Crimson’s Creative Challenge #68: A Lesson in Architecture

CCC#68

A grey green smear of filth and algae on the concrete bridge showed the river’s natural level. For years it acted as a marker, a barrier the water wouldn’t cross.

Then it began to rain and we were told why and how it was happening but all we knew was that the fields were underwater and the drains spewed back what we had pumped in.

We watched as neighbourhoods drowned, homes were lost, people displaced. We tutted, shook sad heads before something new distracted us.

Until it was out turn.

And there was something fitting about watching the deluge from the shelter of that bridge, the strip of water shielded a little from the barrage of rain, the sounds around me not softer but more defined, individual.

The grey green marks were submerged, the river lapped the towpath and I finally remembered the architectural style of that bridge – Brutalist.

***

Written for Crimson’s Creative Challenge #68. See Crispina’s great pic and be inspired here.

Bristol and the entire UK has had weeks – and weeks – of storms and seemingly endless rain and today is no exception. We have the dubious pleasure of welcoming Storm Jorge over the weekend.

Today – right at this moment – Greta Thunberg is in the city on a march against climate change.

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State of Denial: Iain Kelly’s new novel for these ‘Interesting Times’

There’s an old Chinese curse that wishes the unlucky recipient to

Live in interesting times

Now, no one – be they Brexiter, Remainer, environmentalist, climate change denier (Donald Trump, I suspect, might be all of the above, depending on what time of night he’s tweeting and how much cheese he ate before he snuggled up in his jammies) – could say the early 21st century isn’t just that

Interesting.

We have an American President who spills his scrambled brains in public at any time of day or night, who slams a free press and pulls his country back from environmental reforms at a moment of global catastrophe.

We have a British Prime Minister who behaves like a despot, illegally closing parliament when it doesn’t agree with his policies, sacking long time supporters when they do the same, is determined to drag the country towards an economic abyss because his backers have gambled big on a no deal Brexit.

We have a sixteen year old girl with Aspergers talking more sense, being a better leader to a generation than a whole room full of squirming, suited, self-serving politicians …

Interesting times indeed.

Perhaps this is why Iain Kelly’s State novels resonate so deeply.

Set in a world post huge environmental collapse, in an undemocratic state that controls every aspect of peoples lives from what they eat to how they spend their time and what medication they can take.

And yet, even here, revolution smoulders.

State of Denial (the second of Iain’s State Trilogy) is out today.

It is election time in The State, the citizens prepare to vote. A journalist from the Capital City, Maxine Aubert, heads north to report on growing resistance to the powerful ruling Party. Ex-police detective Danny Samson returns to the City he once fled, leaving behind a new found peace in the wilderness. Together Max and Danny become entangled in a burgeoning opposition movement with links to Danny’s past. Soon they learn the ruling Party will do whatever it takes to remain in power, and one life is all it takes to spark a revolution.

A novel for our interesting times.

Here’s a link to Iain’s site.

And if you’d like to read a previous interview I had with Iain on the release of the first State novel – A Justified State – see here.