It's my first attempt at doing this, so maybe a 'covering letter' can explain how it got here. It's a work in progress but I will but a few paragraphs up from the opening. There are more pages that have been written. First the 'covering letter'.
It’s a work in progress, a pastiche of P.G. Wodehouse with a nod to Oscar Wilde. It’s a farce.
I started writing it for a bet after being set a challenge by a close friend to write an opening line for a novel that would make her smile and make her want to read more. I sent her six different openings.
The one that made her smile most was:
‘Madeline rarely let go, but this one blew holes in the back of the rattan chair, and shot Lady Bracknell straight out of the French windows and into the garden….’
She insisted I do a second line and after that the wretched thing got out of control.
That line is still in there but other friends who read the subsequent farcical drivel said the scene needed a back story and maybe even a conclusion, so ‘The Shoot at Glandings’ began.
I won the bet and the fact that can now prove that I had the nerve to submit even just a few paragraphs of a draft opening to at least three literary agents in London today has guaranteed another case of Peroni Italian Lager will be coming my way soon.
I have no writing experience - have never been on a creative writing course, have never been published before and have never self-published. My working life has mainly involved being a new business salesperson for a variety of software providers selling their products mainly to the construction industry. I have also worked for high end estate agencies and more recently in selling new build houses for three of the top five major house builders. I enjoy opera and I paint without the Revenue knowing that I sometimes sell them.
I’m Irish and therefore impossible to offend.
Kindest,
Micheal John
The first few lines...
‘The Shoot at Glandings’
The Duke had never experienced battle, although Eton had been a challenge when the lights went out in the dorm and the prefects came in later with flashlights and lube, but that could be handled.
He rarely hunted, couldn’t fish, and only inadvertently shot random Black Labradors when distracted.
The last two months for him had however had been difficult. ‘Bunty’ Greymore his cousin and heir had gone on an otter hunt up The Ouse and had had both of his knackers bitten off by an irate swan as he waded past her nest in the dark with only shorts and a small torch. He didn’t make it.
The Rt. Hon Mercival, next in line, was discovered two weeks later in the Gentlmens toilets at Kings Cross Station, not breathing, but with a bicycle wheel wedged between his buttocks.
So the Duke knew now that without a male heir he was letting the side down badly.
He had two daughters and no son of his own, and because he knew his ancestor had come over with ‘William The Bastard’ there was a family tree, and the family were always looking at it, counting down the days.
He’d fucking looked at it as well and knew which one was next in line. It wasn’t personal, he thought that ‘Barmy’ Clapstock just wasn’t up to muster as he was back in rehab again, still twitching, still only 14, and only being his second cousin, once removed, he could only remember him as a dribbler with a large head at family parties who shat himself. He couldn’t see him lasting long pass Lammas.
So he had to look at the next in line. There were three, each in their own order of ranking but the Duke looking closely thought only one should be considered, but he wasn’t the first in line.
Later, digging deeper he understood that all three were descended from ‘The Bastard’ but from different branches of the same tree. Going further he looked at all the people who hung off their particular branch and that gave him pause for thought. Everyone knew that ‘Barmy’ was fucked, each one of the three next in line had one rotten apple hanging from their branch with ambition lurking behind them and the Duke realised he knew all three of the ‘rotten apples’ quite well.
There was a shoot at ‘Glandings’ in a few weeks and most interested parties would be there.
The Duke decided to expand the invitations to maybe shake things up a bit and try a different sort of cull...
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