Posted by Mike Lathouras, 1st April 2024
Writing has always been core to my various roles in my career. Sure, it was mainly technical and commercial writing, but it was always a point of pride that I write well and received accolades for it. The idea of writing a novel was dismissed for decades due more to the opaqueness of the writing, editing and publication process than the challenge of putting something entertaining together. I’m a storyteller and those who know me well will corroborate that. I found myself storytelling about funny, even ridiculous things that have happened to me or someone I know and often in relatively unremarkable circumstances. I particularly find the ridiculous things I’ve done, or my mates have done, or my wife or their wives have done, which make for really good stories because they are so human. That’s how “One Mad Year” got its start and, once well into the task, I found more and more material came to me by recalled anecdote or memory.
I hate cliché and I challenged myself to write (what I hope is found to be) authentic Australian stories set in environments that I know well. Having travelled to over 40 countries in my career, I found myself regularly being an unofficial ambassador for our Country. I would have the standard things that people know about Australia said back to me with a well-meaning guffaw. I found myself wanting to write a story with a real Australian theme and language, set in a real Australian environment and culture, so people could see how we really live and talk. Being a ‘60s kid, I was exposed to a steady stream of American shows which, to many Australians, including me I suppose, were taken as typical of how life in the USA was at the time. Looking back, now knowing better, I guess I wanted a bit of reality about Australian life as a backdrop to the stage where my characters in One Mad Year do their thing.
My stories were rarely told if they weren’t funny or absurdly dramatic. I’m not sure why and I don’t intend to lay bare my psyche so someone might hypothesise on it. I guess it’s to do with putting a story or a joke or an anecdote out there first, before someone can be critical of me. As a distraction, that is. I admit I am a hard-sell when it comes to humour. In that, I have a ‘high bar’ and don’t find a lot of the contemporary stand-up comedians funny. You can imagine how confounding it was to be me in the seventh self-editing phase of One Mad Year, trying to accept or reject a passage that was supposed to be funny; or at least it was funny four edits ago. It’s really difficult stuff. Bring in the fact that I’m a generalist and you can imagine the torture it was. Well, I got it completed.
Getting back to the “why a novel, now”, I think it must be because I wanted to entertain people with my writing. I certainly didn’t want write anything instructive. Nor did I want to produce anything moralising, yet I realised the other day I did just that in one of the chapters. That particular chapter (no spoiler content) was a matter that really pissed me off (to be blunt). While writing it I was confronted by how true-to-detail I should make it.
To be holding a published hardcopy of a book I wrote is a strange feeling indeed. I am pleased with it. I’m getting a kick from people’s feedback: both Australians and in the US. I think there is only one typo in the entire book, which I think, being a self-published effort, isn’t bad. Especially for a generalist anyway.
K- Great blog it helps to give us an understanding of you as an author and person - so happy the book is finally here! Well done! It’s a great read!
I suspect you’ve got more than one book in you, mate!
Interesting blog - I can really see your voice in the book. Loved the book!