Another short section – 53 and imploding Kindle/Paperback

Posted on by Opher

I wrote this novel out of rage. I had reached the age of fifty-three and was taking a real hard look at the world, humanity and myself. There was an element of despair. What came out was a vitriolic howl of fury!

Excerpt – 53 and imploding 

Bear baiting, cock fighting, dog fighting, bull fighting, gladiatorial fights and stoning to death are all cruel activities carried out by evil fuckers in the past or evil barbaric fuckers in uncivilised countries. Except these evil fuckers are or were considered ordinary people by everyone and themselves. Those cruel displays were eagerly visited by the masses of ordinary people. They sat and ate their equivalent of popcorn and oohed and aahed as the victims got ripped to pieces before their eyes. That’s real. Our civilised revulsion is a thin veneer covering a festering propensity towards violence.

There are no rules.

We make it up as we go.

We probably need the rules because deep down in our genes we are all evil fuckers.

I have to check down into myself to see if I can find the symptoms. I crane my neck at accidents.

53 and imploding eBook : goodwin, opher: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store

53 and imploding Kindle/Paperback

Posted on by Opher

I wrote this stream of consciousness antinovel twenty-two years ago! I still love it. Here is an excerpt from 53 and imploding . You might find it upsetting!

53 and imploding – another small bit!

How can you be happy when each new panacea for the world’s problems is a system run by leaders with vested interests? And none of them can be trusted?

How can you be happy when the aim of dominant males is to dominate everything that breathes – even if that means annihilating everything that lives – just as long as they end up top dog? Better to be undisputed leader of the last ten rather that a leader of a billion among many leaders of billions. They cannot rest while there is still one other potential leader.

            How can you be happy when your life is all about owning a third DVD player, another TV and a swish car and you feel shit because your phone is the wrong colour, shape or size? When you are obsessed with the label on your clothes, your body shape and muscle definition? When your new IPad cannot shop fast enough? You need a new one.

            How can you be happy when the world is being covered in concrete, corporations buy off politicians, MacDonald’s has a branch on the Amazon river, (which is now concrete lined), the last tree is in a museum and the music you listen to is a product of a mass industry?

            How can art be a commodity? How can creativity be assessed?

            How can you be happy when nobody cares about the scant600 Mountain Gorillas we have left? When the world is so depraved that a rich millionaire can pay a fortune to get hunters to kill three precious gorillas in order to capture a baby gorilla, have it ripped from its dead mother’s arms and hauled off to America so he can have it for a pet?

            How can you be happy when a moronic footballer’s salary is hundreds of thousands a week? Stupid, selfish, greedy Rock Stars, actors and actresses earn millions and babies lie bloated for want of a bowl of rice? A millionaire buys a trip on a spaceship while a whole nation festers in their own excrement?

53 and imploding eBook : goodwin, opher: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store

Extract from the antinovel: 53 and imploding Kindle/Paperback

Posted on by Opher

I live in a nice house that is three hundred years old. The doorways and ceilings are low because people were smaller back then. Even I have to occasionally duck. It used to be a farm, a pair of two-up two-down cottages, and a shop and now it is my home. The mortgage is completely paid off. I own it. Except in reality I am merely passing through. I will leave it to my wife and then my children. It will be lived in by others after me. It will be altered, decorated, knocked around, improved and no evidence of me will remain. I am passing through.

I love this house. It is warm and cosy. It has room to stretch out. We have invested much time and energy into making it a home. It houses my books, records, CDs and computers. I am comfortable here. There is a sense of history in the walls. They lean and tilt, the floorboards creak, and the ceilings sag. It is happy with the way it has settled into itself and redolent with the memories of unseen people. I have grown into it and lean and sag to the same extent in sympathy.

I am passing through.

53 and imploding eBook : goodwin, opher: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store

Yet more from 53 and imploding Kindle/Paperback

Posted on by Opher

Another little glimpse into the world of this biographical novel – a biography of thoughts, feelings and observation; a snapshot in time.

53 and imploding 

That’s why we had to make rules.

I’m quite in favour of most of the rules. They limit the things that the evil fuckers can do. You see, I use the word evil. We invented that to describe the vicious cruelty of a percentage of humanity. We imagined it as a cosmic battle between good and evil. It is not. It is merely life. It is a fundamental feature of humanity. We enjoy violence, pain and are excited by blood and death. We adore cruelty. Of course, most of us have blotted this out because we have been taught that these things are wrong. Only evil fuckers do these things because they are deranged. We are the good people. We believe in the rules. We do not want to be seen as evil fuckers and we do not even want to see ourselves as evil fuckers. The evil fuckers do these things. They have penetrated the restrictions and given vent to the feelings inside. They enjoy the power of being evil fuckers. They like the fear they engender. They get a buzz out of cruelty.

Bear baiting, cock fighting, dog fighting, bull fighting, gladiatorial fights and stoning to death are all cruel activities carried out by evil fuckers in the past or evil barbaric fuckers in uncivilised countries. Except these evil fuckers are or were considered ordinary people by everyone and themselves. Those cruel displays were eagerly visited by the masses of ordinary people. They sat and ate their equivalent of popcorn and oohed and aahed as the victims got ripped to pieces before their eyes. That’s real. Our civilised revulsion is a thin veneer covering a festering propensity towards violence.

There are no rules.

We make it up as we go.

We probably need the rules because deep down in our genes we are all evil fuckers.

I have to check down into myself to see if I can find the symptoms. I crane my neck at accidents.

53 and imploding eBook : goodwin, opher: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store

53 and imploding Kindle/Paperback – another extract

Posted on by Opher

Here’s another short extract from my antinovel:

The first rule is that whatever starts off in idealism usually ends up bogged down in practicality.

That is the way it is planned.

            We have rich social lives – all those friends, all weaving their strands into that tapestry, changing and going their own ways. We have shared many seconds, many values and much fun. It would be so fine to go back and be there again. These memories are so flawed. I would like a taste of the real thing to savour one more time.

Events seen from different perspectives can seem incredibly dissimilar. Taken together could they possibly reveal a greater view of those seconds of reality? Would anything alter your own subjective experience? I hope not!

The first thing you have to understand is that there are no rules.

You just read that. It did not cause you to drop to the floor in horror.

It should do.

There are no rules. You can do whatever you want.

Apart from the physical laws of nature that permeate the whole of this universe there are no rules. You can make them up. There is no morality. There are no rights and wrongs. There is no evil. There is no good.

We made them up. That is good. We have both compassion and intelligence.

There are no rules.

You can live your life exactly how you want. There was no God handing down a structure or a blueprint on how to live your life. We made all that up.

There is no ultimate reason why you shouldn’t fuck your children and then eat them. There are no reasons not to be cruel.

We can decide.

Why not give this unique book a go? You will find it shocking.

53 and imploding eBook : goodwin, opher: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store

Another excerpt from – 53 and imploding Kindle/Paperback

Posted on by Opher

I wrote this novel twenty years ago. I am currently writing a book on Ian Dury but I am visiting with my old self when I need a break, to clear my head. I love Ian Dury but concentrating hard for long periods is tiring. I need a break. Reading this autobiographical novel is like visiting with my old self. Have I changed? No, not much. I’m still happy and irascible.

Here’s another slice of the cake:

53 and Imploding:

Does death scare you?

            The universe is so big that our egos do not even have the significance of a speck of dust; our intelligence is laughable. From my perspective your Leah jet can’t get you there and your wealth can’t buy a single star. Your beliefs won’t gain you a second more and all your possessions will be passed down to others and decay.

            The only good thing is that one day all traces of us will cease to exist and our place in the history of the universe will be as if we had never breathed.

            All we have to play with is the present. We can build futures. We can stop suffering. We can care. We can make this second perfect. Surely that is a worthwhile aim?

I hear the ticking. Each tap on this keyboard could have been spent differently. I continue to tap until something more important comes along. I would like to see what that might be.

I would like to be happy. I continue to send reports from the termitarium. These are the sermons on the mound.

I am sitting at my computer in my room and tapping in the contents of my mind. Can you glimpse me between the words or is the person you think you’re seeing merely a shadowy fiction?

53 and imploding eBook : goodwin, opher: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store