Category Archives: author

Comics, and how they Kick Started a Writers Imagination!

Posted on by Steve Higgins

When I was a school kid one of my passions was comics. And I mean comics of all shapes and sizes. The crazy thing is that now, whenever I look round a newsagent’s or supermarket, one thing you just don’t see are comics. Maybe the younger generation are too ‘adult’ these days for comics, or maybe they just appealed to my generation. Perhaps comics are just a casualty of the electronic internet age. Who knows?

image courtesy wikipedia

image courtesy wikipedia

One of the earliest comics I remember reading is one I used to prise off my Dad despite his protests that he wasn’t interested in comics. The Hotspur. It was a great comic, although a little old-fashioned even then. Another similar comic was the Valiant. Now the Valiant had some great stories. Captain Hurricane, who was usually the front page feature: A World War II Royal marine who had a habit of flying into what might be termed today a ‘wobbler’ but in the comic they called a ‘ragin’ fury’. Kelly’s Eye was another favourite, about a man who had an ancient charm he wore around his neck called the ‘Eye of Zoltec’ that protected him from harm. Then there was ‘The Steel Claw’ about a scientist who had a false hand which when connected to an electric current rendered him invisible.

Remember the Tiger? I used to buy that for a strip called ‘Skid Solo’ about a formula one racing driver and his team.

In the late sixties and early seventies I was fascinated by Gerry Anderson’s sci fi children’s series and a comic soon appeared called TV21 which featured Anderson’s series in comic form. What I loved about TV21 was that the front page was in a kind of newspaper format with a headline and associated stories, even sometimes with a stop press that all related to comic strips within the comic. For instance: Stop press. WASP submarine Stingray reported missing in the Atlantic. When you turned to the Stingray page, there was the full story.

image courtesy flickr

image courtesy flickr

I used to buy American comics too. DC comics like Superman and Batman and the Marvel comics featuring Spiderman and The Fantastic Four. My favourites were the older DC comics and you used to be able to get an 80 page ‘Giant’ featuring something like the origin of Batman. (All super heroes had their ‘origin’ edition.) In the case of Batman I loved the older 1940’s gothic versions of Batman with his 1940’s style Batmobile. It’s great to see the latest movie versions of these fantasy comic strips but they don’t always live up to their comic predecessors.

Comics instilled in me a love of stories and lit the fuse that burned inside me and made me want to be a writer. Just to finish this blog here’s one final comic confession: Many years ago my Mum had a part time job as a cleaning lady at a big posh house in Gatley. The family which lived there included two young girls who read a girl’s comic called  Bunty. I hate to admit it but my Mum used to bring home a pile of old Buntys every month or so and I used to put them in chronological order and sit down and read them! I really did love my comics!

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Unknown Numbers and Taking That Call.

Posted on by Steve Higgins

The other day my phone was ringing and when I looked it was an unknown number. MobileNow, normally I wouldn’t necessarily answer an unknown caller but, and here’s the thing about writing and trying to get stuff published, I’ve currently got quite a bit of product ‘out there’ sent to publishers, magazines, and producers, all with my name, address and mobile number displayed prominently so I could not afford to miss that call. I was particularly hoping to hear from a radio drama producer who had looked at a radio play I’d written and had not rejected it out of hand but liked it and wanted to look at the next draft. Well, I wasn’t really contemplating a next draft, I thought the piece was pretty much ok as it was, in fact, I was pretty pleased with it. Here’s what I’d done, I’d taken all my nerdy knowledge as a self-confessed conspiracy theorist, written something about –not the JFK assassination but the RFK shooting, re-invented it as the shooting of a British MP, set it in Manchester and thrown in a lot of speculation about organised crime and MI5 and stuff and thought I’d arrived with something pretty good.

Anyway, you can imagine my feeling when my mobile was ringing. I very briefly imagined a scenario where the radio producer was offering me a lot of money, asking about who I wanted to play the main characters, did I need a car to pick me up for the rehearsals and the recording day? Was the 20th a suitable date? Well, I’m sure you’ve got the picture, anyway, so I pressed the answer button on the phone and here’s what happened; I thought I’d put it in script format just so you can really get the feeling.

(INTERIOR DAY, STEVE HIGGINS IS AT HOME, WATCHING TV.)

(FX: MOBILE RINGING.)

STEVE

Hello.

CALLER

Is that Steve Higgins?

STEVE

Yes, speaking.

CALLER

Are you the same Steve Higgins that has just registered the domain name stevehigginslive.com ?

STEVE

(APPREHENSIVELY)Yes . . .

CALLER

Well I represent a new web design company and for a small fee we can completely re design your site and actively promote it and-

(CUT TO DISAPPOINTED LOOK ON STEVE’S FACE; FADE OUT)

Writing isn’t particularly easy but it’s something I’ve always done and have always loved. The end product is usually its own reward but like any writer it’s great to have your work get somewhere and be read by others. That’s why I so love the digital age. Every time I publish something on WordPress and get some tiny comment back or even just the odd ’like’ it’s a great feeling.

Just going back to the radio producer and his request for another draft it just reminded me about screenwriter William Goldman’s book, Adventures in the Screen Trade. Goldman tells how it’s fine to get your script finished but then the producer always wants another draft and then the star steps in, he wants a new draft and he doesn’t like it when his character does this, he thinks the character should do that so can we have another draft and then he drops out and the new star likes the script only he doesn’t think that should happen so, can we have another draft please . .

The day I actually get to hear my characters on the radio investigating the shooting of my fictional MP I’ll be overjoyed.

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James Hilton, Shangri-la, and Hollywood

Posted on by Steve Higgins

james hilton autog

James Hilton is one of my personal writing heroes and yet his name may be unfamiliar to many of you reading this blog. He was a journalist and an author and made the trip from his home in Leigh, Lancashire, in the UK to the Hollywood hills in the United States to become a screen writer. He is probably more well known for his book ‘Goodbye Mr Chips’ which was made into a film with Robert Donat (actually another northerner from Didsbury in Manchester) but my favourite of his books and quite possibly my all-time favourite book is ‘Lost Horizon’.

Lost Horizon is a book I found in a second-hand shop many years ago. A battered 1940s paperback I paid twenty-five pence for and yet that small investment has paid me back many times over for sheer reading pleasure as Lost Horizon is a book I re read every year or so and I often pull it down from my bookshelf when a current read fails to entertain me.

Lost Horizon is a completely original idea and is about British consul Robert Conway in the dark days before World War II. Conway is helping his fellow British citizens escape from civil war in China and he and his small party escape in the last plane only to be kidnapped and taken to a distant Tibetan monastery. Conway meets the High lama and after a time it is revealed that the Tibetans  want to preserve the best of world culture and art and make it safe from the coming war.

Hilton is one of those few people who have invented a word or coined a phrase that has become part of the English language. In this case it was the name of the Tibetan monastery, Shangri-la which has since become a byword for a peaceful paradise, a distant haven. Camp David, the US President’s retreat was originally called Shangi-la until renamed by Eisenhower for his son, David.

Hilton’s journey from Leigh to Hollywood must have been a magical one and one I envy, especially as his time in Hollywood was a golden age for movie making. Lost Horizon was made into a movie by Hollywood director Frank Capra and starred Ronald Colman as the urbane British diplomat of the novel. It’s a movie that was recently restored and is a great DVD if you happen to see it. Colman also starred in another movie authored by Hilton :‘Random Harvest ‘.

Hilton settled in Hollywood and wrote a number of screenplays for classic Hollywood movies such as ‘Mrs Miniver ‘. Sadly he died from cancer in 1954.

WordPress of course is an American site and I wonder sometimes if a bored Hollywood production executive may decide to sit down one day with his Ipad and search idly across the site in search of movie ideas. My own book; ‘Floating In space’ could easily be relocated from Manchester to Los Angeles and I am available for writing the screenplay.

Well, may keep my flight bag packed, just in case . . .

If you enjoyed this post, why not try my novel, Floating In Space? Click the links at the top of the page for more information.

Personal Heroes and bonne sante

Posted on by Steve Higgins

Picture courtesy wikipedia

Everyone has their heroes, writers perhaps more so than other people because it’s our personal heroes that inspire us or perhaps even make us want to write. I come from a working class area of Manchester called Wythenshawe and when I get a bit down and look at my pile of rejected screenplays, essays and novels that seems to get bigger monthly, I wonder if I will never make it to the big time as a writer. That’s when I think about four working class northern men who did make it big, who worked hard at their craft and had incredible success. They weren’t authors but musicians; the Beatles!

One hundred percent northern through and through, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr became the Beatles and didn’t just make it to the top of the hit parade they reinvented the pop music industry and their genius as both writers and performers will live on as long as music is listened to.

Many moons ago when I worked for a cigarette vending company I used to visit a small pub in Woolton and the owners of the pub were two retired ex shell tanker drivers. They were both friendly guys but one in particular was outgoing and talkative and if he was on duty at the bar we would always have a good chat while I sorted out the cigarette machine. One day we got onto the subject of the Beatles and Lennon’s working class background and I was surprised to hear that Lennon’s house was just around the corner. Woolton is a very pleasant middle class suburb of Liverpool and I remember thinking what? This is where Lennon was brought up? John Lennon always struck me as a typical working class guy and his image as a sort of working class hero led me to assume he had a background in a rough and tumble area of Liverpool, like the Dingle where Ringo was brought up. The truth was different. Perhaps Lennon fermented the working class hero thing, perhaps the fault was mine, I just assumed something without knowing the facts.

Driving round the corner I found Lennon’s old house, 251 Menlove Avenue. This was where Lennon lived with his aunt Mimi from the age of five. He was living here when he started his first band, the Quarrymen and also when he met Paul McCartney. Lennon’s life was one heck of a journey taking him around the world with the Beatles and finally to New York with Yoko Ono where he was shot and killed in 1980.

This blog is about personal heroes and I’ll introduce you to more of them in another blog but for now I’d like to finish by wandering off the subject and returning to that pub in Woolton.

I’m not totally sure but I think the pub was the Derby Arms and the owner, whose name I cannot remember told me a story about the death of his father. His father was an old chap, a veteran of the first world war and had picked up a habit in France of always having water with his meals and he would always raise his glass and toast ‘bonne sante’ to whoever he was with.

My friend went to visit him in hospital on his deathbed and asked the nurse how his was. ‘OK’ they replied ‘but a little dehydrated. Try and get him to drink a little water’
In the hospital ward the son passed a glass of water to his father’s lips and the father murmured ‘bonne sante’ before passing away.

So to all you who are reading, let me wish you ‘good health’ and if you enjoy my writing  why not take a look at my book. Click the links at the top of the page to buy or for more information.