Gerald Lynch Short Story In Time Out Dubai Shock Horror

Would I like to write a 1,000 word short story for Time Out Dubai as part of their Emirates Airline Festival of Literature coverage? Sure, no problem. The story idea was in my head as I pressed 'end call'. 1,000 words (and a lot of slicing and dicing) later it was done and shared with the shadowy and feared 'Grey Havens Gang' of globally based writers I hang out with, for their comments. And a bunch of my favourite beta readers pitched in. And some Tagalog speakers were recruited from Twitter (I love Twitter) to help with one small, but important piece of dialogue. It's more like flash fiction than a 'short' - just 1,000 words to play with means you have to make pretty much every word count. Edited, polished and angsted over, 1,000 words of prose was popped off to the PRs to share with the TOD team.

And then word came back. It's 'too racy' to run in the magazine because it contains references to sex and adultery. Have they READ my books? Anyway, by now the magazine was at deadline and I had an hour to deliver that thousand words so I resorted to an old friend. If, by any chance, you've been living in the International Space Station over the past three years, Gerald Lynch is the evil Northern Irish spy in Olives - A Violent Romance and a slightly less evil spy in Beirut - An Explosive Thriller and the positively benign spy with a heart of gold who's nice to small furry animals in Shemlan: A Deadly Tragedy.

Of course he just tumbled off the keyboard into Dubai. And of course he didn't approve of the place one jot... The story's below, or you can go here to Time Out Dubai to read it. Or you can hand over Dhs9 to any newsagent or Spinneys and have your very own 'curl up on the sofa' hardcopy!

                                  Death In Dubai                                   

Gerald Lynch strode through the Park Hyatt’s cool Arabesque reception, ignoring the ‘good morning’ offered up by the doorman, the girl in the long beige kandoura, the receptionist and the dark-uniformed staffer who passed him in the glass corridor. Blue-eyed, his dark hair a widow’s peak, Lynch hefted his leather jacket over his shoulder, his other hand in the pocket of his jeans.

He caught the glint of a camera, a tiny dome of smoked glass nestled up in the corner and added it to his mental audit of the devices he’d already encountered in his short stay in Dubai.

Brian Channing was spread out on a sofa in the coffee shop. He had a silver tray in front of him bearing coffee in a porcelain cup and a decorative little selection of Lebanese sweets in paper wrappers. He had chosen Wealthy Tourist In White Linen, his artfully rumpled two-piece offset by a pastel blue shirt.

Channing waved Lynch to a chair. ‘Gerald. Good to see you. Must be years since you last saw this place. Changed a bit, has it? Isn’t this an exquisite little hotel?’

‘If you like this sort of thing.’ Lynch took no pains to mask his distaste. ‘What’s the big emergency, Brian? The embassy people made so much fuss trying to pick me up the barman ended up smacking one of them because he thought they were trying to kidnap me. Half of Hamra nearly got involved.’

‘I heard. Unfortunate, but then you’re supposed to carry your secure bloody mobile at all times. Even out on the lash in Beirut.’ Channing bit off a chunk of nut brittle and finished his coffee with a flourish. ‘Come on. Walkies.’

A waitress rushed to push open the double doors out into the patio overlooking Dubai’s creek. Little boats bobbed. On the opposite shore was parkland, cable cars swinging against the vast blue sky, a creekside ride. Channing shouldered his jacket and led the way down the warm stone steps towards the decking and sounds of rope slapping against masts. Only when they were standing in the marina did Channing halt. Leaning on the railing, he addressed the creek.

‘In the hotel behind us, at noon, a high-ranking Russian intelligence official called Sergei Anasenko is going to hand you the complete technical specification and blueprint of a new technology they have developed for jamming ultra-fast, frequency-hopping radio signals. If it works, clearly it has the potential to render every drone programme NATO has redundant.’

‘I don’t get it. Why me?’

‘He asked for you by name. We have been very careful indeed with our Sergei and gone to great lengths to establish he’s as pure as snow. He checks out at every level. But we’re damned if we can work out why he’s so in love with you, to be honest Gerald. I rather thought you might have an idea.’

‘None at all. Anasenko? He ever work the Middle East? Come to Beirut?’

‘Never. No connection with Dmitri or Jaan Kallas, no relationship with The General and no time served in the region. Desk boy, Moscow-bound all his life. More a politician than a field man, an espiocrat. Technology is his thing. Hardly your type, is he? Yet after two years’ work bringing him in, we get to the end game and, right at the last minute, he insists on a handover in Dubai and to Lynch and nothing but the Lynch, so help him God.’

‘So a handover in the most surveillance rich city in the world to a man he doesn’t know from Adam. That makes no sense whatsoever, Brian.’

Channing squinted and rooted in his pockets for a pair of Ray Bans, which he settled onto his fleshy nose. ‘You can ask him why yourself, you’re due to knock on the door of room 211 in,’ Channing peered at his watch, ‘one hour, twenty minutes.’

* * * 

Lynch waited for the door to open, playing with the key card in his pocket. He’d taken a room himself, ensuring his camera tracks were linked to the fake ID he’d flown in on. He also took the precaution of waiting a while after checking in then returning to a different receptionist and having his key card re-swiped, claiming it wasn’t working properly. ‘No problem, it happens,’ he told her. ‘Room 211.’

He knocked again and then used the key card. Pulling the door closed behind him, Lynch swore softly. Anasenko was lying on the floor in a bathrobe. There were signs of a struggle, a chair pushed over, a table lamp on the floor beside the sprawled body. Lynch crossed the room and pulled a paper tissue from the box on the desk. He knelt, feeling for a pulse, pushed back the curly brown hair from the corpse’s ear, checking the pale skin for any needle marks. The lamp was close to Anasenko’s right hand. Lynch noted the hand was still wet, the switch on the wall set on but the lamp off.

He pulled the robe up from each wrist, but the cause of death looked obvious. Lynch scanned the room. On the bed was a manila envelope. Lynch untucked the flap and slid the documents out. Blueprints, a slide-bound sheaf of papers. A memory key. He tucked the envelope into the small of his back and left the room without a backward glance.

* * * 

Channing was peevish. ‘Electrocuted himself? Balderdash. Don’t believe it. A waste of bloody time. With Anasenko dead, we can’t tell if this was supposed to land in our hands or if it was just a stupid accident.’

‘Forensics, surely—’

‘You really think we’re going to declare an interest in this to the Emiratis? Come on, Gerald. No, we’ll just have to proceed on the assumption this is all bunkum until proven otherwise by the analysts. You can go home, Gerald. Go back to your bar in Hamra and drown yourself. Take your mobile.’

For which small mercy Lynch was, at least, profoundly grateful.

______________________________________________________________________

Meanwhile, I spent this morning horrifying everyone over at The American School of Dubai. Only they refused to be horrified and were very lovely indeed. Even when I started hurling myself at the walls, speaking in tongues, throwing things at the kids and generally terrorising the class. I love the LitFest. Love it.

Don't forget Saturday's session on Spies, Conspiracy and Censorship! We're going for Martinis at Vista afterwards and you're more than welcome to join us!!!

Book Post: An Interview With Gerald Lynch

Bob Studholme is a lecturer in English at the Al Ain branch of Abu Dhabi University. One of the beta readers who gave valuable and extensive early feedback on the book, he volunteered to interview Gerald Lynch, the Northern Iriish spy who plays such a key role in Olives - A Violent Romance (where all agree he is a complete cad) and Beirut - An Explosive Thriller (where readers learn that Paul Stokes' view of Lynch might have been somewhat skewed by circumstance).

Either way, Bob let himself in for this. And here's how it went:

An unnamed hotel in Beirut. Yesterday.

 

   A knock sounds on the door.
  'Come.'
  Bob Studholme slinks into the room with a nervous grin. A university lecturer, he’s been forced to adopt the role of journalist and, even if he lectures in English, the prospect of facing down a difficult subject in person is not one he had counted on actually having to physically endure. He feels sweaty. Difficult doesn’t quite do it justice, he thinks. Dangerous. He gulps.
  The man he is here to meet stands, brushing his trouser legs. Studholme advances, his hand held out. He bobs a little. The man shakes the proffered hand and gestures to the armchair opposite his own. Studholme sits.
  ‘Would you like a drink? Something for the nerves?’ says Gerald Lynch.
  Peering up, he nods. ‘Umm, yes please.’
  Lynch wanders to the sideboard and fixes two stiff scotches. ‘Here. You’ll take ice.’
  Studholme almost spills the drink, gulping it too fast and wiping his bearded chin with the back of his hand.
  ‘So they’ve sent you to interrogate me, is it?’
  ‘Well, not so much that as interview you.’ He finishes the drink and Lynch pours him another.
  ‘Let’s get it over with then,’ the Irishman sits back, his hands steepled and his blue-eyed regard on the English lecturer with his notebook and HB pencil. Studholme produces a voice recorder and places it on the table between them. His voice is stronger than he feels.
  ‘To start with the one that puzzles me most, Mr. Lynch. You are an Irishman.  A Catholic Irishman from the North, where it matters even more than it does in the South. So why are you working for the Empire?’
  Lynch waves his condensation-frosted glass at Studholme, his finger pointing. ‘You’re a cheeky bugger, aren’t you? That’s a fine start, that is.’
  Studholme, fortified by whisky, stands his ground. There is a long silence. Lynch turns to put his drink down.
  ‘Let me tell you something, Bob. It is Bob, isn’t it?’ Studholme nods his assent. ‘I grew up in an orphanage but they put me out to a family whose kid was on heroin. He died and they blamed me for the habit their son had and they didn’t know about. So I got sent back. A few years later I met the dealer who sold him that last hit and he was an IRA man. That was the day the truth first hit me. They didn’t mind how they made the money to buy guns, see? They became criminals, as bad for decent folk trying to get by as the Brits, even worse. I used to join in, throwing stones and stuff down on the Falls Road. But after that I sort of lost my appetite for people who deal heroin for their so-called fight for freedom. So when the Brits came calling, I answered.’
  ‘Still, working for the people that you do has got to mean working with the British Establishment. Forgive me for saying it, but I can't see that being a mix of personality types that is exactly made in Heaven. In fact, I think you'd piss each other off royally. How do you get on with your superiors?’
  Lynch laughs. ‘You’d be right on the money there. Look, you have to understand how these people work. They don’t really care too much for the niceties of life, they have a job to do. And I’m the guy they like to give the messy stuff to. Channing understands the Middle East is hardly what you might call a ...’ Lynch makes air quotes, ‘conventional environment. So we have conventional assets in the region but it suits him to have someone around who isn’t too ...’ Lynch reaches for his drink and takes a slug. ‘Prissy. As far as getting along, we rub along okay as long as we avoid each other.’
  Lynch leans back and favours the room with an indifferent glance as Studholme scratches away at his notebook with the pencil.
  ‘You writing shorthand there, Bob, are you?’
  ‘Umm, no. Just catching up.’
  ‘Thought they taught you journalists shorthand. ‘spose they just teach you Facebook now, is it?’
  Studholme grinns weakly, sips his drink and raises his gaze to meet Lynch’s intensity. ‘I can't remember who was supposed to have said it, but there is a story of a Lebanese whose reaction to Churchill's description of Russia (a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma) was to say that in Lebanon, such stories are told to little kids, who like simple tales. So how do you find working there? And, while we're on the subject, how do you get on with your counterparts in the Lebanese intelligence world?’
  ‘There’s one simple law in the Middle East. “My brother against my cousin, my cousin against the stranger.” Once you cop on to that, you’ll be fine. I like working here plenty, you don’t get bored easy here. Mostly my masters leave me alone, sometimes they remember me and throw some bones my way. I’m a dustman, me. I clean up mess. Lebanese intelligence? Most of their intelligence consists of blood and sawdust, let me tell you. Tony’s good people, but he’s a copper not a spook. If their spooks get you, let me tell you now, Bob, you’d better have non-conductive balls.’
  Lynch’s dry chuckle turns into a cough. He sips his drink, shaking his head at his own wit.
  Tongue protruding from his lips, Studholme toils away with his pencil. Lynch regards him with amused tolerance. Finally, the man raises his head from the notepad.
  ‘Someone once defined the stress that the police are under because of their work as: That feeling and desire, along with the ensuing bodily effects, experienced by a person who has a strong and true longing to choke the living shit out of someone who desperately deserves it, but can't. Get that much in your job?’
  ‘I usually just choke ‘em. Next.’
   ‘On the same line, the police are generally a reasonably honest group, but their divorce rate shows that they have difficulty in keeping relationships going. You, being a professional liar, can't have an easier time. At the risk of sounding like a Women's magazine, how do you keep relationships going?’
  ‘Professional liar, is it? Liar?’ Lynch’s smile is Siberian. ‘You’re a cheeky fecker, are you not? I keep relationships going or not as I see fit and by Christ that’s all I’ll tell the likes of youse about my bloody relationships.’
  His eyes drop to the notebook momentarily before Studholme faces Lynch, rebellion in the set of his shoulders. ‘In your job you might talk about sources and assets, but what you often mean is the people you lean on and use. Those people can't all have happy endings. How do you deal with it when bad things happen to good people because of you?
  Lynch leaps to his feet. He leans across the coffee table. He raises his hand, his two fingers together pointing at Studholme’s forehead. ‘I know precisely who you’re talking about and you can drop that line of questioning before you find yourself wearing a laser fucking bhindi, you understand me? I was not responsible for what happened to him. They told me to play nicely with you but I find my desire to conform to my empirical masters’ wishes is being very fast eroded. I hope I make myself clear to you. Bob.’
  Studholme drains his whisky, his face pale and crimson patches high on his cheeks. Perched on the edge of his armchair, his body weaves and he blinks a little. ‘Sure.’ He says, before burping. ‘Look, last question. James Bond always gives the impression that spying is about having the right gadget and a really nice suit, but there must be more to being a spy than that.  How much intelligence is involved in the intelligence business?
  Lynch ponders the question, then laughs. The tension leaves him and he curls back into his seat. ‘Intelligence?  There’s precious little intelligence goes on. Just shit and fear, small people trying to get by and big people crapping on them from a great height. Sure an’ you get the pure data from people like GCHQ and outfits like Nathalie Durand’s, but that’s no substitute for what the Yanks call humint. What you and I might call people. It’s all about people, scared people and happy people, bad people and sometimes even good people. People who care, people who’ve got things to lose. Loved ones.’ Lynch pauses, a puzzled look on his dark features as if he has even surprised himself. He stands, pulling down the lapels of his jacket. ‘Right. That’s us then. Here, I’ll show you the door so’n I will. You might want to get a taxi home.’

So You've Written A Book. What's It About?

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The first question anyone asks you when they find out you've written a book is 'What's it about?'. This is a natural byproduct of human curiosity, but comes with a built-in conundrum. You have about fifteen seconds before their eyes glaze over and they suddenly remember they had to be somewhere else like really fast.

How do you sum up your 80,000 words of lovingly crafted prose in a few seconds? You can't just read them the blurb (you could maybe have it printed onto index cards to give to people. Hmmm, that might be an idea), but you need to find a way of getting the scheme across to them because if writing books does nothing else, it transforms us from thieves into salesmen.

Thieves? Yes, everyone wot writes books steals moments, traits, expressions and gestures from the people around them. The biggest act of thievery in Olives, for instance, is Northern Irish spy Gerald Lynch. He's got a hangup about being called 'Gerry', it's always Gerald. He's spent twenty years escaping from being Gerry Lynch. That, for instance, was stolen. Someone said it to me in a meeting and I couldn't wait to get away and make that phrase into a new character. Believe it or not, the spy in Olives used to be a fiftyish, gingery fellow called Nigel Soames. Gerald Lynch, born of a theft, replaced him that very evening and has gone on to be the central character in my two subsequent books.

Salesman because all I want to do is sell you my book now. When you ask me what it's about, I'm going to take the chance to tell you enough to make you want to pick it up when you see it in the bookshop, beguiled by Naeema Zarif's stunning cover art, and take it to the cash counter. I want you to click on the book cover on the right, go to the the Kindle store and send the data flying over Whispernet to populate your reader.And I want you to be curious enough to click the 'Olives - A Violent Romance' link on my blog and find out more about it so you can be ready to buy it when it comes out in December. At least you know what's deep in my black little heart now, the next time we meet. And don't think it stops there, by the way. I want to talk you into reviewing it on Amazon and GoodReads too. I've become quite shameless.

And, as you ask, Olives is about a young British journalist called Paul Stokes who goes to Jordan to live and work who becomes attracted to a Jordanian girl. He's blackmailed into spying on her family by British intelligence, who claim the family's involved in funding terrorism and he has to try to work out quite who the good guys and bad guys are as a series of massive bombings go off around him that seem somehow tied to his movements. With each decision he makes, things just get worse until he finds he has to betray everyone around him to survive.