Book Blurb:
Doing
Life in Paradise explores
the impact and ripple effect of trauma on a group of strangers inextricably
linked by, and witness to, a tragic accident.
The novel is a surreal voyeuristic journey
into the minds and lies of its larger than life characters, each trapped in
their own psychological struggle for survival and redemption. Ruby hopes for love, but her destiny is
controlled by a malicious spider. Peter
laments the loss of love, but prefers to discuss it with Mr Dishwasher. Madeleine discovers rapture while counting
down her periods. Hawkey knows if you lie to your
psychologist, you are still telling the truth. And Tommy is a killer.
Through the eyes of its flawed characters,
and clipped acerbic prose Doing Life in
Paradise exposes the absurdity of life and dependence on hope to find
meaning within life’s disinterest. But
how can life in a city called Paradise feel anything but cruelly ironic, how
can it not be anything but a life sentence?
The novel explores the peculiar places life
can take us, while exposing the curious strategies we each employ in order to
survive.
We also asked Gary Line questions about his book Doing Life in Paradise and about his writing process. These are his answers. Enjoy!
How did you come up with the
story?
In Doing
Life in Paradise, the narrative discusses the philosophy of the dependence
people have on hope, or should I say the over-dependence. Without hope we all would
struggle to get out of bed each day but too much hope, or the wrong kind of
hope can be a paralysing factor in people’s lives. It either prevents them from
taking charge of their own life or at the very least, retards their outcomes –
they hope for things rather than taking action to achieve the things they want
in life. The story took shape when I imagined a group of ordinary citizens to
which an extraordinary thing happens. Such as, in this case, the witnessing of
the accident which kills a young girl. Events like this tend to interrupt
people’s hope structure.
Doing
Life in Paradise asks the questions, what happens
to a young woman when she witnesses a car accident, which results in the death
of a girl her own age? What happens to the young driver of the car who causes
the accident? What happens to the other people who witness this accident? such
as a young boy with his mother and the brother of the girl run over and so on.
And how do these people cope and proceed with their aspirations in the light of
such a tragedy? Are their personal hopes and dreams corrupted? What can they
rely upon now?
This is how I started the story, but how I
invent scenes and characters is a function of my writing process.
What is your writing process?
As a writer, I am always thinking, listening
and watching people. I note what people say, and what they do and when they do
the things they do. I am not concerned too much about why people do anything,
as the explanations of why people do the things they do, are very often elaborate
lies – lies they tell themselves and lies they tell others almost as though the
truth of our lives must be kept hidden. It is this behaviour and gap that the narrative
explores.
I do not have a formal method to track a
plot such as cards for each chapter or an organisational chart. Nor do I
construct characters in service to a plot. It is the other way around. I am
more interested in the characters and what they do both consciously and unconsciously.
It can start with a line of dialogue, or
alternatively, a line of seemingly ordinary dialogue or behaviour will trigger
an idea or a character. The discussion of the importance of either character
over plot or vice versa has never been answered satisfactorily and probably never
will. However, each writer will have their own opinion in regards to this question
that will always inform the way they write. I think both are important, but for
me, character is the superior of the two. So invariably, I will start with the
character. I zero in on the gap or space we inhabit between reality and
hyper-reality, the gap between lies and truth.
Elaborate action is not so important, I am
more interested in the interior life of a character – what they think, what
they believe in, and how they react when life indiscriminately singles them out
and interrupts their universe. Postmodernism often concerns itself with the
small events, not the grand events of life – indeed it might be said that it is
all the small human events that create the grand event, or result from a grand
event. This is never more evident than the example of 9/11 for example.
I start writing with an idea that is
expressed through either dialogue or action and I may have a theme in mind but
almost always, I never have an ending in mind – I prefer to let the narrative
write its own ending, as life itself does. And it isn’t automatic that any
opening line or paragraph will survive. As any piece I write takes on its own
life and creates its own universe and starts to drive in one particular
direction, the first sentence or paragraph, even the character themselves might
disappear or change. For example, I started Doing
Life in Paradise with the character Peter. It was his story and journey
that started the whole thing but that changed, and it became more of Ruby’s
journey, at least that is now how the narrative starts.
This may seem somewhat unorganised or even
chaotic but that is not the case in the end. However, this method allows me to be
as surprised as my reader might be with the actions and behaviour of my
characters, and there will be a freshness and an absurdity to each character
that might not be there if I were to use a more logical controlled method. In
other words, I trust in the ‘muse’, I let the work do the work and I do not consciously
impose myself in a contrived way.
Here is an except chapter from Doing Life in Paradise
18
TOMMY
Tommy had to come home early
from work. He was sick again. He managed to pick up some tin beer at the
Tonsley Park Hotel drive-thru near his flat in Clovelly Park without passing
out. He had to rest outside the café where Ruby often had her favourite
pineapple crush drink and where he bought biscuits. But that was when he was
eating. He made it back to his flat and struggled up the stairs, holding on to
the rail and trying to keep hold of his tin beer with his shaking hands. About
half way up, Lemon Guy who lives on the top floor was coming down. Tommy didn’t
look at Lemon Guy, no one looked at Lemon Guy, he wasn’t the kind of guy you
wanted to make eye contact with, he took it as an invitation to beat the crap
out of you. And Tommy was too sick to take in Lemon Guy’s stink. ‘Well if it
isn’t Franz.’ Tommy was never sure why Lemon Guy insisted on calling him Franz
but he wasn’t the kind of guy you challenged; Tommy wouldn’t have thought him
capable of reading anything more substantial than a comic, so literary
allusions were well out of his reach. Tommy stopped, held his breath swallowing
his nausea and bowed his head to let Lemon Guy pass. But it was no good. As
Lemon Guy reached Tommy, he clocked Tommy right in the face. Tommy’s legs
buckled, and he crashed to the floor. When Tommy opened his eyes, his nose was
full of lemon smell and blood and Lemon Guy’s face was only centimetres from
Tommy’s face. Lemon Guy spat at Tommy. ‘You killed my cat, you cockroach.’
Lemon Guy shouted this into Tommy’s nostrils. Tommy didn’t ordinarily use his
nostrils for hearing, but in Lemon Guy’s case, he felt compelled to make an
exception. Then Lemon Guy smashed Tommy again with his head and that was when
Tommy felt his nose buckle, making a sound like plastic snapping. It seemed
unlikely that a discussion about neighbourly harmony would be fruitful right at
this moment. Tommy felt his nose fill with blood, which surely would put to an
end any ambitions Tommy’s nostrils might have entertained as listening devices.
As it stood at the moment, they were flat out fulfilling their basic design
function of air in, air out. Tommy didn’t know it was Lemon Guy’s goddamn cat.
It was true then, Tommy thought, he had killed Lemon Guy’s cat and this
confirmed his worse fears about himself. Tommy was a killer.
My Review
***I received the eBook free as a review copy from the author/publisher in exchange for an honest review***
Angelina: This was definitely a very interesting and unique book to read. Honestly, after I finished reading this book, I needed some time afterwards to sit down and think about what just happened. Not because I didn't understand what exactly happened, but to process it timeline-wise.
This book switches perspectives every chapter to the next person who is going to progress the story in some way. Those main characters are called Ruby, Tommy, Peter, Madeline and Steve. The story takes place in a town called Paradise (previously called Adelaide). I won't reveal much about what happened prevoiusly because a lot of the fun reading came from finding out what happened and how all of the characters are linked together in a strange and explicit way. But stated simply, all of these characters were linked together when they all witnessed the same trauma several years back that would ultimately affect their lives in the future.
I actually really liked the concept of this book. It was really philosophical at times and I had to put the book down several times when the statements got big and deep in order to process my thoughts on them. Another unique thing about the theme is that it talked quite a bit about coincidences and synchronicity. Especially after finishing the book, it does make one think about coincidences that can't be explained in real life. However, I think that in some cases, the characters became too philosophical to the point where it started getting a bit annoying. I felt kind of overwhelmed that every single character became so philosophical. I felt that the plot wasn't progressing because of this because some of the philosophical thoughts, I felt, were being repeated by the individual characters. On the other hand, a factor that had me wanting to keep on reading this book was to see when the characters would meet once again. The close calls when the characters just barely missed each other had me wanting to read more.
The characters in this book were unique. They all seemed really real, not just a work of fiction. They all had to deal with problems that other people also face around the world. First I thought that it seemed weird that coincidentally all of the characters had such big dilemmas in their lives, but then it kind of made sense with the context of the story. My favourite perspectives were probably Ruby and Tommy's perspectives. Something about their point of view just clicked with me.
I also really liked how the ending tied all of the loose ends together really nicely, so that there wasn't anything left hanging which would otherwise make the reader have a nagging feeling that something was missing.
Overall, this was a very unique book with a very realistic set of characters. The book focuses on how characters deal with trauma and the stress of living in a place called "Paradise". The philosophical thought put in this book was clever, although I felt that it as too much for me at times. I give this book 3 out of 5 stars!
About
Gary Lines
Website is
garynlinesauthor.com
Gary is a regular
contributor to the Australian Financial Review, Australia’s premier business
daily newspaper. He writes a column for the “Talking Points” section, which
allows him to discuss everything from ‘Why we keep our books’ to Celebrity
chefs and their proliferation in the world today. This section of the paper is
intended to be informative and humorous.
Doing Life in Paradise, Gary’s debut novel, has received strong endorsement
from reviewers as being a ‘precise’, ‘thoughtful’, ‘clever’ and ‘intriguing and
highly original read’. The novel centres on a group of people all struggling to
cope with the absurdity of life. Some make it, some don’t – everyone tries in
their own way.
Book Blurb (from Goodreads): On March 1, 1940, Adolf
Hitler ordered the invasion of Norway. Having swept across Europe at a
terrifying pace, the Nazi assault on Scandinavia was designed to secure
the valuable source of iron ore being delivered by rail from Sweden to
the Norwegian port of Narvik. To complete the task, Hitler sent ten
large, modern destroyers, with 220 Alpine Troops on each. Five smaller
British H Class destroyers were sent up the fjord in retaliation by the
Allied forces, with little knowledge of what to expect. On April 10, the
first battle of Narvik began. Royal Naval Captain, Bernard
Warburton-Lee, led his flotilla at midnight into the fjord. They had to
navigate the four hour passage undetected, under darkness and in driving
snow storms. The harbour — eerily silent on their arrival — quickly
erupted into a torpedo attack. Back into the fjord, the destroyers
Hardy, Hunter, Hotspur, Havock and Hostile were confronted by five
German destroyers, coming from both the front and rear. This resulted in
a ferocious sea battle with the loss of Hardy and Hunter and damage to
the enemy ships. Those crew members who managed to abandon ship and swim
ashore, under bombardment from the Germans, had to endure a ten mile
march and pray for safe passage back to Britain in order to survive.
Author Ron Cope delivers a comprehensive and gripping account of the
Narvik battle, juxtaposing the myriad strategic difficulties encountered
by the British Navy, with the vivid and insightful personal accounts of
the brave survivors involved, most of whom were under the age of
twenty-three. Including first-hand testimony from Cope's own father
Cyril, a then twenty-one year old Torpedoman, and documents shared for
the first time by the family of Captain Warburton-Lee, Cope presents an
arresting account of this crucial British naval victory, as told by the
sailors who were there. "Meticulously researched, Attack at Dawn relates
the vivid real-life experiences of the British sailors who took part in
the extraordinarily bold attack by five British destroyers against
superior German forces at Narvik... and the desperate running battle
that ensued as they tried to make their escape". John Warburton-Lee,
grandson of Captain Bernard Warburton-Lee. V.C.
