My Favorite Books

Literature is one of my interests, I read a lot. Just like you need to watch a whole lot of movies before turning into a filmmaker yourself, you always need to read like crazy before you're able to write yourself, before feeling the will and urge to become a writer. So this is a non-exhaustive list of books I have read and use as my main references when writing. You will notice that most of them are rather short.

THEY SHOOT HORSES, DON'T THEY? – Horace McCoy (1935)

A short novel set in the early 30s, during the Great Depression. Robert Syverton and Gloria Beatty are two movie extras in Hollywood, with no money but still hoping to break into movie business. They subscribe to a marathon dance with the hope that they get the $1,000 top prize or get noticed by producers in the audience. All they have to do is keep moving around and try not to get eliminated during derbys (sort of horse races organized around a white oval line). In order to achieve that they need to manage with 10-minute breaks used not only to sleep but also to wash, brush teeth, massage feet, etc. A literary masterpiece that is a strong tale of desperation as well as a metaphor of the American dream and its society, greedy and ruthless, here showing both faces of America, the rich one in the audience and the poor one, on the racing track. This was the author's first book and also, probably, the very first ‘noir’ American novel. You won't recover easily from this story, hailed by the French intellectuals at that time (Sartre, De Beauvoir...) as the very first existential book coming from the US. It was turned into a film by Sydney Pollack in 1969, starring Jane Fonda, Michael Sarrazin and late Susannah York, and a French stage show by Robert Hossein in 2002.

A CLOCKWORK ORANGE – Anthony Burgess (1962)

1984 - NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR – George Orwell (1948)

FALLING ANGEL – William Hjortsberg (1978)

A very surprising crime novel about a private detective hired by a mysterious individual to find a missing crooner, then ending up investigating himself and coming to an incredible truth. It was made into a famous film called Angel Heart, written and directed by Alan Parker in 1986, with Mickey Rourke, Robert De Niro and Lisa Bonet.

TEN LITTLE INDIANS or And Then There Were None – Agatha Christie (1940)
Ten very different people from very different classes and with very different backgrounds, are invited in a luxurious house based on an island, where they disappear one after another until there's nobody left. Originally published as Ten Little Niggers (lol), Agatha Christie's timeless mystery book, a real piece of anthology.

THE FIVE-CORNERED SQUARE or A Rage in Harlem – Chester Himes (1959)

PLANET OF THE APES – La Planète des Singes, Pierre Boulle (1963)

From the author of Bridge over the River Kwai comes this highly inventive work, maybe one of the most famous science-fiction ones… and it came from France! Author Pierre Boulle got the idea for such a story during a stay in Cameroon. Instead of the films which are set on our planet, this stunning work takes place on another planet the main character, an astronaut and scientist named Ulysse Mérou, lands on, discovering a civilization dominated by apes, where humans are treated as slaves and study objects kept in cages. Captured and first treated the same way, Mérou soon shows off his intelligence and knowledge and is helped by Zira, a female chimpanzee, and her husband Cornelius. I guess you know what follows next, except for the ending I won't give out not to spoil the pleasure, I'll only say that Mérou will leave the planet with his human, savage lover (Nova) and return to his Earth where an incredible surprise will welcome him. An excellent, thrilling book translated from French by Xan Fielding and turned into a series of movies started by an amazing film from Franklin J. Schaffner in 1969, starring late actors Charlton Heston and Roddy McDowall, itself recently remade by Tim Burton in 2001 and ‘prequeled’ in 2011 by Rupert Wyatt as Rise of the Planet of the Apes.

THE BEACH – Alex Garland (1996)

Since I've read this amazing book, Alex Garland has become one of my favourite writers. Another good reason for that is, he writes movies now. And good ones (28 Days Later, Sunshine, Never Let Me Go). But he started - and met with great success only at age 26 - with this impressive cult novel set in Thailand, where he spent much time as a backpacker. The book tells the story of Richard, a young British backpacker in Thailand who, along with a French backpacking couple, decides to go to a mystery island forbidden to tourists, that is showed on a map some crazy guy gave him before committing suicide. They manage to reach the island and discover a dream place dominated by a superb beach, already inhabited by a small group of urban people living there as Robinson Crusoes. But for safety, Richard had made a copy of the map he gave to some American friends he met before going, and soon the same guys can be seen coming towards the island, putting everything and everybody in jeopardy… The book was turned into a (somehow disappointing) film by Danny Boyle in 2000, starring Leonardo DiCaprio.

RED DRAGON – Thomas Harris (1981)

THE GODFATHER – Mario Puzo (1971)

CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY – Roald Dahl (1964)

One of my clearest influences for "Charlie's Trips". That timeless classic from Roald Dahl about a young boy named Charlie Bucket who wins a tour across Willy Wonka's magical chocolate factory after miraculously finding one of the very few Gold Tickets, is still a reference for every child all over the world. Adapted twice for the big screen.

UBIK – Philip K. Dick (1969)

I AM LEGEND – Richard Matheson (1954)

Dracula in reverse: one sole man has to deal with the whole of humanity which has 'turned' into vampires after a plague. A wonderful idea for a tragic, legendary SF post-apocalyptic novel which delivers one of the best endings in literary history. Very mistreated in movies.

THE GETAWAY – Jim Thompson (1959)

A couple of married gangsters rob a bank before running away to Mexico. Adapted twice for the big screen by The Warriors' director Walter Hill (first for Sam Peckinpah in 1972 with Steve McQueen and Ali McGraw, then again in 1994 with Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger) and clearly duplicated by Quentin Tarantino in three of his screenplays, True Romance, Natural Born Killers and especially From Dusk Till Dawn. Some other movies like Thelma and Louise and Out of Sight are also very taken from The Getaway. A famous and very fun ‘noir’ novel, filled with violence and romance, that has influenced several generations of storytellers and filmmakers, from one of the greatest writers in 20th century, who notably brought us The Grifters and The Killer Inside Me, both taken to the screen as well.

CARRIE – Stephen King (1974)

A shy, complexed teenage girl, bullied at home by a religious nut of a mother, obsessed by sin and evil, and bullied at school by everybody else, finds hidden paranormal abilities and uses them to get payback. Made into an awfully stressful, scary, terrific horror movie in 1976 by director Brian DePalma, starring Sissy Spacek: this is Stephen King's first and best book.

The art of being bilingual

You guys must be wondering why I write my blog in English when my native language is French. Why not? English is the most widely spoken and written language in this world (along with Chinese I guess, even if Chinese language is mostly spoken in China – but there are almost 2 billion of them!) so I guess that speaking English anywhere (in China included), and speaking it fluently, is a big advantage.

What could be more surprising is that I am writing long texts in English, that’s much more complicated and risky I guess, as you’re more exposed to making mistakes that can be noticed immediately and your credibility can be ruined right away. I’m too conscious of that, that’s why it took me one year to write “Charlie’s Trips”. Actually it first took me one year to write the script, then one more year to turn it into a book. There were so many mistakes I always had to spot then correct… and I’m such a perfectionist, so demanding! I also had to add more stuff to make the story richer. This is what can happen to you when you write a book in a language that is not yours, and then self-publishing it – which means you have to do all the editing and corrections and design, all by yourself. But on the whole it was rather fun writing that book but I’m not sure I’ll be able to do it again in the future, even if the novel is a commercial success. Writing a book in your native language is already so complicated… so doing it in a different language than yours (even when it’s English) is too demanding, takes too much time. Writing film scripts in English is easier for me even if it’s basically hard enough. I have half a dozen scripts written in English.

I learned English a rather unique way: watching movies. Of course I learned the main stuff at school – and I was one of the best pupils, as far as I remember – but I used cinema to improve my knowledge. In 1984, when I was only 13 years old, my father subscribed to a new French TV channel. It was Canal+. Which is an internationally respected channel and institution now. The channel was broadcasting only sports and movies at that time, it was dedicated to that only. No commercial or information breaks, no shows, nothing else but films and sports. From this point I really discovered cinema, especially in its original version, with the real voices from the English-speaking actors. Before that, I was young and naive enough to think that those English and American actors were really speaking French! I didn’t know yet about the art of dubbing. That was a big shock, my fascination was huge and I started recording films in their original English-speaking versions (with subtitles) before watching them over and over again. That’s how I could get used to the rhythm and 27 years later, even if my speaking and understanding are not perfect even today it still made me able to manage with grammar and vocabulary and to write long texts in English with rather good confidence.

Actually I find it easier to speak English instead of French, the language is even simpler to learn and speak. At least in English you don’t have to deal with the masculine-feminine genders on each noun – when you do in most other languages, such as French, Spanish, and I guess Chinese too. That makes the language attractive right away. I guess that’s why English is the most common language around the world. That’s also why I intend to get married in the future to somebody who speaks English and no French J Also, writing in English gives you another great advantage: because it’s the most widely spoken language across the world, the market is much bigger, you can reach many more people and you can sell your work in many more ways. I always feel limited when I’m in France because it’s a country that is very closed, and everything that’s made there doesn’t get past the borders. And when I produce something in English when I’m in France, it’s impossible to pass it around or to contact people without spending much money in phone calls.

So I could learn English without going to any special school. I’m not saying that schools are ineffective, only that there are other ways than schools to learn a new language, especially such an easy language like that one. But like when you’re at school you still have to listen and speak continuously. Like Brad Pitt says in Tarantino’s film Inglorious Basterds: ‘PRACTISE’.

As for "Charlie's Trips"...

It's the very first book I managed to write in English. I completed some other works in French language before, mostly manuscripts, all unpublished. Now I've completed something serious in English I feel sort of forced to tell about it, maybe more than I should. I just can't stop myself! In this one I kind of managed to tell a surprising story, the one of a young soldier from the Midwest who's taken away by a tornado (like in The Wizard of Oz) but instead of winding up in some magical world, he's hurled into space-time. He ends up... 21 years later, on the West Coast! A bit off San Francisco. He's found unconscious on a beach and stays in a coma for two or three days. But in the meanwhile more and more people start imagining things about this young boy from nowhere, who just appeared, just like that (nobody knows his name or where he comes from), and who may have fallen down from the sky, according to some bimbo. The rumour that this very boy could be the Christ Himself, back on earth, always grows bigger in minds. And he's in a coma, a TV show about to be organized on him, waiting for the moment he'll wake up! And when he DOES wake up... right away he has a prediction about the future, the vision of a violent earthquake, supposed to strike the city (San Francisco) the day after. Of course he doesn't know he's the host of a TV show, he's still not aware either that his memory of the past is lost... and he's still unaware of a lot of other things around him.

I'm not a believer. In fact I'm an atheist. I don't believe in God. As I wrote this story I didn't think about religion. I was just somebody, writing an ironic story about our society. Now I'm aware of some other things in it. I know that some atheist people, not believing in God or in any other deity supposed to watch and protect us all, have written stories closely connected to God. Like brilliant writer Alex Garland (author of 28 Days Later and The Beach), who wrote that film, Sunshine, which shows the Sun as a positive representation of God. I wrote Charlie's Trips as an atheist, with the idea of the possibility - and I'm saying again, only the POSSIBILITY - of the Christ coming back to Earth in a shape we don't expect. In this case, as a teenager who doesn't really believe. Who even lost his past. Why not? A little bit like John Connor in Terminator 2, who's still a teenager and still doesn't believe he's the one supposed to save humanity from the destroying machines. Charlie's case is of course different since he's not supposed to be anybody in the first place. And he just showed up, as a total stranger, in a world he doesn't know about.

This rather short book doesn't give any explanations and sticks to the action and to the descriptions of the futuristic world Charlie ends up in; following what happens to him and around him, and what may get through his blank mind. You'll probably say I'm just trying to promote my work, of course I'm promoting it, this is what a blog is for but since I'm an atheist and this domain is very vast I thought it was wise to question people (and myself) about this issue and start a debate here. Maybe the Christ is already among us and we don't know it, maybe he's already judged us? For some strong believers, the end of the world is for next year (2012)... The book also speaks about some other values that are very strong these days, family, marriage, celebrity, patriotism...

The book also introduces us to a new kind of character: an 'amnesic psychic' (able to see in the future when he has lost his past) and to space-time travel. Unlike films like the Back to the Future or the Terminator series, where the characters travel through time but stay at the exact same place, Charlie's Trips shows a time travel that includes space, young Charlie jumping from the Midwest to the West Coast, without even realizing. Without even remembering, since the result of that travel for him is a complete loss of memory! And an ability to see the other way, forward instead of backward.

The book is a fun and compelling read for all audiences. Along with The Wizard of Oz, Charlie's Trips could be put close to other classic tales for children and teenagers like Alice in Wonderland, Charlotte's Web, Gulliver's Travels and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, as well as to science-fiction works from Philip K. Dick (for his approaches of precognition) and HG Wells (the time travel). So the book will grip fans of Dick and Wells as well as those of Roald Dahl. It makes children and teenage literature meet science-fiction and disaster genres. Because Charlie's Trips is also a disaster story.

I'm not saying 'Buy the book, if you don't you have nothing to do here since you don't know what you're talking about!...' stuff like that. No, I really can't wait for what everybody has to say, I'm looking forward to hearing from you storytellers, readers, and (non) believers!

Why do we write?

Hello folks, I'm Jack, I'm an author and sometimes I wonder why I do that, writing things (not just single blog or forum posts) that nobody will care about unless it's promoted. Did that question ever come through your mind, as such a writer that nobody reads?

Personally I do that because I need to express myself, sometimes words can be more effective than oral talk. It can reach more people. But I'm part of those many guys who keep struggling as writers, using typewriters or computers or ipads or whatever else, burning their minds and bodies, and then struggling the same way trying to get heard or published or produced or etc. Since the writer is not supposed to have a face and show off, since he's supposed to stay in the background and keep his mouth shut, it's much more difficult for him to get through and make a living. That's the way things work of course, it's been like this since human kind started, and every writer can't reach the largest audience but still...

I've been writing stuff (fiction and non-fiction - as manuscripts, screenplays, also a stageplay, in both English and French, I'm French by the way), for fifteen years now. So far nobody knows about what I've done. You'll probably tell me, it's my fault, I don't know how to sell myself, I'm deaf and dumb. Maybe. But I also have lots of hope. Anyway I've created this blog to share my passion(s) and achieve something - among other things.

I just finished a work that was a film script in the first place. The script is too long and the synopsis was rejected by the agent of a famous actor, so I took this too long script and turned it into an average book. It's called "Charlie's Trips". The story of a young, 16-year-old soldier from the Midwest who's swept away by a tornado and winds up on the West Coast, in the future (21 years later), as an 'amnesic precognitive', able to see in the future when he lost his past. With a reverse memory. It's an interesting story. Available only online, on Amazon Marketplace, so far. I'm working on promoting it now, in a special way, and I hope it works.

I'm also trying to be a film producer, maybe in a close future I'll be able to make films from my own screenplays. If you enjoy cinema and books (don't worry, I sure do), feel free to come around and comment and see what I should check out. I'm not close-minded, I have other interests than books and films. I love sports - especially tennis and football (& soccer) and many other things, and I can talk about things (and people) that I don't like - I love that too.

Hope you'll like this blog. Hope it will be useful and allow me to answer my own questions.