Down the back of the sofa
It’s been one of those hushed weekends where the wind can’t get a word in, and the Wellington peninsula seems startled by its absence.
It’s also been a hushed as my family are back in the tribal lands, leaving me with four delicious days of isolation, working on various writing projects, staying up late to watch obscure arthouse films, or sitting on the deck drinking coffee and wondering at the lack of sound.
Yesterday morning, feeling the need for exercise, I took a walk at Makara – a tiny bay on Wellington’s west coast that’s accessed via a small, and well-hidden, back road. It’s pretty rough country out there and most days you’re exposed to the full brunt of the wind and sea, but it remains a popular spot for divers, walkers, and fishermen.
There’s also a strenuous walk out this way, up to Fort Opau – an old fortification built in 1942 when Wellingtonians feared invasion from Japan. On a clear day, the views are simply spectacular and the distant South Island looks close enough to touch. I come out here early in the morning to avoid even the most solitary of trampers, sit by the gun emplacement pillbox and allow myself to become absorbed in the immensity of the landscape.
Some days, it does you good to realise that, in the scheme of things, we’re really not that feckin important.
Welcome to Vóg!
Raider’s Moon – A Review in a Sequence of Obscure Digressions
Raider’s Moon was a battered paperback I picked up recently at a second-hand book sale at my daughter’s school. I wrote about this in a past newsletter and, at the time, I mentioned how you can occasionally find treasures at these kinds of sales, treasures that can lead you down avenues you’d never imagined or might never have otherwise experienced. For me, Raider’s Moon was one such treasure, and it took me down a number of interesting paths.
So what’s about?
The blurb reads as follows:
For Alan Armistead, just turned twenty-one in the spring of 1790, orders he receives from his superior at the Hudson’s Bay Company mean his first adult responsibility, and a promise of adventure.
News has come of a plot to steal an valuable cargo of furs belonging to the company, and the young clerk is chosen to lead an armed expedition to the remote trapping-post to ensure the furs’ safe delivery.
But out in the wilderness of the Canadian Lakes Aslan finds himself in a harsh, violent world where a man’s life is worth little. Soon, he must confront death, corruption, betrayal- and, in the shape of a mysterious, sensual French-Canadian girl, forces that have broken stronger men then he …
So, there you go. For me, the blurb reference to adventure around the Canadian Lakes region was an immediate pull. I’ve always enjoyed North American/ Canadian-based historical adventures (Last of the Mohicans, etc.) and occasional trips to Canada over the last ten years (Vancouver is our transit when travelling back to Ireland) have increased my curiosity about those regions. I’m also attracted by anything involving characters in the wilderness as that kind of isolation can often bring some interesting behaviour.
And writing.
The story commences with a party celebrating Alan Armistead’s 21st birthday, an event organised by his employer and mentor, Mr Findlay. There, under the influence of a potion (which we learn about later), Armistead has a flashback to his childhood in New England and the flight of his elder brother Leo, who ran away from their family home to join General Washington’s army.
The subsequent arrival of a canoe flotilla bearing supplies and letters from the company’s head office bring the celebrations to an abrupt close, particularly when one of these letters reveal the recent murder of two Company men and a plot to intercept the delivery of a high-value consignment of furs. Armistead also discovers that his long-lost brother Leo, is currently based little more than a hundred miles away at another trading post called La Pepite. This means he can potentially meet with him while working with one of the Hudson’s Bay Company agents – a Mr Cooper – to gather and transport the pelts to their final destination.
When Findlay departs to set the delivery plan for the pelts in place, Armistead is left in charge at Fort Harmony and successfully defends it against an attack by raiders attempting to destroy the Company’s transport canoes. Findlay returns and subsequently dispatches him to La Pepite to catch up with his brother and help out on the safe transport of the pelts as best he can.
Leaving Fort Harmony, Armistead travels by canoe to La Pepite, encountering danger and an attempt on his life along the way. He also meets some strange individuals, including a charming French Canadian who seems to know far more than she’s telling him. Landing at La Pepite however, he discovers that he’s arrived too late. His brother is dead and Mr Cooper has already departed on his perilous voyage downstream. Now Armistead must take matters in hand and decide what to do next.
The Bad
Raiders Moon is very much a product of its time. An old-style paperback adventure (it was published in 1977 – some 45 years ago), its style and tone will mean that some contemporary readers will struggle to absorb it. In this regard, I personally found the first chapter hard going with some incredibly turgid writing. I actually came very close to dropping the book altogether but, fortunately, I persevered as it improved dramatically after that.
The choice of protagonist is also quite a strange one. Alan Armistead is initially presented as a very competent individual, dependable, a good shot, etc. etc. but when things start to get violent, he tends to freeze like a rabbit in the spotlight, wavering in his intentions and becoming frustratingly indecisive. At times, it feels as though he’s little more than a passive participant in the story with most of the action happening around him or being carried out by others.
The book is also quite dated in terms of its representation of native Americans, almost all of whom are portrayed as quixotic, obtuse, and downright erratic. To be fair to Knox, none of those portrayals are intentionally negative (at least that was my impression). Mostly, the indigenous characters are generous or kind but you get the sense that he has no genuine familiarity with indigenous culture and, hence, no understanding of why they behave the way they do, of what makes them ‘tick’.
For a New Zealand-based Irishman reading this Canadian-authored book almost fifty years after it was written (particularly in New Zealand, where Māori culture is pretty well understood by the majority), this comes across as quaintly amusing. To be honest, I’m still not entirely sure whether this represents simple ignorance on the author’s part or whether it was a sly attempt at an authentic representation of that difficult early stage of interaction between such vastly different cultures.
The Good
Despite the stylistic limitations relative to the book’s age, Raider’s Moon still works well and its actually a pretty decent read once you get past the first chapter. The story is relatively simple - a youthful protagonist seeks vengeance and travels across the Canadian wilderness to get it, accompanied by an enigmatic young woman. Despite that apparent simplicity however, it still manages to throw in one to two satisfying plot twists that I didn’t see coming and which elevates the overall work.
The descriptions – particularly of the Canadian wilderness once the hero leaves the relative safety of his trading post and enters the unknown – are very well written and you can tell Knox was familiar with the Canadian outdoors. His descriptions of the wilderness reek of authenticity and, for someone like myself who puts a lot of effort into describing the wilderness in my own books, this was really impressive. I also picked up some good ideas from Knox that I might adapt at some point in the future.
Overall, then, Raider’s Moon is a solid read. I certainly found it good enough that I’m keen to try some more of the author’s work - something that could be an issue given that its out of print and no digital copies currently exist (see below).
So who’s Alexander Knox?
The author of this work was a Canadian by the name of Alexander Knox. That wasn’t a name I’d ever come across before (or so I thought) but because I enjoyed the book, I looked him up and was surprised to discover that he was also a relatively well-known Canadian actor back in the day (predominantly from the 1940s to the 1980s). Although he was certainly no celebrity superstar, it turns out that I’d actually seen him on screen in the 1979 version of ‘Tinker Tailer Soldier Spy’ where he played ‘Control’. Admittedly, I never actually got around to watching this until twenty years after its release, by which time, Knox had already been dead for many years.
Further research revealed that Knox had also turned up in a 1970s action movie that impressed me as a kid – Puppet on a Chain (based on Alistair McClean’s novel of the same name but baring very little similarity to the book). That film starred Swedish actor Sven-Bertil Taube (an odd casting as, in Europe, he was far more well known for his singing).
The movie’s very dated now, of course but it uses its gritty Amsterdam location to excellent effect and contains one of the better speedboats chases I’ve seen. If you’re interested, you can actually find the film online by following this link (Knox is the guy on the left of the picture):
Alternatively, rather than watching the lot, you can check out the boat chase sequence here:
There’s that’s 1 hour twenty minutes of your life I’ve saved. Don’t say I never do anything for you.
But back to the author.
In addition to Knox’s acting career, it turns out he was also quite the profuse writer. As well as Raiders Moon, he pumped out a number of action/adventure novels that included Bride of Quietness (1933), Night of the White Bear (1971), Totem Dream (1973), and The Kidnapped Surgeon (1977). Apparently, he also wrote several plays and detective novels under a pseudonym, but I haven’t got around to looking them up.
All of the books listed above seem to be Canadian adventures akin to Raider’s Moon. Like Raider’s Moon, they also seem to be out of print and don’t exist in digital form. If you look them up on Goodreads or Amazon, you’ll see a few listings but very little commentary and no meaningful reviews. It’s sad, but in a way it feels, as though Knox’s written works have simply disappeared down the back of the metaphorical sofa.
Down the Back of the Sofa
All this research around Knox and his works confirms a pattern I’ve increasingly come across over the last decade or so - the disappearance of creative content. This isn’t limited to literature of course There are also a number of movies and sound recordings that I’ve been keeping my eyes open for years, but which I’ve never been able to locate.
Much of that comes down to the transfer of work from one technological format to another, for example from analogue format - photographic prints, motion picture film, early audio and video tape, etc. – to digital format. A lot of creative work never actually gets transferred and fades out of sight forever.
Another part of the problem is linked to the commercial and licensing systems for creative works. For example, Raider’s Moon was published by Mayflower Books Ltd in London – a publishing imprint of Dell Books (itself established in New York the year before, so this was obviously a British subsidiary). From its initial establishment in 1962 to its subsequent folding in 1993, Mayflower published a few hundred titles, mostly non-fiction but also a range of science fiction titles (it published a lot of Michael Moorcock and Jack Vance’s works, for example).
In 1967, the London based Granada Group Ltd acquired the entire share capital of Mayflower Books Ltd and, in 1968, it transferred the company to its publishing arm, Granada Publishing Ltd. Fifteen years later (1983) it then sold its publishing interests to Glasgow based publishers William Colins, Sons and Co Limited. (they went onto become publisher HarperCollins) who subsequently dissolved Mayflower Books Ltd in 1993.
That basically means there are probably hundreds of Mayflower books, the intellectual property of which, is now owned by another company. From a profit perspective, the new owner would probably focus uniquely on top list, resaleable titles (i.e. which are more likely to bring some money in) for republishing or transfer to digital. Midlist titles (like Raider’s Moon) simply wouldn’t meet the profit cut-off and end up sitting in licence limbo, never to be seen again. This kind of intellectual property compression has been going on ever since the infamous Irish Battle of the Book, of course, but it does mean that if you have a creative work in a non-digital format, you’d better hang onto it as you may not otherwise find it again.
Interestingly, when it comes to film or audio, you can actually find a lot of less well-known works put up on You tube by film or audio aficionados. As far as I know, there’s no such route for books.
The End
And that’s the long stream of consciousness that was October, nicely bottled and served with a twist of lemon.
This month the ‘paid’ section of the newsletter features an audio short story and an image from another project I’m working on.
Until next month
Slán go fóill!
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