Exactly one year ago I finished writing
ODDITY O'CLOCK and now it has been officially published. This means that the
KNICK KNACK TRILOGY is complete! It's a trilogy that consists of three books that can be read in any order.
Except that... Well, my original plans for the trilogy have changed. It's now going to be a thing called a "permutational trilogy" in which there will be many more books (I don't know how many) and readers will select any three books from the total and read them in any order and that, for them, will be the trilogy. It means there are going to be hundreds, maybe thousands of different permutations and therefore a heck of a lot of different trilogies... But in the meantime, here are the first three books:
* TRUMPET FACE, with an introduction by Michael Moorcock.
* THE UNFAIR DINKUM, with an introduction by Brian Evenson.
* ODDITY O'CLOCK, with an introduction by Paul Di Filippo.
These books are available here.
Going back to the idea of the permutational trilogy, I can say that it's also a combinational trilogy. There's a difference, of course. Let's suppose there are 11 books in total. Depending on whether the order in which any three books are read counts as a different "trilogy experience" there will either be 165 trilogies available (combinational) or 990 trilogies (permutational).
As far as I am aware, the notion of the permutational-combinational trilogy was invented by me. The process by which a pool of related books exists, but any chosen trio constitutes the actual trilogy, as far as my knowledge of literary history goes, is original to me as a structural model. I don't know it that's worth anything but I like it.
Maybe I will add to the series one new book every year.
Last year I wrote three in three months. This year I am writing a new book for the series called THE DANGLE CUSTARD and maybe will write a fifth before the end of 2026. If I can write a dozen in total, that will be 220 different combinational trilogies or 1320 permutational trilogies. Let's see!
THE BISCUIT THIEF has now been officially published.
It's a speculative romp through an ironic version of the 1970s, complete with adventures in both time and space, not to forget the ghostly dimension. To celebrate the publication, I went on a hike from Aberdyfi to Machynlleth over the hills.
I took a detour to Llyn Barfog, where King Arthur's horse, Llamrei, supposedly fought the Afanc, a lake monster... But this has absolutely nothing to do with my novel.
The Biscuit Thief is a robust farce, a comedic fantasy. If any book I have written is going to get me 'cancelled' it will be this one. Not because there's anything politically or culturally reactionary in it but because it's a satire against the values of the 1970s and people often don't understand satire. They think it promotes what it mocks. This is a common problem and if I was more sensible I wouldn't try to write satires that are almost fated to be misunderstood.
However, I had a heck of a lot of fun writing this story. It moves forward through time and space but the main characters remain stuck in their own private 1970s. The Biscuit Thief delights in references to Space 1999, Doctor Who, Reggie Perrin, Conan comics, Carry On films, and dozens of other 1970s essentials.
Talking abour Reggie Perrin, I was inspired to write my book after reading the first 'Reginald Perrin' novel by David Nobbs. I was intending to return to work on my ironic thriller, Average Assassins, which has been on hold for a few years, but the misadventures of Reggie gave me the urge to write something set in the most formative decade of my life. It was all completely unplanned.
Now that the book is available to be purchased, I am really hoping that it somehow catches the attention of a readership because I really reckon it's curiously amusing. Difficult to have any clear perception of one's own work from the inside, of course!
The Biscuit Thief is published by Telos and is available from many outlets including
Amazon.
