mafia undertones, delving into the spiralling demise that anger and revenge can wreak on the personality.

The main character’s personality transformations follow the cycles of an eclipse, from the light into to the darkness then back to the light. I am just working on some final editorial changes, then will be seeking an agent/publisher for it.

Visit Lea Scott’s website at leascott.com.

-.

Macca is part of an RAAF mission to supply medical aid via a Hercules, to support the New Guinea military trying to deal with fictional hotspot Costa Mauria. He finds some guns among the cargo, and refuses to continue on the mission. This starts a series of big problems for him. Eventually his downward trajectory leads him to an encounter with a strange secret government organisation. But it’s a good secret government organisation.
Author and book reviewer Ian Jay was a flight engineer and weapons system technician for the Royal Australian Air Force for more than 22 years, and he uses it to bring realism to the book. Along with the story you get a good portrait of an air force life, including family life.

Ian Jay also has done his share of book reviewing, on ABC Radio in Brisbane. But he hoped to do more writing now that he had finished his book reviewing show. Here are some of his thoughts on book reviewing.

READERSVOICE.COM: I read somewhere that the role of the book reviewer is to ascertain the author’s intention and say to what extent the author has achieved that objective. What do you make sure you do when reviewing?

IAN JAY: The process is as follows: I read the book from cover to cover (non-fiction books of a reference nature do not require this level of reading).
Once I’ve read it, I ask myself three questions: Does it entertain or educate?. It is a subjective question based on my opinion. For fiction, I must feel that I’ve been entertained.

The next question is about the construction of the book. This is objective and I consider the cover, the layout, the editorial and the overall quality of the publication.

The last question is: How does the book read?. Most critics might say that a book is “well written” but for me it’s the reader’s viewpoint I’m interested in. In this area I consider the characters, believability, 1st versus 3rd person styles, use of language etc.

After this I draft my review and forward it to my announcer.

RV: Do you read a lot of book reviews or literary magazines and get influenced by how other people review books around the world, or do you just have a style that works and stick to it?

IJ: No. I use the above method and stick with it.

RV: How do you balance the need to tell the truth about a book, with a desire not to discourage an author or hurt their feelings?

IJ: The good and bad as I see it exposed. However, there are ways of identifying negative aspects. I like to do it in a way that doesn’t offend and hopefully educates. Doesn’t always work out that way!

-continued next page

-.

READERSVOICE.COM: Is it better to just ignore a book that was badly written, or is just bad, rather than review it?

IAN JAY: I wish I could sometimes, but I stick with it and am as honest as possible. If an author writes the book and it’s released to the public, it’s fair game!

RV: With the books you’ve reviewed in recent years, what kinds of mistakes do you see?

IJ: Poor production values by authors, editors and publishers. Also, 1st versus 3rd person. Authors mix the two up and it can be confusing.
Weak endings, particularly with a strong build-up.

RV: If you could create a bit of a checklist of a few points, what should authors make sure their books have, in your view?

IJ: Every author should ask themselves this one question and ask it often: “What is the purpose of this book?”.

Also, read the draft after a good break in time. Then rip into the work and re-work it until it’s right. Have a couple of trusted reviewers but not too many. Authors can lose their way with too many opinions.

Get a good edit done; don’t skimp on this.

RV: When writing your thrillers To Do or Die, and its sequel Maximum Effort, did you have a critic’s voice in your head competing with the writer’s voice?

IJ: No. But reading them now, I can see the errors.

RV: Can you recommend a few of your favourite books of all time, fact or fiction?

IJ: Anything by Gerald Seymour (UK thriller author). [Novels include his first Harry's Game (1975), The Glory Boys, The Contract, and A Line in the Sand].

I thought The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger) was outstanding.

RV: How often do you do your talks on writing and publishing?

IJ: Not very often. Once or twice a year. My reviewing with ABC concludes this year [2009]as I need to get back to writing.
RV: If someone was serious about learning to write novels, what habits would you advise them to get into?

IJ: Read lots of books, and analyse them critically!

RV: Can you recommend a book or two, or a magazine, on writing?

IJ: That’s easy… On Writing by Stephen King.

-.