Beirut, Bombs And Chaos Theory

Rafic Hariri beirut 2 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I follow the #Beirut hashtag (Tweetdeck's multiple columns are a wonderful thing) and so it was that I had just finished putting up Friday's guest post by Micheline when I caught the first tweets from Achrafieh as people reported a loud explosion, some asking 'What was that?'.

The tweets quickly became more specific, Ashrafiyeh pinpointed and a large blast. People close by talked of the ground moving, while an increasing number of tweets mentioned Sassine Square - a busy area of restaurants and cafés. There was a sense people were holding back from saying it was a bomb, perhaps a gas cylinder. Anything, in fact, but a bomb. Nobody wanted to admit it could be that.

The first twitpics showed a black cloud above the city. Now tweets talked of a bomb, people linked the location to the headquarters of the March 14 movement - the anti-Syrian coalition named for the date of the last such bombing in Beirut - the massive car bomb that killed Rafiq Hariri.

News started flowing thick and fast. A car bomb, very big. People were reporting casualties. The first images from the scene came in, confirming what people had feared - a massive explosion in the busy area. The phone network was down but 3G was still working. Mainstream media reports were mentioned, LBC first to the news. The volume of retweets was going up as mainstream outlets were quoted. Some outlets ran with graphic images of body parts and pools of blood. Reports of deaths from mainstream outlets, one dead said one outlet, two said Reuters, three said another. The UK's Guardian was quoting tweets and showing twitpics on its website, many people cited Reuters' reports. Twitter started carrying calls for blood from the hospitals, queues built of up people volunteering to donate. One Lebanese news channel was reporting it wasn't a car bomb, another that the bomb was actually in a bank.

Joining in the fray, reporting at Twitter speed, mainstream outlets were helping the confusion as they posted information without confirmation and certainly lacking the 'context and analysis' that have been so often cited as a reason for their relevance. The volume of retweets was very high now,  voices from around the region joining what had been a very local conversation.

It was horrible to watch. So many friends in Beirut and here, worried for loved ones who lived or worked in the area and then, as the news sank in, so much bitter disappointment that once again the lives and hopes of ordinary people are to be sacrificed, that the optimism was to be ground out of everyone and replaced by fear. Waking up the next day to the headlines confirmed that yes, this was an assassination, that a key member of the March 14 movement was dead, along with seven others and tens more had been injured.

As so many times before Twitter looked like a Lorenzian water wheel. Initially it efficiently carried eye witness reports, the first news breaking and confirmed by multiple sources and twitpics. With the huge increase in volume comes retweets and second generation shares, the water wheel starts to become more erratic and it becomes harder to filter the information.

What I found interesting was the sight, the first time I have noticed it, of mainstream media sources getting right in there and posting flows of unconfirmed information, reprocessing tweets and posting 'breaking news' with clearly little attempt at filtering the raw data. People quickly quote mainstream sources because we have so long been told we can depend on them, yet the information they were providing was of no different quality to that being shared by eye witnesses. Mainstream media were retweeting witnessesx. I thought it a dangerous precedent.

Book Post - Beirut And The Disposable Character

   Lynch called across to Leila. ‘Where’s Deir Na’ee?’
   She uncurled and came to him, looking over his shoulder at the screen, her blouse opening to show the warm brown mound of her breast. ‘Deir Na’ee? The lonely home? Sounds like something up in the Bekaa. Never heard of it. Try Googling it. Might be a village somewhere.’
   ‘And “Spike”?’
   She paused, then turned to regain her place on the sofa. ‘No idea, habibi. I’m not a phone book.’
   Lynch chuckled, the search phrase ‘Deir Na’ee’ for some reason returning the Irish poem A bhonnán bhuí, The Yellow Bittern. He read it out loud, the Irish words coming back to him from the mists of distant childhood, the disinfectant reek of the Sisters of Charity’s classroom. ‘A bhonnán bhuí, is é mo léan do luí, Is do chnámha sínte tar éis do ghrinn, Is chan easba bidh ach díobháil dí, a d'fhág i do luí thú ar chúl do chinn.’
   Leila was laughing at him. ‘What are you saying?’
   ‘It’s Irish. Deir Na’ee gets that in Google. Christ alone knows why.’
   ‘That is not a language. It sounds like dogs fighting.’
   ‘Póg mo thóin.’
   From Beirut - An Explosive Thriller

Today brings a treat - a guest post and quizzing from Micheline Hazou, patroness of genteel blog MichCafé, friend and Beirut wandering companion as well as beta reader of Beirut – An Explosive Thriller...

It is quite exciting to be a beta reader. It is also something I take very seriously.

I had the privilege to beta-read Alexander McNabb’s first novel, Olives – A Violent Romance. I was even more flattered to be offered the chance to beta-read Beirut – An Explosive Thriller a couple of months ago.

It’s not as easy as it seems, because you often get sucked up in the story and forget to keep an eye out for anything that might be wrong, from proofreading to translations and anything you don’t quite like. So I had to re-read many a chapter with that in mind.

From the first few pages of Beirut I felt Alex had come into his own. I got caught up in the “explosive” thriller and rediscovered the main character, Gerald Lynch, in another light. Whereas he had seemed pompous, uptight and unlikeable in Olives, here he is chasing the bad guys with a conscience and sexy on top of it.

As with Olives, I was drawn by the local female character in the book. I can identify with them. And I wonder why they are so disposable. As most of you have read Olives by now, you must know Aisha Dajani’s fate. But Leila Medawar? Why, Alex?

As described in the book, Leila Medawar is the “student activist, dissident, blogger and poet to the leftist anti-sectarian intelligentsia. Born into wealth and privilege she was heart-rendingly idealistic… beautiful dark haired Leila, lover of freedom, equality and British spies. Well, spy.”

Without giving too much away, here are a few questions I would like to ask about Leila Medawar, Gerald Lynch’s lover:

I like Leila Medawar. She humanizes Lynch. Why is she so disposable?
That's partly why she's there. And partly it seals her fate. It's odd but I seem to have this habit of killing the characters I love the most, from the delicious Kylie in my first book, Space, through to a number of characters in Olives, Beirut and, yes, Shemlan.

I often recall an incident involving The Niece From Hell. We were on a walk along the Thames when I was pulled up by the realisation I recognised a particular bench on the towpath. ‘Wow,’ I exclaimed. ‘I killed a guy on this bench!’

The niece glanced carelessly at the bench and shrugged. ‘Whatever.’

I know I am involved in murdering a number of attractive Arab women, but don't take that personally - I'm an equal opportunities killer. I do for a number of occidental men in my books too. And some of them are quite ugly.

On the bright side, it's probably a good thing I'm getting this stuff out of my system. And anyway, there are a thousand and one Leilas...

I sound like I’m gabbling guiltily. I probably am.

How come she knew he was in intelligence?
It's how he met her - when on a surveillance job involving a student protest. In fact, that’s not mentioned until much later in the book in the 'beta' MS but part of the feedback from readers made me bring that history right up front.

Lynch isn't really very good at observing some of the traditional modalities of intelligence, he's far too Arabised for that. Leila is very much into his 'home life'. They live a cocooned existence together - she has his key, they keep their relationship secret (she leaves the room when Palmer comes from the embassy with Lynch's ticket because they have agreed discretion is the way to go for both of them) and Lynch knows who she is. She trusts him not to spy on her and he, I rather think, trusts her not to use her relationship with him in her activities.

Where is Leila’s family? How is it that she was able to live with Lynch, and then in the flat he provided her?
She doesn't actually live with him, just has a key and comes around a lot. He was hoping the flat in Hamra would be a bolthole for them both but was surprised by the strength of her reaction to the news he would be shacking up with another spy type.

Her family is living in Dubai, as it happens - but she's got away with going back to Beirut to study at AUB. That gives her independence beyond reason - and the freedom to go out with a man over twice her age.

And no, it's not one of my secret fantasies sneaking into a book. There's a certain journalist living in Ain Mreisse who might be influencing some of Lynch's lifestyle...

What is the story of the Orrefors tumbler?
I've long been a huge fan of Orrefors glass and have a number of those beautiful pieces with the blue teardrop.  It just seemed natural that it should sneak into the book - and tells us that Leila's moneyed, incidentally. That stuff's hideous expensive.

Leila being particular about how she takes her whisky is a mannerism I stole from a rather lovely Lebanese friend...

I also let my personal preferences sneak in with the Lamiable champagne later in the book, which is a stunning single grower extra brut - a hard champagne to make well as it has little or no 'dosage' and is therefore incredibly dry. I have a nice chap called Charles who ships it to me in the UK. One has a literary agent and a vintner, don't you know...

Why the choice of Proust? And which of his works was she reading? 
Remembrance of things past of course, silly! Probably The Prisoner, a reflection of Lynch’s ardour for her mixed with a desire to control her, perhaps why he offers her the flat in Hamra. Leila’s not Albertine, of course – but she is enjoying casting herself in the role.

Leila is possibly reading it because she likes Proust, or because she likes to be seen to be liking Proust – that’s a very Lebanese dilemma. She was reading it in the original French because, of course, she speaks French like a native. And she likes to tell friends she finds the Moncrieff translation sloppy.

Why did Lynch only try calling her? Why didn’t he go over to see her? And why didn’t she have protection?
He was scared of finding some ape from AUB in her bed. He was also rather busy saving the world and flying to and from Europe. He talked to the concierge, too, which just confirms his worst fears.

Lynch had checked with the concierge and yes, she moved in to the flat in Hamra. Yes, she had indeed taken male company, the old crone told Lynch, laughing dirtily and pocketing the fifty thousand lire tip.

There was no protection - Lynch operates as a lone wolf most of the time, he's not often part of the 'framework', but a maverick operator Channing uses for the messy stuff. His approach to intelligence is 'go local, go low-key' rather than bringing in the Keystone cops every time. It's one reason why he prefers to use a servees rather than an embassy car.

Part of Lynch would also let her cool her heels, perhaps even be angry at her and take an 'Youse know what? F youse too' approach to her flouncing off like that. And yet she's under his skin. Not quite as much as Michel gets under hers, though...

Does Lynch fall in love again in Shemlan (please say yes…).
No, but Shemlan is very much a love story – although not a very straightforward one.

Don't forget all you need is to click on this here handy link to get your own print copy of Beirut - An Explosive Thriller shipped to your doorstep or downloaded instantly to your reader!

The Displaced Nation

Just in case you could care less, I was interviewed recently by US-based expat blog The Displaced Nation and they posted it today. A wide-ranging chat, we talk about how I got to the Middle East, books, wine, literary controversy and stuff.

It's linked here.

In one of those odd little marvels of serendipity that is the Internet-driven process known as 'discovery', Displaced Nation's ML Awanohara was trawling the Interwebs looking for expat food stuff and stubbed her toe on dead food blog The Fat Expat. That led her to my books and a quick read later she was hot on the interview trail.

Unlike many writer friends who have an abhorrence for the evils of publicity, I enjoy interviews. They often focus on my favourite subject. Me. I must check with my agent and see if that seems immodest. I'm sure it's fine...

Barbarians At The Windows 8

Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

There's a wonderful moment in the film Barbarians At The Gate when the beleagured CEO of RJR Nabisco tries out the 'smokeless cigarette' that's going to save the company from a buyout and discovers it tastes like a toilet when it's lit with a match - the R&D team have been using lighters all along.

The moment when Nokia CEO Stephen Elop was told that Lumia was Portugese for 'lady of the night' must have felt similar. If you're going to bet the future of your company on a single product, you really want to get it right. Totally right.

October 26th is another such moment, when Microsoft launches its Windows 8 operating system in six cities across the world, including - Gulf News tells us - Dubai. Windows 8 is really about Microsoft's future - the company arguably can't afford another Vista scale disappointment but it desperately needs to stay relevant in a world where iOS and Android are the talking points and most people have either stuck with XP or wished they had. The days of everyone flocking to 'this year's Windows' are long gone now. Windows 8 is going to have to be special - I'd argue it's going to have to be as special as Windows 3.0 was - a true game changer. And there are major question marks about that.

Early reviews have been mixed, with a great deal of disappointment and frustration expressed by reviewers. The 'tablet friendly' interface is actually a highly dangerous move for Microsoft. It's an inflection point - if the burden of navigating the new interface is as great - or greater - than the burden of change, users are more likely to make that change. Especially those of us who have been vexed by Vista and living with the nice but dim Windows 7. Microsoft's saving grace may be that the options out there are limited right now, but it's doubtful Google will give them too much 'wriggle room'.

October 26th is a Friday. It's also the first day of the Eid Al Adha holiday. It's not the day I'd pick for a Dubai product launch, but then what do I know...

This rare technology themed post comes to you courtesy of sponsor the UNWired radio show on technology, online and all things digital I co-host every Wednesday with Rama Chakaki and Siobhan Leyden. Today we're broadcasting live from GITEX - 12-2pm Dubai time (GMT +4) on 103.8FM or streaming live at this here handy link. This'll be my 24th GITEX and also marks my first meeting the girl who would become the future (and long suffering) Mrs McNabb!

Liars

The Interview (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I am never at my best in job interviews. I’m a disastrous candidate (I was once stopped in the middle of an interview to be told my ‘interview persona sucks’) and even worse as an interrogator. Never a great lover of formality, I find the stilted nervousness appalling.

The other day a candidate asked me what was the difference between PR and advertising. It struck me as an odd question to ask in an interview for a PR job, but I did my best to answer it. And my answer boiled down to this.

Public Relations - as I see it - is the communications discipline. It is about driving structured, benefit-led change. In my professional career, fifteen years now, in public relations I have never told a single lie. Never.

But advertising is all about lying. It's what they do, constantly. What amazes me is how we put up with it, consigning it to the dump bin of background noise when actually we should be protesting it. Look at HSBC's most recent radio ad in the UAE. "At HSBC, we believe that..."

No you don't. That's simply a lie. You do not collectively believe in personal loans with 'keen' (6.5% is competitive, apparently.) interest rates. It's not a corporate value. In fact, your offer is not driven in any way by a "belief", other than a commercial imperative. So why do you find it appropriate to so glibly misrepresent yourselves in this way?

Axe does not make men attractive. Oh, sure, it's an amusing way to highlight the 'brand essence' of the product. It's also a lie. It smells like toilet freshener. I have yet to meet a woman attracted by the smell of toilet freshener. Pantypads don't make you a more successful mum and microwave dinners don't mean more time to enjoy the family. Famously, I would contend a Mars a day doesn't really help you work, rest and play. It just tastes nice and is bad for you. There's no medical evidence to support the unsupportable claim.

It has long been a catechism for me that assertion without proof is a lie. And yet this is what advertising does constantly. Feel the radiance warm your skin, taste the joy of the open road. Dare to dream the dream. Oh, and while I'm at it, why does the 'Hundred reasons to buy a BMW' radio ad only ever feature reason 82? Do you think they even have a list of 100 reasons to buy their blasted cars?

And on and on we go through a litany that touches pretty much every commercial we see. A constant barrage of the untrue, indefensible and mis-characterised. And we let it wash over us rather than pushing back and asking brands to kindly just stick to the facts, the truth.

Which is what you have to do in public relations. Because if you don't, you'll get called out. In public. It used to be by journalists, now it's by every mobile phone in the country.

I can't say the interview was a great success. It contained some very long silences...

Book Post. Beirut And Prostitutes

   She was silk and she was jasmine, ivory and frankincense, her skin a pale golden slide for the smooth satin riding up her legs as she mounted the stairs. Her hips moving under the wrap were a provocation, her long hair cascaded down her mobile back.
   Reaching the top ahead of them, she strutted across the dance floor and sat on a high stool at the bar. Lynch ducked behind the counter and started to fix coffee at the gleaming red espresso station. This was obviously some sort of well-worn ritual – Nathalie noticed Lynch’s deft movements as he manipulated the machine.
   The white filter of Marcelle Aboud’s cigarette was reddened by her lipstick, her dark, kohl-lined eyes coolly gauging Nathalie as the younger woman waited, her hand resting on the back of a bar stool.
   ‘Come, sit,’ Marcelle purred, gesturing at the stool. Her very movements were languorous and sensual, her voice husky, rolling and dirty. Nathalie caught the flash of a full breast trying to escape the cascades of smooth bronze material as Marcelle turned her magnificent face to Lynch.
   ‘So you’re buying or selling, Lynch?’
   He brought the espresso cup over to her. ‘Her? You can have her for free.’
   Nathalie twisted off her stool. ‘Sorry, not putting up with this.’
   ‘Sit down,’ Marcelle’s languorous voice wasn’t raised, but her tone stopped Nathalie in her tracks. ‘Make her a coffee, Lynch, Play nicely.’
   Lynch busied himself with the espresso machine as Marcelle examined Nathalie, who met the dark brown eyes after they finished travelling lazily up her body like a slow touch. The clink of the espresso cup on the bar broke the moment.
   Marcelle turned to Lynch. ‘So what do you want, you and your assistant?’
   Lynch waited behind the bar with his hands laid on the marble top. Nathalie was surprised at how he eased into the role of barman and fancied perhaps he had worked here many, many years ago as a young man.
From Beirut – An Explosive Thriller

Who did you think of when you created Marcelle?
There was no inspiration as such for Marcelle, she just happened that way. Probably Jessica Rabbit. I suppose in the same way as Anne was a metaphor for Paul’s homeland and Aisha Jordan in Olives – A Violent Romance, Marcelle is Beirut. She’s beautiful, sinful, capricious and a little dangerous.

Why a prostitute? Could she have been doing something else instead and still be integral to the plot?
Perhaps, but she just wouldn’t have been the same if she was a welder, would she? Marcelle is part of Lynch’s seamy side, the underworld of a city and someone with power and contacts in her own strange way. She knows men, she knows Lynch and is perhaps a counterpoint to his intensity and anger. Their relationship is stormy and yet they clearly are very fond of each other.

Nathalie’s big contact is the wealthy and philanthropic Vivienne Chalabi, Lynch’s is the madam of a cat house. It sort of speaks to their respective approaches to life and, I guess, their work...

There’s a hint of a past with Lynch...
Oh yes. It’s not fully explored in Beirut, but Lynch first lived in Beirut towards the end of the civil war, sent undercover to track down some unpleasant IRA drug runners and close the gold seam. His ‘cover’ was working as a barman at Marcelle’s.

Lebanese politics is about religion, won't the Marcelle character create more controversy for you?
What, as much as a future president whose daddy was a warlord and who has a taste for nuclear warheads? There’s bound to be someone who finds something offensive in Beirut – An Explosive Thriller, I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s a by-product of the lack of fiction in the region, this inability to divorce creativity from reality.

I’m looking forward to the first person telling me there are no prostitutes in Lebanon. I already had one person point out that Marcelle couldn’t possibly be Christian, if she was a prostitute she’d be Shia. Which tells you more about Lebanon than I’d care to admit.

I also think you can approach this whole angle of controversy two ways. You could tiptoe around in a constant state of fear and dumb down everything you do so it couldn’t possibly offend or be contrary to anyone’s preconceptions or the way they publicly present themselves while acting differently privately. Or you can just get on and do your thing with integrity, making it as good as you can and perhaps even playing with some of the situations and personalities you encounter in this part of the world.

How did you research Lebanese bordellos?
Cheeky! I made it up. I’ve never been in one. Honest. Ask the Spot On girls, they keep me out of trouble.

Is Marcelle in the next book?
Now that would simply be telling...

Interview by Beirut - An Explosive Thriller beta reader Mita Ray.

The Beirut Website - Including Handy Links to Buy eBooks or Print Books is here!

Life Is Good...

One of my many reasons to be cheerful is co-hosting the weekly 'UnWired' radio show on talk radio station Dubai Eye. It's my idea of fun, radio - I love the pressure of the dreaded 'dead air', the mix of news analysis, banter and live guest interviews. You get to meet all sorts of strange and wonderful people and when you come across something admirable, interesting or deserving of a little publicity, you have that gift within you. Which is always nice.

This week's show is going to be a little bit special for me - and, I suspect many others. We're interviewing Len Chapman.

I have long been a fervent admirer of Len's work. He's the man behind wonderful website Dubai As It Used To Be - an archive of Dubai over the years made up of memories, photos and stuff from all sorts of people who have come to live and work here over the decades since Dubai was "A collection of mud huts on a creek" as a friend of my father's who was here during WWII described it to me - horrified I should be living in such a forsaken place!

Anyway, pop over to the site and have a wander in the past and do tune in at 1.30pm today to listen to Len - 103.8 FM in the UAE or streaming at this here handy link if you're anywhere else. You can text in comments or questions to 4001 in the UAE or tweets with hashtag #UNWiredFM always get to us.

The picture is the Sheikh Zayed Road in 1991, BTW. Howzat?

The Times They Are A-Changin'

The Man Who Fell to Earth (film) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This isn't really a book post, it just starts like one, so bear with me.

I've just heard that Beirut - An Explosive Thriller has been passed by the National Media Council in Abu Dhabi and I therefore have permission to print the book in the UAE. Many of my friends overseas have a hard time understanding why anyone would need permission to print a book and, in fact, have drawn parallels between this and the control of information by the Church in the dark ages.

The fact of the matter is it's something of a Catch22.In the Middle East it is generally assumed that the national media is controlled by the government and therefore speaks with the same voice. It isn't until you have a fully deregulated environment that you can afford to drop the regulation, and yet a fully deregulated environment is almost impossible to conceive here.

What has changed, however - and to a remarkable degree for someone who remembers how it was in the 1980s - is the lightness of the touch on the tiller. I remember Lawrence of Arabia being banned in the UAE and now a digitally enhanced recut of David Lean's seminal (if sometimes fanciful) film is showing at the Abu Dhabi Film Festival. I once had a DVD of Nicholas Roeg's 1970s art-house movie The Man Who Fell To Earth confiscated by the Ministry of Information in Dubai (and replaced in my Amazon sleeve by a booklet about finding the path to God). Today, bookshops in the UAE are selling EL James' books.

I'm not sure about selling 50 Shades of Grey and its two sibling titles in the UAE, to be honest. While I'm all for freedom of choice and expression, it rather flies in the face of a censored Internet and certainly is not in line with the cultural and moral environment here. I mean, we're asked to dress decently in malls and public places here. You sort of get the feeling that someone, somewhere hasn't understood it - that it has somehow flown under the radar. There was a period some years ago when one prominent bookseller in the UAE was selling George Bataille's scabrous work of porn, 'The story of the eye', much to colleagues' glee. It did not, of course, last.

Magic Menon (explained in this early blog post although I first mentioned the solvent abusing Black Marker Gang here.) must have retired now, too. It's hard to go on putting black pen on pages when they're iPad apps.The Ministry of Information is certainly no more. The dark offices where I was once brought in to be censured as a magazine publisher, all big desks and locked bookcases full of Jackie Collins novels, are now the friendly corridors of the National Media Council. I thought I was pushing it with Beirut - An Explosive Thriller - there was already quite a bit of controversy regarding the morality, or otherwise, of Olives - A Violent Romance. Beirut has a lot more contentious stuff in it. My reader in Abu Dhabi (He's much too jocular and friendly a chap to call a censor) did note the number of f-bombs, but explained he understood 'this is the British style'.

But when you've got 50 shades in tottering stacks in the malls, I suppose I'm pretty safe. Although I personally think it's only a matter of time before someone picks that book up and decides a light hand on the tiller is one thing, but enough is enough.

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.’

Fridays Is Now Book Posts Days

Novels in a Polish bookstore (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I'm going to reserve Fridays for book posts. This enables me to talk about Beirut - An Explosive Thriller without boring everyone to death (on a day when I usually don't post anyway) as well as resuming normal service on the blog.

I might still post the odd writing thing here or there if its of broader interest, but other than that, Friday is now book day. And we'll see how we get along with that for a while...