I’m at the local motorcycle repair shop where Sherwyn, a most competent mechanic and pleasant cove, is replacing a brake master cylinder on the Blaze. He first thought to replace only the seals, but he can’t find the right size. A new cylinder is 400 pesos, just under six quid, an unwell encephalopod. I just tell him to get on with it. Sherwyn works in the open space outside a motorcycle parts shop, where he seems to buy most of his stuff, although, as today, sometimes he has to go further afield. While I wait I sit on a wooden bench in the shade and observe the street life. Baklas soon begin to appear; it’s like they’re in the woodwork.
Poaching the River is back on the shelves, both physical and virtual, so I have been addressing the next issue.
Poaching the River was written only partly in English, or at least the Scottish version of it, and all the dialogue is in authentic Mearns Doric. That is my native tongue of course, although I didn’t really know it until I was at school.
The book was written as a homage to that culture, but it is a sad fact that there are few of us left who understand Doric, or can speak it. Ever since Poaching was first published I have had requests to translate it into English, something I have always resisted, for a number of reasons.
I was in the middle of my steering watch when suddenly a blinding streak of white light whizzed at us from over to the right.
I knew what it was, of course, stinger missile, aimed straight at us. Eosha had her eyes glued to the Infra-scopes, as usual, and she saw it coming before I did. I pulled the control stick and turned the anti-grav tank towards the missile, to reduce the target area, and stood on the mag-brakes, bringing the tank to a halt under the shelter of a small hillock of ice and setting it down.
I canna hink A wis muckle mair nor fower or five year auld the verra first time A clappit ma een on a deider. Noo ye maun hink yon’s a gey queer-like wey tae open a bookie siccan this een, an hink tae yersel, by, whit’s this lad hinkin aboot? But A says to youse, that gin a bookie’s tae be an honest bookie, an no jist a pile o havers, then we maun set aff on the recht fit, an be honest wi wirsels fae the aff. An sae it is; fan A hink on ma childheid, death aye seems affy close. But this parteecular deider, A’ll hae tae explain mair aboot.
If you like this writing in genuine Scots from Angus, you’ll just love Poaching the River, available in paperback and as an e-book!
Christmas 1981: Europe is in turmoil, the Human League is top of the charts, it’s pissing stair-rods in Paris and Johnny Macmaster has just got back from Damascus with a load of smuggled blood diamonds he wants rid of fast.
The first book I completed, which nearly got lost but hey that’s another story.
Don’t you want me baby? Don’t you want me ohhh
Harry, the most notorious fence in Paris, offers Macmaster a special surprise: Hermann Goering’s gold-plated 9mm Luger, along with his Blue Max and a wad of cash. Johnny accepts the deal and goes back to the bar to pay his tab. He gets another surprise: a round from a suppressed Ruger .22. That’s when his world explodes. Calling on his ex-lover Irene, Johnny goes back to work. The plot line criss-crosses Paris to a spectacular climax.
This book contains scenes of violence and sex. Plenty of them.
A hilarious romantic comedy, by Rod Fleming, set in a tiny village in Scotland. Follow the adventures of the protagonists as the they fuddle their way through to a climactic finale.
Spring is coming to the village of Auchpinkie on the east coast of Scotland. With it, women’s minds turn to romance and men’s to something else — poaching. But it turns out these are actually very closely related. A charming romantic comedy set in a world full of larger-than life characters.
French Onion Soup! tells the story of a mad Scotsman (me) taking his family to live in France.
It’s full of hilarious anecdotes as well as lots of useful information that you’ll need if you are planning something similar. Most of all, perhaps, there is lots of humour…because moving to a different country will make you laugh or cry, and laughing is a lot more fun.
Brilliantly funny tales of the life of a mad Scotsman, his wife, children, two dogs and a cat, who escaped the rat-race to live their dream in a country house in France. In 1993, photographer, journalist and Francophile, Rod Fleming and his artist wife bought a house in France. French Onion Soup! is the first in a series of books describing their life in France.
On the tenth anniversary of completing the first draft of The Warm Pink Jelly Express Train, I am republishing this article about it. It describes an affair between a Brazilian transsexual prostitute and a Western straight man.
Poaching is essentially a romanticised memoir; Warm Pink is nothing like that. It is far deeper and more introspective and writing it, along with the later Why Men Made God, was what shaped my current world view.
My ideas about gender in particular were formed by the research and writing of Warm Pink. Although it is a breathlessly-paced romantic adventure, it required me to dig deep into the natures of gender and sexuality, something I had never done before.
The Warm Pink Jelly Express Train is a fast, sexy novel set in Paris. It concerns the lives of two trans prostitutes and a Brian MacMaster, a journalist who falls in love with one of them, Rafy. Soon, Brian’s newshound nose begins to suspect the girls are up to something and he soon uncovers a scandal that brings down the government. It’s an absolutely cracking read.
Gold and God & Goddess Patrons can download the book by clicking the link below.
An action-packed tale of love and life, humour and romance, played out by an unforgettable cast of characters with genuine Scots voices, Poaching the River will make you laugh and cry out loud.
It’s a quiet afternoon in Auchpinkie, a tiny fishing village on the east coast of Scotland, and in her Corner Shop, Mae and her cronies are setting the world to rights.
Suddenly a furniture van draws up outside one of the houses along the street. A beautiful young woman is moving into Etta Swankie’s old house. But no-it can’t be-that’s Rae, Etta’s daughter, and Etta always swore she’d disinherit her!
Over the next few days the action races to its riotous climax, as Big Sye, Rae’s cousin, poaches the River Pinkie in a daring adventure, the village public convenience is destroyed by a freak explosion, and the parish minister is baffled by the sudden religious conversion of two formerly heathenish young lads.
Behind it all a spider’s web of intrigue is woven, as the villagers conspire to get Big Sye and Rae together. But there are things going on that none of them ken, and secrets that only Rae’s old friend Izzie knows…
Print ISBN: 978-0-9554535-0-2
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