News I Made Up

All of which is *entirely untrue*.

All of it.

No, really.

Clarence House, London

The heir to the throne and his wife, the Duchess of Cornwall, have vowed to continue their arduous round of Christmas social engagements in the face of the vicious assassination attempt made upon them last week. “We won’t be cowed,” the Prince said, speaking from behind sixty three marksmen from the Royal Marine Commando unit and a sheet of Lexan, “Despite the shocking and terrifying events of last week, during which we were jostled at least once and shouted at by angry middle class children while surrounded by an armed protection detail who for some extraordinary reason elected not to execute the miserable ingrates on the spot for treason – I mean, they wouldn’t have hesitated if it had been a Brazilian plumber, would they? – we are going to carry on going to the theatre in a huge swanky black automobile. It’s what we do, and we won’t be prevented even if we are beheaded, the way that oik said we should be, and why haven’t I got his scrotum tanned and stitched for use a purse, eh, that’s what I want to know, where’s my bloody equerry?”

Other world figures have endured marginally more concerted assassination attempts in recent years. Pervez Musharraf, for example, can barely walk to the bathroom without something exploding. Mr Musharraf could not be reached for comment, but an aide said: “Mr Musharraf has just dodged an exploding grapefruit at the breakfast buffet and the phone line is not good. He says to say ‘hi’ to Great Britain, but he is very cross because he was a huge fan of Cher Lloyd. We all were here. She can totally come and rap any time, especially in those leggings from Arrogant Cat. Hmmhmm, yes, indeed.”

Meanwhile, the Prime Minister David Cameron is said to be considering sterner measures against public unrest. “The first step, obviously, is water cannons,” a spokeswoman said, “but the Prime Minister is not convinced they’ll be enough. He’s speaking to Liam Fox about the possibility of deploying Trident. This kind of civic disobedience can’t be allowed. If we have to immolate London to make this country free and rich, like America, then that’s what we’ll damn well do. That’s the new Conservative Atlanticism in a nutshell. Cut it, tax it, nuke it. But don’t tell Nick Clegg, he hasn’t figured it out yet.”

News I Made Up

London, December 10th.

The student protests against tuition fees were revealed as a smoke screen for international terrorism last night, as a carefully planned assault on the heir to the throne and the Duchess of Cornwall unfolded within sight of the seat of government.

The Prince and Duchess were travelling in their official Rolls Royce, until recently the Queen’s car, when the violent and shocking assassination plot was activated. The car, which has its own air supply, laser turrets to attack satellites, and armour which can withstand a direct strike from a surface to surface missile, was struck with heavy blunt objects and pelted with paint.

“That’s the fiendish ingenuity of the plan,” a spokesperson from MI5′s Q-branch said, “the vehicle has never been tested against bits of fencepost and emulsion. We just didn’t consider that when we designed it. Although it can emit a low-frequence pulse which drives weasels into a state of sexual ecstasy. We were very worried about trained-weasel tactical ordnance. So that’s completely taken care of.”

Theresa May, the Home Secretary, placed London under martial law for three hours over night. Several people were killed by police marksmen, including a publican, two dogwalkers, and a web designer. All were carrying suspicious objects or were walking in a funny way.

“Paint-based terrorism is a new threat,” Ms May said, “but it’s one we will deal with robustly and effectively. We will not allow Rolls Royce automobiles driving through areas of huge social unrest to be besmirched in this way. I’ve set the wheels in motion for a full investigation. Up to a thousand suspects will be rounded up and held for twelve hours without access to toilets in Trafalgar Square. This approach is proven to reduce stress and lull criminals into a state of compliant bliss similar to a breast-fed baby. The name ‘kettling’ is ridiculous and is an example of lexicographical terrorism.”

No arrests have been made, but the Swedish government has requested the extradition of a vet, a particle physicist and a modern linguist on charges of bestiality.

…

Oh, fercrissakes…

I was having fun with this, and then I just ran out. Why? Because they were in the wrong car. They were in. the. wrong. car. They were in a car which actually wasn’t all that well-protected. It had toughened glass and that’s about it. I doubt they were ever in any actual danger, but there is no way they should have been in the situation in the first place. And then there’s that jackass who runs the Met talking about how kettling is an awesome way to deal with protests and I just want to shout at him. It isn’t. It’s just not. I’ve been kettled. I’ve also been horseback charged. The whole thing made me so angry I wanted to break things, and I’m about the most placid person in the known universe. I’m still angry about it now, this morning, and it happened over five years ago.

Anyway. Here’s what I think (because obviously, what the world’s been waiting for on this issue is the opinion of a novelist from Cornwall by way of NW3.)

This wasn’t inevitable. There were ways to avoid these cuts to education. They were adjudged to be even less palatable. We could have cut Trident. We could have decided that we didn’t need to spend so much on health, or on transport. Going back a bit further, the Blair and Brown governments could have been a bit more judicious about spending, and less enthusiastic about free market ideology. (I’m reading Ha-Joon Chang’s excellent 23 Things They Don’t Tell You About Capitalism, which is an accessible… ‘romp’ probably isn’t quite the right word, but it is playful… through the myths and misconceptions about markets. You should read it too.)

But within the confines of the other decisions which have been made about how we’ll spend the money we basically don’t have at the moment, education was always going to be a bad, bad scene, and people were always going to be angry about it. Education has been pimped as the must-have of success in life for three decades, and the promise of it has been held out to Brits by successive governments. Conservative politicians talked about how it must be available without tuition fees as late as 2005. Making access more difficult cuts to the heart of how we believe social mobility happens and how we believe you get on in the world.

More obviously, after days of riots, last night was always going to be riot central.

So taking Charles and Camilla through the middle of it in an elderly, non-secure Roller was the plan of an utter prat. It’s almost as asinine as imagining, after years and years and years of evidence to the contrary, that keeping a few thousand angry people in one place and refusing to let them use the loo, and then charging them on horseback, will calm the situation down. Kettling is not about pacification. It is about the limitation of property damage – or at least, the localisation of property damage.

It is the strategy of a total prat.

Much like setting things on fire and shouting “off with his head” at Prince Charles is not really a great way to change anything.

So this morning, while I have sympathy for anyone who has to stand eye to eye with a bunch of people they don’t trust and whom they believe intend them violent harm - in other words, for both sides as individuals – and while I would have been on the demo when I was a student and would believe it was my job to keep things contained if I was a copper…

I think this was a stupid bloody mess. And a deadlock, produced far, far up the line. Vince Cable made the point this morning that Labour were also preparing to follow a course like this before they lost the last election. The screw-up, assuming an unwillingness to compromise other core services or Trident, took place years ago.

So, great.

Screw it. I need some tea.

In which I do not review anything…

The Christmas lights in the High Street are up (disappointingly un-genital this year) which means I’m allowed to recommend some stuffz! Yay! So, first of all, the two books it was my privilege to blurb on this year:

How To Live Safely In A Science Fictional Universe – Charles Yu’s strange and wistful timetravel story, which features among other things a non-existent but very present dog,

and

Warm Bodies – Isaac Marion’s splendid, sad, uplifting zombie love story/political fable.

(I’m really cautious about blurbing; I won’t blurb on books by people I know – a resolution which will get infinitely harder as I know more novelists – and I have to feel a connection to the book and the material to go near blurbery. It feels like a tremendous responsibility. As an author, you get sent all manner of things to look at, and some of them – while in and of themselves excellent – seem wildly irrelevant and oddly selected. I did not blurb, therefore, on the amazing history of HIV infection or the elegantly-crafted parable of urban dismay. If I were to read a blurb by the author of a light-hearted book about a talking sheep, I would not expect the blurbed-on text to be a suicidally depressing tome about life in Doncaster after the Second World War. It would seem wrong to me: a fiddle. So.)

I also urge you to dig out a copy of Micah Clarke. Conan Doyle’s non-Holmes books are often even better than the Great Detective, and almost no one gets to them.

William Gibson’s Zero History I have not yet read, because I need a moment of repose to get into the whole three-book cycle properly again. Needless to say, I’m looking forward to it.

If you didn’t read Beat The Reaper last time I told you to, read it now.

I always recommend The Passion, Fugitive Pieces, and The Shipping News at this time of year. Oh, and Snow Falling On Cedars.

And for kids: two from Tolkien you might not have thought of: Farmer Giles of Ham and the Father Christmas Letters.

Then there’s a movie: Kukushka, about which I will tell you only that it is in three languages I do not speak and that this adds to rather than detracts from the fun. And I do not, generally, get along with subtitles, because I hate not speaking whatever language is in front of me.