Shadow Play – the Hidden Hands of History

I am having so much fun dealing with my Korean publishers, editors, translators and fans that I wonder if I should not just be done with it and move to Seoul. The translator who is currently turning Global Gangland into Korean, Miran, sends me lovely positive emails alongside queries asking me to detail if a certain gangster's sister-in-law is his cousin, younger sister or older sister due to the exacting nature of a language that values familial positioning. The translator of Secrets & Lies, Ahn So Yeon, has been keeping me updated on the television interviews been done on the book. It gave me a warm glow to know that it was one station's book of the day last week.

Today I was honored to receive an email from DooSeung Lee, the chief director at IMAGO, my Korean publisher. I have never received such a pleasant and praising email from anyone actually involved in the dirty work of publishing my books. Beyond the fact that I have been offered the chance to write a new and territory specific preface for latest Korean edition of Conspiracy Files, there is the intriguing possibility I could decide to write a book purely for the Korean market. I am not sure how Shadow Play – the Hidden Hands of History translates into Korean, but it just might allow me to say all those things lawyers prevent me from saying in English.

'First we Take Seoul, then we Take Ankara'

Today I received an email from the Kimizi Kedi Publishing House. They want to put out a Turkish edition of Global Gangland. This is of course incredibly flattering. Who does not want to be published in Turkey? My friend Andrew Collins is something of an established literary name in Turkey and I remember seeing the beautiful Turkish editions of his works.

However, given the rights situation with Global Gangland, I had to let Kimizi Kedi know that as much as I would be delighted to authorise them as my Turkish publisher, it was beyond my power to make happen. This is a shame. I would love to be able to say: 'First we take Seoul, then we take Ankara.'

It is becoming clearer that I need a new agent. Not just so I can say: 'Talk to my agent about it', but so I am always in the situation to say yes to offers I would relish taking up. The core elements of Global Gangland for me were being able to provide a voice to marginalized victims and to highlight how anti- libertarian laws and inequality create forces that impact on us all. Talking about how the biggest crime and injustice is tolerating systems that perpetuate poverty is worth saying in any language. To remove all barriers to me doing just that is why I need a new agent.

The True Meaning of Ghosting

Today, while as Sean Twist would put it, being a ‘word slut’ I had to write about the Litvinenko case. I found writing about his murder incredibly difficult. I have always refused to believe in the bullshit crutch of ‘writer’s block’, but even a hack like me has to acknowledge the emotional obstacles that can get in the way of your words and the page. Writing about the death of someone who helped provide information for one of your books and who may have been murdered for exposing conspiracy theories is like rubbing a dull bruise.

In Global Gangland I was given free reign to write what my then editor called a ‘David Southwell book’. By this, she meant that she expected me to bring some of myself to the subject I was writing about. My direct experiences and personal perspectives could flow into the bare facts and reported narratives. Where it was relevant – the Rettendon murders, the Belfast slaying of Brendan Campbell and my family’s glancing involvement with the Richardsons – my own special knowledge of the topics covered, my feelings, became part of the reporting. My editor also knew full well I could not survey organized crime without railing about poverty and prohibition, that my take on crime would be have some political DNA buried within the text. I always try to make a ‘David Southwell book’ something beyond a mere hackwork refrying of old, cold facts.

However, in my current ghosting job I have to take the exact opposite approach. I have to exorcise myself from the text. Even though I had some contact with Litvinenko and the echoes of his death have been felt in my life, I cannot let a trace of any personal knowledge of his murder make it onto the page. The esteemed crime author holidaying in Barbados I am impersonating did not know Litvinenko, therefore I write the case up in his staccato rhythm, try to include his trademark tastelessness and make myself totally invisible.

There is no informed reflection on the Litvinenko’s character. He becomes simply: ‘Alexander Litvinenko, a former lieutenant-colonel in the KGB and outspoken critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin’ rather than a man who generously took time out to offer advice on the Moscow Mafiya and the ‘Tambov bastards’. My views on who murdered him and why are absent, possibly waiting for the new version of Conspiracy Files, possibly to be swallowed deep inside myself to never be published at all.

It is on jobs like this I understand the true meaning of ghosting. You have to remove your spirit from the text. You become insubstantial. Without mass. Nameless and unable to interact with the audience, you do not officially exist and no-one can notice your literary half-life. Naked to the eye, you are condemned to float through the world of words beyond the detection of the reader.