October | 2017 | Guy Portman's Blog

Sociopaths in Literature

Oct 27 2017

This post is devoted to sociopaths and psychopaths in literature. Click here to discover the differences between the two. Sociopaths and psychopaths have long fascinated us. One of the reasons for this is that we wonder what we could accomplish if we were not burdened by that obstacle that is a conscience.

There are numerous examples of sociopathic personalities in literature. These include:

The Prince (1532) by Niccolò Machiavelli — the reader is urged to be sociopathic

Othello (1603) by Shakespeare — the character Iago

Macbeth (1606) by Shakespeare — Macbeth

Persuasion (1817) by Jane Austen — Mr. Elliot

Vanity Fair (1848) by William Thackeray — Becky Sharp

East of Eden (1952) by John Steinbeck — Cathy

Here are some books with sociopathic/psychopathic protagonists that I have reviewed, and one that I have written.

A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

My Review: Alex is an eccentric 15-year-old delinquent with a penchant for classical music and drinking milk. He and his fellow ‘droogs’ assault, rob and…(more)

The Killer Inside Me by Jim Thompson

My Review: Twenty-nine-year-old Lou Ford is a Deputy Sheriff from the West Texas town of Central City. Lou is a hard-working and simple character with a fondness for clichés…(more)

POP.1280 by Jim Thompson

My Review: Sheriff Nick Corey’s problems are mounting. There are the troublesome pimps, the nagging wife and mistress, and the forthcoming election that could see him replaced…(more)

American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis

My Review: American Psycho is a highly controversial novel that brought its author Bret Easton Ellis instant fame. The book is written from the perspective of a young Wall Street financier…(more)

Sepultura by Guy Portman

Publication Day – Thursday, January 11th – Dyson Devereux is a busy man, with a challenging new job at Paleham Council and a young son. He would be coping just fine were it not for crass colleagues, banal bureaucracy and…(more)

13 Bewildering Book Titles

Oct 20 2017

I have dedicated numerous blog posts to the topic that is bizarre books. Now it is the turn of bewildering book titles. Here are 13 bewildering book titles.

The Stray Shopping Carts Of Eastern North America

English Smocks

Pornogami

Bowl Better Using Self-Hypnosis

The Art of Faking Exhibition Poultry

Ruby Ann’s Down Home Trailer Park Cookbook

Crafting With Cat Hair

Jewish Chess Masters on Stamps

Snow Caves for Fun and Survival

An Arsonist’s Guide To Writers’ Homes In New England

What Bird Did That?

The Original Road Kill Cookbook

The Mullet: Hairstyle of the Gods

There will be a second instalment at some point.

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20 Bizarre Author-Related Facts

Oct 13 2017

In recent years I have dedicated a number of blog posts to the topic of bizarre author-related trivia. Here are 20 of the most bizarre author facts I have come across to date.

Modernist writer Katherine Mansfield wore a mourning dress to her own wedding.

Zadie Smith spent the best part of 2 years writing and rewriting the first 20 pages of her novel, On Beauty.

William Burroughs accidentally killed his partner Joan Vollmer by shooting her in the head.

There is an asteroid named after Kurt Vonnegut.

J.R.R. Tolkien typed the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy with two fingers.

Dr Seuss included the word ‘contraceptive’ in a draft of his children’s book Hop on Pop to make sure the publisher was concentrating.

It took Helen Hooven Santmyer 50 years to pen And Ladies of the Club.

Dan Brown is a fan of inversion therapy He often hangs upside down in antigravity boots because he claims it helps him relax.

John Boyne claims to have written The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas in only 2 and a half days.

ELIYZABETH YANNE STRONG-ANDERSON is the author of Birth Control Is Sinful in the Christian Marriages and Also Robbing God of Priesthood. Every letter in the book capitalised.

Helen Hoover Santymeyer was 88 when her seminal work And Ladies of the Club was published.

John Steinbeck — Steinbeck was obsessed with pencils, particularly Blackwing 602’s.

American music critic and author Gustav Kobbé’s was out sailing when a seaplane misjudged its descent and struck his boat, killing him.

Vladimir Nabokov had a fixation with index cards. The majority of his novels were written out on cards with a pencil.

Dorothy Parker’s epitaph reads, Excuse my dust

Victor T. Cheney is the author of Castration: The Advantages and the Disadvantages.

In 1912 Ambrose Bierce invented 1 of the earliest emoticons, the snigger point, written as \ ___ /! It was designed to look like a smiling mouth.

Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables contains a sentence that is 823 words long.

Jane Austen never married, but she was engaged for 1 night. She accepted the proposal of marriage 2 weeks prior to her 27th birthday. Austen changed her mind the next day.

Billy Wilder epitaph is, I’m a writer but then nobody’s perfect

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Authors As Desserts VI

Oct 06 2017

This week I have been hard at work on my fourth novel, Sepultura. It is the sequel to my black comedy, Necropolis.

I have also written the sixth instalment in my series; authors and the desserts that in my opinion they/their writing corresponds to. Here are 8 authors and their corresponding desserts.

James Patterson