Zef Nano

What an interesting and ever more awful experience writing this book is turning out to be. Today saw more calls from Interpol, another email from a convicted murderer and an interview with an Albanian mobster.

It is a sorry state of affairs when an Albanian mobster comments: “You have the face of misery. You look like a sack of sad shit.” He wanted to murder AM’s public schoolboy boyfriend for free just to show me he could kill anyone and because he bizarrely thought it might put a smile on my face. It took a lot convincing for him to actually believe that I didn’t want anyone shot, beaten up or even scared a little bit. His final comment on the matter was: “You are either mad or not a real man if you not even have him done with a knife.”

However, Zef Nano, despite being pure scum, did give a good interview and produced a fantastic quote I hope to be able to open the European Gangland chapter with. It was: “I used to run the crime in only one village. Now Europe is my playground.” I did try to explain to him who Suede were and why that line was so funny, but I suspect he thought Brett Anderson wasn’t a real man either.

950 Words

After the most miserable Christmas I’ve experienced, I tried to get back to writing the book today. It didn’t go well. Two nosebleeds and 16 hours managed to produce 950 words. I need to be able to do 2,000 a day between January and February 20th. After today, I don’t feel any confidence about hitting that mark.

The Wheel of Boethius

It seemed to so odd today to be researching the Kray twins again. I’ve spent the day back amongst the interview tapes I first made as a naïve 17-year-old for my first published piece. The ghost voices of long-dead gangsters mixing with the voice of a young man I can hardly recognise. Yet here we are, joined by this equal distance of time at different points on the wheel of Boethius.

I can’t feel Christmas this year. No stocking to fill, no AM to try and delight. Without her love there doesn’t seem to be anything to celebrate. There have been too many tears today to produce any words, so I’m here alone with the sound of the dead and only the words of Boethius for comfort.

I Cried For Hours

AM contacted me today to say her mum is sending me a Christmas card and that things are ‘amazing’ and ‘going incredibly well with Alex’. I cried for hours.

Cagliostro and the Tonton Macoutes

The picture list is 73 pages long. 21,837 words. 108,417 characters (without spaces). What should have taken me two days to do, has taken me eight. I forgot to allow for the fact that I’m both a little brain damaged and more than a little sick. This means I can’t work at the speeds I used to. When you have 100,000 words to do in less than eight weeks, that’s a worrying prospect to say the least.

However, it is a good picture list. It’s a little gruesome what with the high body count, but hopefully I’ve also ensured that it also has a strong victim focus. If all goes plan, this will probably be the only organised crime book with photos of the statue of Comte di Cagliostro by Giuseppe Balsamo and an image of the Tonton Macoutes.

I’m dreading returning to the hospital on the 20th. Fear is such a small word for such a big feeling.

Fight to the Last Bloody Drop

I’ve decided to do the book. I know this is near suicidal, but what else can I do? At the end of the day, I can only do what you always do when you are poor and don’t have rich folks to give you handouts - you get on with it. I don't have the money for rent or food, I don't have enough to pay for a funeral, so I work. I graft. It’s what people like me do. We struggle because it’s the only way to survive, the only way to get through. Normally, I could go back into politics and spin doctoring, but no one is going to give a job to someone as ill as me. I need to pay rent, I need to eat, and so I’ll swallow hard and get on with it.

I know how bad things are for me, but I am not a quitter. I will fight to the last bloody drop. This book will not only keep me afloat financially for the next few months, it might just stop the heartbreak killing me.

In Touch With My Mortality

As it crept up to dawn on Saturday morning, it was obvious things were not good. The pain went from uncomfortable to nearly passing out level and there was some blood. The doctor was called at just after 6am. I was persuaded to go to hospital to be checked over. I’m now back. More in touch with my mortality, but otherwise OK.

Time Travel Saga

Two hours sleep last night. The usual Anne-Marie nightmares warped into a time travel saga where I was able to project into the past to try and save our relationship. I’m not sure whether it became a nightmare at the point where I realised that it was pointless because I hadn’t travelled back enough years to point where AM still loved me or at the point it became lucid and I was stuck watching reruns of the pain we put each over through.

I woke up just after 2am. I didn’t get back to sleep. This left me coping with the day on a less than solid basis. I managed to visit my grandparents, but in retrospect, this may have been a bad move. They could see how ill I was. When they are fading before my eyes, I hate the idea that they worry about me. They had to bury my father and I can see that they now fear outliving me.

The physical pain and the haunting of my heart have combined with overtiredness to make this look like another night of hollow, lonely hours where the comfort of oblivion is elusive.

Pathetically Victorian

The medical advice is to not attempt to write the book. I am also told that my current mental state is not exactly conducive to my physical health. It seems so pathetically Victorian to be burning out from a broken heart.