Everyone on This Train Is a Suspect

“It’s all words on a page,” I continued. “I put as much of myself into my work as anyone here.”

“If you don’t know the difference between pulp and literature, that would be a serviceable definition of the problem.” He crossed his legs and leaned back, as if to imply that his response was of such inarguable caliber he would not indulge a retort.

“It’s nothing to be ashamed of. We all start somewhere,” Alan Royce chipped in, predictably.

“Sounds to me like the only difference is having a last name or not, Wolfgang.” This got me another laugh from the crowd, which incensed Wolfgang enough for him to sit up straight again.

“You write blood and guts for the sake of it, as if it’s entertainment. It’s distasteful. In fifty years, books like yours will be spat out of machines. And of course, your prose is amateurish. I’m not the only one here who thinks that.”

He looked over at McTavish, who glanced up from his flask somewhat confusedly, and I realized that we’d been wrong about Wolfgang being too lofty to read the online reviews. Apparently no amount of acclaim can bandage the cut from a stranger on the internet. I’d done panels before, when the book had first come out, and I was familiar with the occasional barbed question, sure. But the majority of writers are generous and warm. For a literary confrontation, this had struck me as particularly aggressive. Now I knew why. Wolfgang was incensed that McTavish had ranked him down low alongside me, and so was now trying to assert himself above our commonality. It still came down to ego.

“You want the difference between pulp and literature? Between a real writer and just a writer? I’ll tell you: adverbs.”

“Adverbs?”

“You use too many of them,” he said, derisively.

It seemed to me quite snobbish to say that real writers didn’t use an entire group of legitimate words in the English language, but here is where I confess that I was too flustered to articulate this. I shut up, embarrassed and enraged in equal measures.

“Leave the lad alone,” McTavish said, surprising me by both coming to my defense and revealing that he’d actually been paying attention. He used the microphone like a father of the bride: inexpertly, alternating between too far from his mouth so the words came patchily, and too close so the wincing ring of feedback echoed. “Nothing wrong with a bit of blood and guts. I’m sure it’s fine.”

And just like a flare of lit magnesium burning bright and short, we settled back into the usual panel rhythm, though not without a few whispers of excitement from the crowd, no longer regretting missing the gorge tour. The next set of questions went to Wolfgang, beginning with his In Cold Blood adaptation and then moving on to his future works. It turned out he wasn’t writing anything new at the moment, but was instead focused on an “interactive art installation” titled The Death of Literature. He started most of his sentences with Well, you see and As you know as he discussed influences almost entirely comprising obscure philosophers. I found it grating but kept my mouth shut.

“Nothing like a little bit of literary snobbery to get us started,” Lisa whispered in my ear. “Don’t let it get to you.”

“What’s an adverb?”

It took her a second to realize I wasn’t joking. I had a sinking feeling my only alliance was about to disintegrate. What had started as a grin melted off her face. Slowly.

Wolfgang’s pontification finally ended, and the questioning moved on to McTavish. Backs straightened in the crowd with interest; it was obvious, given it was one of his rare international outings, he was who people were here to see. To my surprise, now that the spotlight was on him, it was like a switch was flipped. No longer was he half slumped in his chair peering into the black hole of his flask. He came alive: impressing with tales of drizzly Scottish moors, of growing up poor and how hard he’d had to fight to not only get his books published, but then to be taken seriously as a writer (perhaps this was why he stuck up for me, I thought, though I was still struggling to forget that little red star), and how, recovering in the hospital after his accident, he feared he’d never write again. He finally finished on how much he hoped people enjoyed his most recent Detective Morbund novel: The Night Comes.

At this, a hand shot up immediately. It was the young woman I’d seen clutching a copy of Misery.

“There’ll be time for questions at the end,” Majors said.

“It’s just—” The girl jigged like she needed the bathroom. “I was hoping you’d talk more about The Dawn Rises, given it’s the newest. Henry, it’s incredible, by the way. I loved the way you—”

“Thank you, there’ll be time for questions at the end,” Majors said again with teacherly steel before turning to the wider crowd.