Jack the Ripper event in Middlesbrough

I went to a Jack the Ripper event at Middlesbrough central library last night and I was very impressed. I wasn’t expecting quite so much forensic science because it was part of the literary festival but I’m certainly not complaining. I got a fair bit out of it for the novel I’m writing; especially about the Whitechapel area in London at the time. I have to be honest here: I wasn’t expecting the evidence against the guy from Hartlepool to be quite so solid as a new potential candidate to the JtR but it really was.

I have loads of stuff to be considering for good material for my novel, and I may even change who I’m scripting as victims based on some of the evidence that was presented – I found out some things which made the situation in Whitechapel seem even worse than it did before, and yes that is some feat considering it was Jack the Rippers stomping ground. With over 1 murder per day in an area of 30,000 throughout the 1880’s I should have a great time describing how a Jack the Ripper copycat managed to pass of his own victims as Jack’s.

The joys of writing

It’s great when you’re a writer and a great idea for a short story just pops into your head: well the one that just formed in my mind is practically like a Benny Hill sketch, but I think I can make it into a good story.

Graduation Day

Well I had a great time on Saturday at The Sage in Gateshead: I was at graduation for my Open University degree; a truly memorable day. I would whole heartedly recommend the OU to anybody wanting higher education- I received a truly remarkable experience.

Funnily enough I also had a bit of a laugh with somebody shouting ‘nice legs’ at me when I went on stage to collect my degree: a by-product of being the only bloke to turn up in a kilt: seriously though – if you have a Scottish last name or are a Scot attending an English university wear your kilt to graduation: the people looking for poster boys will hone-in on you because you stand out. I had a couple of people do it with me: and it’s also a bit of free advertising for me because I said I’m an author in the interview’s I gave.

Why I love a good pub

Never underestimate the benefit of a good homely pub to sit and write a novel in. I’ve got my 2 hidey-holes in Middlesbrough to it down in with a pencil and a pint, and I can write half a short story in a day or get a good way though the chunk of a chapter just sat down behind a table when its quiet.

Anybody thinking of being a writer needs 4 things: a writing pad, a pencil, a homely pub to write in and a laptop to type it up on later.

Updated Store

Hello people. Over the past few days I’ve been updating my e-store, a few of the products have been improved upon and the political section of my store now embodies my viewpoint on the gay marriage debate in t-shirt form:

Visit me online @ www.CafePress.co.uk/AllanMcLeodOnline

Yes, my sense of humour is juvenile

I had a hilarious conversation with a guy from work a while ago which I just have to post about:

There is a picture of an aeroplane on a wall at work allegedly describing how aeroplanes fly however it just consists of the word ‘important’ with arrows pointing to the various components and the work ‘magic’ in several places pointing where the science should be explained.

Well a guy I work with corrected this by summarising how an aeroplane flies into 4 words: suck, squeeze, bang, and blow, which he elaborated on with the following physics:

1.      Air gets sucked in

2.      The air is compressed

3.      Fuel gets mixed in making a bang

4.      This then gets blown out the back end resulting in forward thrust

Me being me I found this funny.

My Novel

OK then: just got given a few new books for my birthday which will help with the next one (the supernatural horror, I know it’s hard to keep up but I tend to have a lot of projects on-the-go at once; it makes life interesting) The novel I’m writing is a post-Jack the Ripper story, focusing on the murders which followed Jack the Ripper in London. JtR has been done to death (no pun intended) so I decided to focus on some of the later Whitechapel murders.

On a funny note I had a chat in the staff canteen of the hospital I volunteer at when I went in for a job interview a few weeks ago with one of my colleagues about my novel. The JtR murders had a certain level of surgical skill and the ones that followed were plain savage, yet at the time some people considered them to be “Ripping’s” at the time – I made the remark that if this was accurate then ‘Jack the Ripper killed some people: and then he went mental’: totally forgetting that in conversation context matters and I was talking about what was done to the body rather than his state of mind. Oops.