Me Vs Dan Brown

Dan Brown's latest novel, The Lost Symbol, has just been released and I, like so many others, went out to the book store to grab my own copy. I think it's because I enjoy the overall journey despite the prose being riddled with annoying quirks that sometimes make me laugh unintentionally or jar me from the novel's reality.

These quirks include: Cliched / cookie cutter opening sentence; massive overabundance of unnecessary details; lame dialogue; recycled characters / events / situations; horrible metaphors and similes; incorrect word usage; extremely obvious "twists" and, really, really bad descriptions of characters.

Yet here I am, with the new book in my hands. And even more annoyingly, I know I'll probably enjoy it. Unless it turns out that this is another book about a worldwide conspiracy involving an ancient mystical order of thousands of members that actually consists of only two people. If that happens I will set this book on fire and never, ever buy another Dan Brown novel.

To celebrate the release of The Lost Symbol and in honour of Mr. Brown's success in the face of adversity, I give you my imagined version of Dan Brown's first draft of his next novel, "The Lost Artefact of Ambiguousness".

Archaeologist Peter Oldman listened in horror as the horrible beeping sound clawed at his ears like a rake claws at a pile of dry autumn leaves. He knew with the certainty that Howard Carter must have felt when he descended the steps of tomb KV62 in Egypt's Valley of the Kings that he was going to die. I am, thought Peter Oldman intrinsically, going to die.
In front of him, strapped to several bricks of C4 explosive, plastic binder, plasticizer and taggant chemicals 2,3-dimethyl-2,3-dinitrobutane was a mobile phone. He knew with an absolute yet completely unnecessary to the plot or current action certainty that the phone was a Nokia N95 with a 332 MHz processor and 64MB of SDRAM.
The ringing stopped as suddenly as a stop sign appearing out of the fog on a foggy day and a voice crackled through the speaker.
'Hello, Mr. Oldman,' the voice sublimated. Oldman had never heard the voice before yet somehow knew he had heard it every day before now.
Peter gasped, 'What do you want with me? I've told you everything I know about the Lost Artefact of Ambiguousness.'
The stranger, who called himself Zekal'Mor rather than his real name, even in his own inner monologue, because it would keep the audience guessing about his identity for another three chapters, laughed strategically.
'Isn't it obvious?' Zekal'Mor asked in an unintentionally rhetorical way. He paused while he thought of some incredibly cliched dialogue, then added, 'I want you to die.'
Before Peter Oldman could deposit another thought, the hot heat of the explosion's explosive inner sanctum disintegrated him completely, leaving behind nothing but ash.

Symbologist Robert Langdon frowned at the ancient manuscript in front of him. Showing a careless disregard for the irreplaceable and incredibly fragile document that one would expect from a highly celebrated University Professor, he held the parchment up to the light.
He gasped. 'This is the Symbol for the AAA - the Alliance of the Artefact of Ambiguousness.'
Although this was a good time to explain what his comment meant, it was an even better time to awkwardly describe Robert Langdon's physical appearance because it is important to give a detailed description of any male characters as soon as they appear in your story.
Langdon was not traditionally good looking though he did look oddly like Dan Brown and almost every woman he met in the course of his stories found him attractive. He wore a charcoal turtleneck sweater under a tweed jacket, which was completely coincidentally the author's favourite ensemble. Strapped around his wrist was a Mickey Mouse watch to tell rather than show the reader that the protagonist had some endearingly strange yet harmlessly inoffensive character quirks.
'What is it?' Spanish astrobiologist Elizabeth Enriques enthused quizzically.
She had dark hair and her gunmetal grey eyes sparkled with a deep intelligence that was never really utilised or evidenced in the context of the story except to solve one or two minor puzzles that access to a google search engine could have solved in 20 seconds because her role in the narrative was actually just to listen to Robert Langdon's verbal diarrhea about symbols and junk.
Rest assured that Elizabeth was ambiguously but extremely hot and was an expert in bikram yoga, which was not at all relevant to the plot of the novel but would lead to at least one uncomfortably sleazy exchange of dialogue between Elizabeth and Robert at the end of the novel in which it would be "implied" that she could finally use those skills for something worthwhile - in the bedroom.
Behind them stood acclaimed philanthropist Anders Grange, a powerfully built 45 year old man with silver hair, who stalked the room like a timberwolf, back straight and proud and on two legs but totally like a wolf at the same time. Grange had been Langdon's best friend since their childhood, despite not having been mentioned or referenced at all in any of the previous three Robert Langdon books.
When Anders spoke, his voice was far away yet disturbingly close. 'I have heard of the AAA. They are very old and powerful,' he reminded. 'The legends say they possessed an ambiguous artefact that granted them power over life and death itself.'
His voice was suddenly as wistful as a blade of grass waving in the sunlight and implied very subtly that he would ultimately turn out to be the sole bad guy responsible for the supposedly global conspiracy.....

Californication, Season One

Fuck! I hate this show. I hate it because it is so ridiculously amazing that I have watched the first season twice through now and already want to watch it again. I hate it because as a very wannabe writer, it's achieved so much of what I'd love to accomplish.

If you've been hiding under your rock (Go out! Stand in the sun, laugh at the petrol prices), or didn't watch the show because you were afraid of the show's "steamy" nature (Tsk tsk, we're livng in the naughties people, it's okay to watch swearing and sex on TV now), or you just plain ol' managed to miss the show because of other commitments (Your priorities are askew), here's the gist:

Hank Moody (David Duchovny) is a best-selling novelist who hasn't written a word in years. He also missed the boat on his beautiful ex-girlfriend Karen (Natascha McElhone), who is now engaged to the slighty douchebag-y Bill (Damian Young). Hank is doing his darndest to avoid both of these issues by living to excess, sex and alcohol being the main poisons of choice. Also, despite being immensely charming, witty and intelligent, he is way, way too painfully honest for his own good. He's as subtle as a porn star's boob job and not likely to change his ways anytime soon.

Hank and Karen's precocious twelve year old daughter, Becca (Madeleine Martin) still loves him and his best friend and agent, Charlie (Evan Handler) still puts up with his shit, but the clock is probably ticking on both of those relationships too and Hank knows it.

Then Hank meets and is seduced by a beautiful girl (Madeline Zima) in a book store and they have punchy sex. Really punchy sex. This is a good thing because it finally gets Hank writing again. Unfortunately, the bad may outweigh the good: the girl is actually Mia, Bill's daughter. And Bill's daughter is only 16 years old.

Duchovny won an Emmy in 2007 for his portrayal of Hank and deservedly so. I've thought he was fantastic ever since the first episode of the X-Files, so I guess I'm not a hard sell, but in my humble and absolutely non-hyperbolic opinion, he was born for this role. He portrays the character with so much depth and realism that it's difficult to remember at times that it is just a character and not that friend that almost all of us have tucked away somewhere - you know, the one you love but want to kill at the same time.

The rest of the main cast are equally great, given the amount of screen time and characterisation they get. Each character is well-realised and unique, bringing something different and essential to the show. I can't single out any one other actor for particular praise above the others because they all put in such a solid effort.

The writing is good. Heaps good. Gooder even than mine, for seriously. I think it all stems from the simple yet delicious concept of the show - the writing team are obviously in love with their characters and content and it shows. They combine outstanding adult humour with genuinely poignant scenes, as well as the occasional naughty moment, in just the right balance of each. Direction and cinematography are also excellent.

So does it have any flaws? Any chinks in the armour for you to complain about so that you can pull the show down and feel superior? A few, but they're more my problems than the show's: 1) At only 28 minutes apiece, each episode is ridiculously short and always leaves you wanting so much more; 2) It's definitely adults only (not actually a problem for me at all but don't say I didn't warn you); and, 3) The first season is only 12 episodes long. ARGH!

Thank Zeus's girdle, it's been renewed by Showtime and will be coming back for a second season.

If you want to be challenged by a TV show, if you're looking for inspiration in your own writing, or if you just want to remind yourself why 'Big Brother' isn't real entertainment, watch this series. Better still - buy the DVDs so you can watch it repeatedly!

I want to marry this show but, failing that, I guess I'll just have to settle for watching it again. Such is life.