tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-48659644808753303712024-03-05T10:57:10.364+00:00THE AFRIKA REICH TrilogyThis is the official blog of THE AFRIKA REICH trilogy. Here you’ll find the A to Z of THE AFRIKA REICH (written between 2011-13) and the A to Z of THE MADAGASKAR PLAN (2015-17). There are also a few words about BOOK 3. I always like hearing from readers, so feel free to leave a comment and if you want to know anything about the characters or world I've created, just ask. Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.comBlogger72125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-73106876046184468702017-02-12T03:33:00.000+00:002017-02-15T16:15:49.378+00:00Book 3<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Six years ago today I
started this blog – so it seems an apt moment to end it. No, not end... the
better way to put it is: take a break. I can’t believe everything that has
happened in those years. I’ve published two novels; had a slew of reviews from
some of the most prestigious publications in the world; appeared on radio and
TV; been on foreign book tours; travelled to three continents on research
trips; had the pleasure of meeting my readers. For someone who always dreamed
of being a writer, it is the dream come true. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">And now it’s time for a
hiatus. I’m currently working on a new novel and want to concentrate all my
efforts on that. This new project is not an <i>Afrika</i>
book; I need a break from Nazis! That said, I do intend to finish my trilogy,
and with that in mind I thought I’d say a few words about BOOK 3 as I head off.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Although <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i> is a standalone
book, if you’ve read it you will know that several narrative strands have yet
to conclude and that the fates of the characters remain unresolved.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">I often mention the
psychedelic version of <i>The Afrika Reich</i>,
the version that was never published. Putting aside the issue of its surreal,
acid-trip aesthetic, another reason publishers didn’t like it was because it
was too long, coming in at 250 000+ words. When I re-imagined this version as a
thriller I divided the original into three parts: the first set in Congo, the
second in Madagascar. The final segment was set around the death camps of the
Sahara. This is the basis for Book 3. I plotted it out in 2007 and in the
decade since have been mulling it over in my mind. It is an extraordinary odyssey
through the deserts of North Africa during the dying days of Nazi rule. I hope
it will be a fitting end to Burton’s and Hochburg’s story.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">I’ll add more details and
information about Book 3 as and when I have them, including a likely
publication date. In the meantime why not check out the <a href="http://www.guysaville.com/afrika-3/" target="_blank">AFRIKA 3</a> page on my
website. There you’ll find a brief outline of the plot as well as a chance for
you to decide what the final book in the AFRIKA REICH TRILOGY will be called.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Thanks for reading this far.
I hope you enjoyed the A to Z of <i>The
Afrika Reich</i> and <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i>.
I hope you enjoyed the books. If you did, please do encourage your friends to
buy them; leave a review on Amazon/Goodreads; and generally help spread the word. Every
copy of Books 1 & 2 sold, brings 3 closer to publication. I can’t wait to
tell you how it all ends...</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">PS – although I won’t be
adding any more entries to this blog for the foreseeable future, I will be
monitoring it. So do keep your comments coming.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com20tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-9568796002853690682017-01-28T19:39:00.000+00:002017-02-07T19:42:05.420+00:00L is for LETTER<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">In the final stages of
writing <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i> several issues
became evident. The first was that I was running out of time. The book had
originally been scheduled for a February 2012 publication date. This soon
became 2013. Eventually I committed to summer 2015 even as I was struggling to
finish it. (This meant delivering the manuscript by October 2014.) The second
problem was word length. I was contracted to write a book between 110-120 000
words. It soon obvious that <i>Madagaskar</i>
would be longer. I was asked not to exceed 150 000, the point at which production
costs escalate sharply. By the summer of 2014 I had broken the 170 000 mark!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Issue number three came when
my UK editor read the manuscript for the first time. He was concerned it wasn’t
sufficiently stand-alone. He felt it referred back to <i>The Afrika Reich</i> too much and that this would deter new readers.
Given the gap between Books 1 and 2, he was also concerned that readers of the
original wouldn’t remember what had happened. As he said, ‘it’s fine if [readers]
finish the first book and immediately start the second... but you can’t assume
that will be the case.’ After pondering this advice I thought it made good
commercial sense, so I removed many of the references to <i>Afrika Reich</i> e.g. mentions of Dolan and Ackerman.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">All of which leads to the
most substantial cut I made from <i>Madagaskar</i>.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">There are two versions of <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i>. The one that was
published, which you hopefully bought and read; and what I call the ‘trilogy
edition’.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12pt;">The major strand I cut was
intended to link all three books of the trilogy. It begins in Chapter 6, when
Burton’s aunt gives him a bundle of letters. They are from Eleanor, Burton’s
mother. Although she never actually appears in the books, she is one of its
most significant presences and I wanted her to have an opportunity to speak in
her own voice – like Ma Bundren does in Faulkner’s </span><i style="font-size: 12pt;">As I Lay Dying</i><span style="font-size: 12pt;">. In the LETTER there is a mind-blowing revelation
about Hochburg, something now completely cut from the published version of the
book (though I wrote his character with it in mind). This revelation was to
have resonance in </span><i style="font-size: 12pt;">Madagaskar</i><span style="font-size: 12pt;"> but much
more significance in Book 3, leading to yet another shock... so I’m going to
have to find an ingenious way to shoe it into the third book.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">In a final ironic twist,
Burton never actually reads the letters. Instead their contents are read by
Kepplar. This happens approximately half way through <i>Madagaskar</i>, which means halfway through the entire trilogy and in
many ways is the scene upon which the trilogy pivots, so it was a shame to cut
it. I won’t reveal the contents of the letter but here is the original, deleted
passage that leads up to it. [Spoiler alert.] It comes as Kepplar is searching
Burton’s room in Roscherhafen: <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">"In the bedside cabinet [Kepplar]
discovered an American passport and a bundle of letters liver-spotted with age.
He flicked through them. They were the tawdry outpourings of an unknown female,
the type of nonsense his wife would have indulged in if he hadn’t forbidden
her; they offered no clue as to where Cole might go next. He was about to
discard them when a word caught his eye.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Walter<i>.<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">He read more closely and saw it appear
again, then with increasing frequency.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Kepplar returned to the top letter and
worked methodically through them. He had finished a dozen pages before he came
across the first reference to Walter Hochburg, son of a missionary family. He
knew nothing about his former master’s past: the revelation caused his stomach
to flutter, Hochburg despised the church. Yet a man was not his parents.
Kepplar’s father had died of septicaemia during the Great War, he barely
remembered him; his mother had called him a traitor to everything decent for
joining the Party. A paragraph later there was a description of Hochburg with
his ‘cascade of raven-black locks’. That made Kepplar simper; soon his lips
were narrow. He read till it grew too dark, flicked on the overhead light,
paced the narrow room undecided whether he could bear to know more. His skin
felt dank, like he wanted to shed it.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Eventually, he sat and continued until
the final letter. It was dated [month], 1930, Lom</span></i><i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">é</span></i><i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">, in what had been British Togoland. When he finished,
he twisted the lobe of his missing ear until it stung. He read the letter a
second time and wished there were some matches in his pocket. <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Kepplar pushed back his seat, the sound
scraping through him, and walked to the balcony: he needed to taste air.
Floodlights cast the beach in a harsh monochrome, a few couples walked along
the sand. He stood watching the breakers until far across the ocean the clouds
flared for an instant. Kepplar counted the seconds that followed, the way he
used to as a boy, waiting for the thunder. <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Silence was his only reply."<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The next chapter was to be
the letter itself. Three thousand words of ‘confession’ from Eleanor. Having
read it, Kepplar’s attitude towards Hochburg shifts. Later Hochburg takes
possession of the letters. The reader would know what was written in them but
the person they most affect – Burton – would remain ignorant of their contents.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">All the sections surrounding
the letter were written up to the fifth draft (of six) of the book. I had a
good working version of the letter itself... but never finished it to a level I
was pleased with. But by now time was against me. Add the standalone issue and
the need to trim the word count and it seemed the most obvious strand to remove
from the book. In a single chop, it reduced the length by 15 000 words. The
only trace of the letter that remains is the epigraph to Part I.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Of course now I have two
different versions of the book on different trajectories. The overall arc of
the trilogy remains the same, but without Eleanor’s letter, the journey there
will be different. The published version of <i>Madagaskar</i>
is 157 000 words, the ‘trilogy edition’ 172 000. Whether it will ever see the
light of day, I don’t know. Because of the licensing agreements with my
publishers I can’t publish it separately, so it may have to wait like some
‘director’s cut’ to be released in the future. Or possibly the extant text will
become the one everyone is so familiar with that it will no longer be
necessary. We’ll have to see. And first I have to finish the trilogy and write
Book 3. Which leads me on to my final blog of this A to Z...<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">L is also for LOST EYE<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">[Spoiler alert.] On the
subject of Book 3, I should also say a word about Hochburg and his LOST EYE. It
is a reference to Norse mythology and Wotan, leader of the Gods. Wotan
sacrifices an eye to gain knowledge of the future and in doing so foresees the
end of the world. Which may / may not tell you something about where Walter
Hochburg is headed...<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-37323057109782810532016-12-24T14:30:00.000+00:002017-01-14T14:22:53.620+00:00J is for JUST COULDN’T FIT IN<div class="DefaultTNR">
Apologies for another long break, but I thought I’d sneak
in an entry for Christmas. Earlier in this blog I mentioned how I ended up
with so much research material it was impossible to include it all. I had
literally hundreds of pages of notes; I could have written a non-fiction book.
So I thought I’d survey some of the things I toyed with including in <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i> but I JUST COULDN’T
FIT IN.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<i><b>Financing of the Plan</b></i><br />
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The most fascinating aspect of the Madagascar Plan which I
had to omit was its funding. One reason for this was the sheer complexity of it
all, but to summarise: the SS planned to finance the Jewish deportation by
seizing their assets and investing them in a new intra-European bank overseen
by Göring. This bank would pay for the Jews’ transportation costs from Europe to
Africa as well as investing in the basic infrastructure needed on the island to
cope with such a large influx of numbers. The resettlement would therefore be
self-funding with the top Nazis creaming off a levy on all transactions. After
the Jews were settled, the bank would take on a new role as the economic
intermediary between the island and the rest of the world. Jews would be
allowed to run small farms and businesses on the island but not trade directly.
Thus ‘Jewish financial contagion’, as the Nazis saw it, would never again
threaten the global economy.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><b>Zionism</b><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">Zionism was an ever present difficulty to me as I
worked on the book. It would be impossible to write something about the
Madagascar Plan, let alone a Jewish uprising on the island, without broaching
the subject. Yet every time I looked at Zionism it seemed too big, too unwieldy
to fit in. Nevertheless I didn’t want to leave myself vulnerable to accusations
of overlooking it or, worse, being ignorant about it. My solution was a
compromise. It’s mentioned a few times – with an extended paragraph in Chapter
24 – but in my world it is not significant to the plot or characters. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><b>Plan Z<o:p></o:p></b></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">This was a plan approved by Hitler in 1939 to build
a huge surface fleet for the Reich, one that would eventually challenge British
naval supremacy. It was intended as a decade long expansion centred on a dozen
battleships, four aircraft carriers and various strategic ports around the
globe, including Konakry, Walfisch Bucht and Diego Suarez in Africa. The
beginning of World War 2 meant it was never properly implemented. Because of
the significance of Diego to the plot of <i>The
Madagaskar Plan</i>, Plan Z was mentioned in the early drafts of the book but
later cut to make things leaner.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgi8Nl8mbikhir4zAMbCclersazn1Dw07IO0B07L6v3q4KSG7GrhTrK4QX6twPYMhj77MxCvjSf65sR2h9_ObOms5TKSffFdKVVv_Td6TYrn81guYQ-SWLmLHNu1OqeQVe1abT6MPdnnG8/s1600/kriegsmarine_aircraft_carrier_and_battleship_by_someone1fy-d72gjw4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="232" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgi8Nl8mbikhir4zAMbCclersazn1Dw07IO0B07L6v3q4KSG7GrhTrK4QX6twPYMhj77MxCvjSf65sR2h9_ObOms5TKSffFdKVVv_Td6TYrn81guYQ-SWLmLHNu1OqeQVe1abT6MPdnnG8/s320/kriegsmarine_aircraft_carrier_and_battleship_by_someone1fy-d72gjw4.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">One of the Nazis' unbuilt aircraft carriers, in scale to their existing largest ship (with green keel)</td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"> </span><i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><b>Heydrich’s Jewish heritage</b></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">As staggering as this sounds, Heydrich, effectively
the Number Two of the SS, had a Jewish (or at least partly Jewish) father. This
is not conjecture or gossip but documented fact. It actually appeared in the
early drafts of the book and was a minor subplot – but eventually I removed it
as I felt it complicated the narrative unnecessarily. I may resurrect it in
Book 3.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><b>Globus’s Lariam allergy<o:p></o:p></b></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">In the 1950s, the best defence against malaria was
Lariam. Nazis operating in the tropics and other malarial areas (such as parts
of southern Russia), routinely took it. In my research on Globocnik I
discovered he had taken it and was allergic to it, causing bouts of sickness, depression,
paranoia and nightmares. In the first couple of drafts. Globus was forced to
take Lariam before visiting the mosquito-hive that is Antzu, leading to an
adverse effect on his mental state in the final quarter of the book. In the end,
I decided he was already sufficiently unhinged not to need this further
complication.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><b>Odin as Santa Claus<o:p></o:p></b></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">Finally, and fittingly for this time of year, in
Chapter 4 Hochburg drives through a Stanleystadt still decked for Christmas. I
managed to squeeze in the Nazis’ plans for ‘<i>Julfest</i>’
but one detail I didn’t have room for was that they intended to do away with
Santa Claus and replace him with Odin, ruler of the Norse gods. He would still
have a flowing white beard but his robes would no longer be Coca-Cola red but
swastika scarlet. Who knows what they had in mind for Rudolph...<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRZjunPfK5D48fgqGRlQXVC7lNIgb5c0tg2W8E_dv1nTj4jLvMhEw7t3cnIRoXQSgasCe8XPJ2-AN98h8fXC8XYAaQjJqRceIZu2TUz5UczIQsvjXqklVFoudkFIYz9SaC3e8a_Yi1iyM/s1600/006321BD00000258-0-from_the_book_Hitler_Churchill_ADOLF_HITLER_GERMAN_DICTATOR_IN_T-a-4_1418747263708.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="222" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRZjunPfK5D48fgqGRlQXVC7lNIgb5c0tg2W8E_dv1nTj4jLvMhEw7t3cnIRoXQSgasCe8XPJ2-AN98h8fXC8XYAaQjJqRceIZu2TUz5UczIQsvjXqklVFoudkFIYz9SaC3e8a_Yi1iyM/s320/006321BD00000258-0-from_the_book_Hitler_Churchill_ADOLF_HITLER_GERMAN_DICTATOR_IN_T-a-4_1418747263708.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">*</span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">There was one other thing that didn’t make the
published edition of the book. It was by far and away the most substantial
omission and deserves an entry of its own, which leads me to the final blog of
this A to Z. I’ll post it in the New Year: L is for...<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-5766458919602583852016-07-16T00:00:00.000+01:002016-09-02T00:30:12.016+01:00U is for URALS<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">It’s a year to the day since <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i> was published. Have
you read it yet?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The URALS are a range of
mountains in Russia. If the Nazis had defeated the Soviet Union, the Urals
would have become the natural boundary of Germany’s Eastern Empire. Many
historians, however, believe a total defeat of the Soviets would have been
impossible and that a guerrilla conflict may have continued on the fringes of
the new Reich for years. </span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">Such a proposition is referred to
in other alternate histories such as <i>Fatherland</i>
and more recently <i>Dominion</i>. Hitler
himself acknowledged the possibility with his infamous quote: ‘People say to
me: “Be careful! You will have twenty years of guerrilla warfare on your hands.”
I am delighted at the prospect... Germany will remain in a state of perpetual
alertness.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqTcjPVZDvC7BEhJaSImPVJvX9r5I7zGOXLwRiNX7XU8wabq5A8JDb01fYMfBJNKpkElzB4j4ehBy5R2KDTLE5ZJ9-HpkGfzxwVZP0ggY_HkmyMJDtPxtn0wUnmbt1ZLpjMAagJ2D0PXQ/s1600/4740043.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="232" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqTcjPVZDvC7BEhJaSImPVJvX9r5I7zGOXLwRiNX7XU8wabq5A8JDb01fYMfBJNKpkElzB4j4ehBy5R2KDTLE5ZJ9-HpkGfzxwVZP0ggY_HkmyMJDtPxtn0wUnmbt1ZLpjMAagJ2D0PXQ/s400/4740043.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Urals, looking towards the east</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The Afrika Reich</span></i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"> began as a more ambitious, five novel sequence. Originally it contained
a trilogy set in Nazi Africa featuring Burton and Hochburg, bookended by two
standalone novels. The first of these, <i>Seven
Bridges to Toledo,</i> was set during the Spanish Civil War and included
Patrick, Tünscher and Cranley. You can read more about this project <a href="http://afrikareichtrilogy.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Patrick%20Whaler" target="_blank">here</a>. The
final book in the sequence was called <i>East
of the Urals</i> and was set during the collapse of the Nazis’ Eastern Empire.
The main character of <i>Urals</i> was
Tünscher, returning East on a mission to assassinate a renegade colonel: Standartenführer
Kanvinksy, </span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">the only SS officer ever to be recalled because his
methods were regarded as too extreme – think Kurtz in the mountains.
Horrifyingly, he was a real person. Tünscher also had a softer, </span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">more personal motive for his journey East, what he
describes to Burton as his ‘debts’.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Because I plotted the sequence
of five novels well ahead of writing them, much of the Urals story was
foreshadowed in <i>Madagaskar</i>. Kanvinsky
is even mentioned in Chapter 50. That is why the Urals are such presence in the
book, like a gust of icy wind blowing through the narrative. Globocnik would
most certainly have served out there too which is why his sections are peppered
with references to the East.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">For commercial reasons it’s now very unlikely that
the Spanish and Urals books will be written. In the original sequence of novels
Tünscher was only going to appear in the odd-number books – so we wouldn’t
discover the truth about his debts till the fifth book. I have now truncated
this – with his debt subtly explained at the end of <i>Madagaskar</i> and the full significance playing out in Book 3.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">Beyond the Urals is </span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Birobidzhan. It is never mentioned in the novel (only in the historical
note), though Globus and Tünscher occasionally allude to it. Madagascar is
where the Nazis planned to deport the Jews of Western Europe; the Jews of
Russia were to be exiled to Birobidzhan, in Siberia. If it’s possible,
Birobidzhan would have been worse than Madagaskar: monsoons and insufferable
heat in the summer, thirty below in the winter. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Birobidzhan is one of the
many things I wanted to include in <i>Madagaskar</i>
but was unable to because of word length issues. In the final couple of blog entries
I’ll discuss others things that didn’t make it into the published book.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">U is also for URANIUM MINE<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">The URANIUM MINE that Hochburg visits in Chapter 7 –
Shinkolobwe – is a real place in Congo. The reason I chose it as a location is
that it was the source of the uranium used in the two bombs dropped on Japan at
the end of WW2. You can read more about the place in this excellent <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/10416945/Tracing-the-Congolese-mine-that-fuelled-Hiroshima.html" target="_blank">article by Patrick Marnham</a>.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-73080795887099440272016-07-03T10:30:00.000+01:002016-09-02T00:31:13.555+01:00S is for SALOIS<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Reuben SALOIS is the main
new character in <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i>,
and one of the three mentioned on the back cover: ‘Burton... Hochburg...
Salois... the fate of the world is in their hands’. I’ve mentioned Salois
before – <a href="http://afrikareichtrilogy.blogspot.co.uk/2011/12/p-is-for-patrick-whaler.html" target="_blank">here</a>, in this blog from the first book. He’s another of my recycled
names/characters... though his first name gave me months of anxiety. I must
have gone through thousands of Jewish male names to find the right one, only settling
on Reuben in the final weeks before the book was finished.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">From the start it was
important I had several Jewish characters in the book. Partly this was to
assuage any criticism of writing about the subject matter solely from a Gentile
point-of-view, partly so the reader could experience the world I had created at
ground level. Salois is one of the first Jews to be shipped to Madagascar, so
we see the whole Jewish experience through his eyes – from the journey to the
equator, to the work gangs, the first rebellion and beyond.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The character went through
various incarnations from the entirely realistic, complete with ‘normal’
backstory, to the more mythic figure he is in the finished book. [Spoiler
alert.] Salois is borne from the ancient tradition of heroism. The Greeks believed
a hero was someone who performed great deeds; the idea of morality – whether in
the deeds themselves or the person doing them – was irrelevant (the link
between heroism and doing good arrives in the medieval period and Age of
Chivalry). The other big influence on Salois was Harmonica from Leone’s <i>Once Upon a Time in the West, </i>which
leads me to...<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpXRKH-NadF6RcL7eSDFAEoVIgxa8ulRLeR4GhaS1v8T8gsR6pXSt2kl_AC2wDatGf8VhkYjyFGQG4c2a31OqrX-wFUuUYHg7wKj7PJUH2ap3iZa1RuWS_qj8ZeQSxUkoWF35PxQsgGWo/s1600/936full-once-upon-a-time-in-the-west-screenshot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="175" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpXRKH-NadF6RcL7eSDFAEoVIgxa8ulRLeR4GhaS1v8T8gsR6pXSt2kl_AC2wDatGf8VhkYjyFGQG4c2a31OqrX-wFUuUYHg7wKj7PJUH2ap3iZa1RuWS_qj8ZeQSxUkoWF35PxQsgGWo/s400/936full-once-upon-a-time-in-the-west-screenshot.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">I’ve left this entry as one
of the last because I want people to have the chance to read the book before turning
to this blog. There is a revelation about Salois I must make. Some readers
understand it, others don’t. If you’ve read <i>Madagaskar</i>
and are happy with your interpretation of Salois, there’s no need to read on. From
what people have already reported, he’s one of their favourite characters. But
if you want to know my intention, it is this. [Major spoiler alert.] Salois is
a phantom; he is not entirely of this world. He is ‘Azrael’, the avenging angel
of Jewish mysticism. Of course it is possible to read the character in an
entirely naturalistic way, but I wrote him as a man returned from the dead to
put right a great wrong. It is the sin of his own life and the sin committed
against his race. There are clues to this everywhere in the text.</span></div>
<br />
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Two final pieces of trivia.
His parting line is based on Prospero’s farewell in <i>The Tempest</i>. We never learn Salois’s actual name. Like Harmonica,
and very much in the Leone tradition, he is a man without a name.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-56714553945502043632016-06-16T00:00:00.000+01:002016-08-31T11:44:07.639+01:00Y is for YAUDIN<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Sometimes I have ideas that
I just can’t get to work. In the early drafts of <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i> I introduced the character of YAUDIN. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The idea for him had been
inspired while travelled to Prora. As I reached the Baltic coast I glanced out
of my train window and happened to see fishermen on sea-slits. These are
literally as they sound: stilts for walking in deep water to fish from). [Spoiler
alert.] After Burton crashes the hovercraft in Chapter 33, I had an image of a
character approaching him by walking on water; only as he neared the shore did
it become apparent he was on stilts. This was Yaudin, a Jew born on Führertag
(or in different versions of the text, 30 January 1933) and thus hated by his
fellows. He would accompany Burton on his quest and later join Salois travelling
to Diego. He was a mix of Caliban and Kaspar Hausar, a kind of jester character
whose role in the narrative was constantly to undermine Burton and the Jews of
the rebellion, showing the futility of the acts.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">He was very much part of the
fantastic realism I’m so drawn to in the <i>Afrika</i>
books.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">I was also incapable of
writing him. For a start he spoke in a unique patois which I could never quite nail.
I also think – on reflection – there was something too fantastical to him, as
though he was a character who had wandered in from a different book.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhE2fzw1q6eqq2VJ47w_hAOrgWtm9tfi2WjWOkysA0iWfWemuplPNUctNItf3Z_kth1X4RxJP4VGT72J8XvPh7kLBhof8ZrLMoDmEWsYlwxk_S08_su7N9PPnTmp2ocm4B53TY4IOabKUI/s1600/Caliban+Hauser+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhE2fzw1q6eqq2VJ47w_hAOrgWtm9tfi2WjWOkysA0iWfWemuplPNUctNItf3Z_kth1X4RxJP4VGT72J8XvPh7kLBhof8ZrLMoDmEWsYlwxk_S08_su7N9PPnTmp2ocm4B53TY4IOabKUI/s320/Caliban+Hauser+2.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Kaspar Hauser (top) and Caliban</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">For months I struggled with
him, going through hundreds of subtly different permutations of the character.
Every time I failed with his scenes, so I would move on... until there came a
moment when I had nothing else to write. I had to deal with him once and for
all. Several days of misery followed; he was central to the ending of the plot,
so simply exorcising him wasn’t an option. Finally I had a flash of
inspiration: an alternative path through the narrative which meant I could cut
the character. This flash came about mid-morning and I started working through
the possibilities for the rest of the day. The next morning, having slept on
it, I woke with a sense of utter relief and knew removing Yaudin was the right
decision.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">So out went one of my more unusual
and original ideas. Perhaps if I hadn’t felt the pressure of the deadline so
much I could eventually have found a version of the character that I liked, but
reading the book now I think his presence is not missed. In fact, it’s probably
beneficial as it means the fantasy/realism elements of the book are better
balanced. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Never one to waste a name,
however, I gave it to another character... so a Yaudin still appears in the
book, albeit in a minor role. [Spoiler alert.] Despite all of the above, you
might like to know that the role of both Yaudins is effectively the same in the
Diego scenes.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-51584908981129560632016-06-02T14:00:00.000+01:002016-08-22T11:00:22.410+01:00Q is for QUORP<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">One of the questions I’m
regularly asked is whether I base my characters on real people. I always find
this rather strange. I’m a novelist, not a biographer. So the answer is no: the
majority of my characters are the product of my imagination. I do, however,
make the occasional exception – and QUORP, Governor of the Western Sector was
one such example.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">He’s actually based on a
writer of some fame. For libel reasons I won’t name him, or even hint who he
is. I confess I’ve never actually met this man but as I was writing the Quorp scenes
I read an interview with this writer, complete with an odious photograph – and
found him so insufferably smug and unreflective I just had to base Quorp around
him.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWJj0aojsNT8PUEow9HWRqXtVGjKkpVr3nYx4LOuMePvpYYZdxLZKfN_Fe6rwuPGtKpfLts3tyRbR-BPM1nhyytaos7KXQpmbSIqZQgqNipsVXqLgFNWsVYcT-3d8drSGRDsIpn8oosYk/s1600/Red+Setters+%25282%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="206" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWJj0aojsNT8PUEow9HWRqXtVGjKkpVr3nYx4LOuMePvpYYZdxLZKfN_Fe6rwuPGtKpfLts3tyRbR-BPM1nhyytaos7KXQpmbSIqZQgqNipsVXqLgFNWsVYcT-3d8drSGRDsIpn8oosYk/s400/Red+Setters+%25282%2529.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Quorp's Red Setters</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">You might also like to know
that Burton’s aunt was also modelled on a novelist – this one much more
agreeable, though once again I will spare everyone’s blushes and not name her.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">I can see how I might be
accused of being terribly coy in this entry, but I have dropped a few tiny
hints in the text as to who the people are. I’m sure the more astute of you
might be able to decipher who I’m referring to... though obviously I will deny
everything!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Quorp is also the embodiment
of a theme that runs through the book (and links all the characters I despise
the most). Excess. If I were drawing up a new list of deadly sins, excess would
be at the top. Without wanting to sound too preachy, so long as mankind’s
excesses remain unchecked the future will always be bleak. Excess is also a
theme in the new novel I’m currently working on (not an <i>Afrika</i> book).<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">[Spoiler alert.] Hochburg’s
threat to Quorp – ‘nice family’ is a quote from <i>The Good, Bad Ugly</i>, a line Christopher Frayling once described as
the most menacing in the film.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<b><i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Q is also for Quince<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Many people have commented
on the use of quinces in <i>The Afrika Reich</i>,
in fact I’ve been asked why Q wasn’t for Quince in the previous A to Z.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Quinces return as a motif in
<i>The Madagaskar Plan</i>. Burton owns a
quince orchard. Partly this was to give him an unusual job but the symbolism of
the fruit was not lost on me either. Through the centuries the significance of
quinces has varied from culture to culture. In Ancient Greece they were a
symbol of love. In early readings of the Bible, the devil tempts Eve to pick a
quince from the Tree of Knowledge (it morphed into an apple during the Middle
Ages). Quinces are an amazing, perfumed fruit that turn the most extraordinary
pinkish-orange when cooked. Delicious! I have a quince tree in my own garden.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-24476031892043642502016-05-17T00:00:00.000+01:002016-08-22T12:41:13.079+01:00Germania - revisited<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">One of the most popular entries
from the A to Z of <i>Afrika Reich</i> was
the blog on Germania, so I thought I’d return to it with some more pictures,
especially given the city actually appears in <i>The</i> <i>Madagaskar Plan</i>.
Germania, as I’m sure you know, was the capital Hitler planned to build if he
won the war; it would have been overseen by the F</span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">ü</span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">hrer’s architect, Albert Speer. Here they are admiring a model of the
city:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Here is a plan of the
intended layout of Germania:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span><span style="font-size: 12pt;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">At the centre of this new metropolis
was the Great Hall. The first illustration gives you some sense of the scale of
the building. Below it are various artists’ impressions of how it would look:</span><span style="font-size: 12pt;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"> Finally, a miscellany of views of Germania:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-66758057441249877112016-05-04T12:00:00.000+01:002016-08-22T10:50:38.274+01:00G is for the GOVERNOR OF MADAGASKAR<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Early in the plotting of <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i> it became clear that
I would need to include the GOVERNOR OF MADAGASKAR, not only to rule the island
but also to thwart Hochburg. Three possibilities are mentioned in the narrative.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">My research soon revealed
that the Nazis had a candidate in mind as early as the 1930s: Philipp Bouhler,
Head of Chancellery in Hitler’s personal office and an old comrade of the
Führer’s. However, Bouhler didn’t make for a particularly dramatic character. He
was too dry, a bureaucrat, so I decided to project the story beyond his
governorship.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">I considered a fictitious
character but wanting to keep things grounded in reality I started looking at
other, real possibilities. One name kept cropping up: Odilo Globocnik. He had
run the Lublin Reservation in Poland (a precursor to the Madagascar Plan) and
later built the death camps; he seemed a very likely contender. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOY9qotmKaLUw3sTNcGh03gwd3aDRP6u4eSCgHxA4NQP8ankPe_UOGaSEpdeV518f6eVw3yAHmS7lgWWPS0fMWpOa63gunq49mIwjjwJYCDcgmfZ-5LL6sYT9ujqaKvGXru004qXu2ciY/s1600/OG+%2526+PB.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="302" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOY9qotmKaLUw3sTNcGh03gwd3aDRP6u4eSCgHxA4NQP8ankPe_UOGaSEpdeV518f6eVw3yAHmS7lgWWPS0fMWpOa63gunq49mIwjjwJYCDcgmfZ-5LL6sYT9ujqaKvGXru004qXu2ciY/s320/OG+%2526+PB.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Globocnik and Bouhler</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Yet I was reluctant to use
him because of <i>Fatherland</i> (where he
is the main villain). It was only after I read a biography of him that I
realised his potential. Although Robert Harris depicts the psychopathic
qualities of his character well, he omitted lots of the bizarre details. I
included many of these in <i>Madagaskar</i>:
Globocnik’s two wedding rings, his alcoholism, womanising, horsemanship, love
of Austrian folk music. All this is true and made him spring alive for me. So
is the fact he never employed women older than twenty-four and that he used to
speak to Himmler while lying on the floor, raising alternate legs as he agreed
with the Reichsführer. As mentioned in my novel, Globocnik had a real breakdown
in 1943.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br />
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">[Spoiler alert.] In the
final chapters of the book a replacement for Globus is mentioned – Herr
Bischoff. Again he was a real person and was considered by Heydrich to run the
island. Bischoff’s reign would have been different to Bouhler’s and especially
Globus’s. He was an accountant and married to a half-Jewish wife. This
illustrates well my feelings on alternative history. Often people say to me
this or that couldn’t have happened, but how can they be certain? All of the
three men above when credible candidates as Governor of Madagaskar. Each would
have ruled the island in a very different manner.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-68886382359913216752016-04-23T11:00:00.000+01:002016-08-22T10:32:40.530+01:00F is for FERRIS WHEEL<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">When I’m working on scenes
I’m always looking for ways to make them more original or unexpected. Initially
Burton and Tünscher’s first meeting was set in an anonymous bar in
Roscherhafen. After working on it for a while I was happy enough with the
dialogue but thought the background should be more interesting. This is where
the research kicked in and I decided to move it to the Tiergarten (the zoo).
Bizarre as they may seem, the scenes set in Roscherhafen are all based on real
places the Nazis intended to build, including an ‘education and entertainment
park’ – this a decade before Disney started building in California.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The memory is an odd thing.
While writing these scenes I was trying to imagine what it would be like to
drink steins of beer and eat sauerkraut beneath boiling skies... then in a
flash it came back to me that I have actually experienced this. There used to
be a German African theme park in Florida called Busch Gardens. It is long
gone, but I went there in the 80s and remembered the bierkeller with the
waitresses dressed in traditional Bavarian costumes and the heavy German food
in the sweltering Florida climate. I’m positive there was an oompha band.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">As well as originality in a
scene, it’s also important for me to delay giving away too much of the plot too
quickly. As the drafts of Chapter 14 were laid down I realised that the key moment
was upon the reader too soon. I needed a device to withhold it that went beyond
Burton and Tünscher pausing to order another round of drinks – hence the FERRIS
WHEEL. I’m sure you got this as a reference to Graham Greene’s <i>The Third Man</i>. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<div class="MsoCommentText">
The Ferris wheel in <i>The
Madagaskar Plan</i> is described as ‘the largest in the world’. My US
copyeditor picked up on this fact and said that the time it took for a complete
revolution – 4 minutes, 41 seconds – was too fast. In her diligence she had
checked the timings with similar sized wheels: ‘In Japan, the 115-meter
Daikanransha takes 16 minutes to go around; the London Eye (135 m) takes 30
min’. That’s what I call an attention to detail! The reason I settled on 4 minutes,
41 seconds is because that’s how the long the Ferris wheel sequence is in <i>The Third Man</i>. I admit this is an
utterly obscure reference.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The other reason I referred
to the Graham Greene scene is because it’s about two characters, Holly Martins
and Harry Lime, who don’t trust each other. This mirrors the relationship
between Burton and Tünscher. Thus far I haven’t said a great deal about the new
characters in the book, something I’ll redress in the coming few blogs. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-88396675879917617662016-04-02T10:14:00.000+01:002016-08-22T10:19:26.317+01:00H is for the HUNGARIAN MELODY<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Schubert’s HUNGARIAN MELODY
appears several times in the book, a motif that links past and present. When I
wrote <i>The Afrika Reich</i> I also wrote
extensive backstories for the characters, including Burton and Madeleine’s
first meeting. I decided that Madeleine should be playing the piano at that
moment. But what music? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgS8yMcx65PFBFpePyotfXQkb-CD8uhbVP5vOw_iv7js7EoLSgAtL_ZsoJxMJVUrbLhUOlVNhSmm81FuOsbpHFnsTPOHX59k4CISwVmopo9ivD6whtSgqvkkxHzp04z40mZOEj4CIvlCPY/s1600/Mad+Fingers.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgS8yMcx65PFBFpePyotfXQkb-CD8uhbVP5vOw_iv7js7EoLSgAtL_ZsoJxMJVUrbLhUOlVNhSmm81FuOsbpHFnsTPOHX59k4CISwVmopo9ivD6whtSgqvkkxHzp04z40mZOEj4CIvlCPY/s400/Mad+Fingers.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">A contemporary song seemed out
of keeping with her character, so it would have to be something classical. Certain
clichés came to mind – such as the ‘Moonlight Sonata’ or Rachmaninoff – but I
wanted something more unusual. I toyed with the second movement of
Shostakovich’s Second Piano Concerto, though this presented all sorts of
alternative history problems because the piece wasn’t composed until 1957, more
than a decade after the USSR had been defeated by the Nazis in my world. Which
begs the question, what would have happened to Dmitri in this new world order?
I can’t say, though even if he had survived I doubt there would have been much
time for music in what was left of Russia. I often get asked arcane questions
like this by readers: what would have happened to so-and-so, how would
such-and-such event have played out? Mostly I have to wing it or admit I don’t
know. Although I’ve constructed the immediate alternative history of my world,
I don’t have an exhaustive store of knowledge for every person or event
post-1940!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">I digress. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Since the scene where Burton
and Madeleine meet for the first time wasn’t in <i>Afrika Reich</i>, I didn’t need any more detail than ‘Madeleine is
playing the piano’, so I put the question to one side. When I started the first
draft of <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i> I
happened to be listening to <i>Woman’s Hour</i>
[a daily radio programme on the BBC for foreigner readers of the blog] where
Imogen Cooper was being interviewed about her latest CD: a collection of
Schubert’s piano works. She played ‘The Hungarian Melody’. I heard it only once
– but it was an instant earworm and I couldn’t get the tune out of my head for
days.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">There’s no deeper
significance to it appearing in the book than that. As much as I like to build
layers of references sometimes details arrive through whimsy or happenstance –
and nothing more.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">If you’re not familiar with
‘The Hungarian Melody’ you must listen to it. It’s a wonderful piece,
mischievous and melancholy. You can find a recording of it here:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-7830579497612997842016-03-18T13:00:00.000+00:002016-04-05T12:35:07.537+01:00N is for NACHTSTADT<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Whereas set pieces such as the
Ark, hospital, dam and Diego were in my mind from early on in the writing of <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i>, the NACHTSTADT sequence
came late in the process.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh43k8_9n-IfpR_aCG5wdhtVgEzqx_W6h4zUt9xKDWV_2MGFFE9tHhu12VPpZE0doaHWxNrEQuNahQ7aJM2iUW0GExdlTe0Nf-brIz-FiMMRtgoq5eorfcxJA5OPGJDldE_2R2wQMDwY2M/s1600/CirceOdysseus.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh43k8_9n-IfpR_aCG5wdhtVgEzqx_W6h4zUt9xKDWV_2MGFFE9tHhu12VPpZE0doaHWxNrEQuNahQ7aJM2iUW0GExdlTe0Nf-brIz-FiMMRtgoq5eorfcxJA5OPGJDldE_2R2wQMDwY2M/s400/CirceOdysseus.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The inspiration for Nachtstadt...</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">[Spoiler alert.] It went
through multiple incarnations – the only consistent thread being it was the
store where Salois gets replacement explosives. At one point it was on an
island in the middle of a lake (a real place I passed on the road to Mandritsara);
in another it was an oil-rig like structure protected by Walküre gunships. The
actual action changed as well, including at one point Globus being present and
taking Madeleine hostage. None of these worked – they struck me as overly
dramatic, more akin to the train/helicopter chase in the first book and I was
consciously trying to move away from such ‘excessive’ set pieces. For months I
was unable to find an alternative.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">As always when I’m stuck I
turn back to Homer and began thinking of the scene set on Circe’s island – where
Odysseus’s crew are turned to pigs by magic. Then when flicking through the
hundreds of photographs I took in Madagascar I came across this one:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKtUIINyKd15dcbnyRDs55Ak9r5tKcZtAITTo-naBWq6-Z-Xti1_bqIhdRBGXFhtRVfQMDKS6_w_TAl8xtf_mixrj-hhMLvG0dJTnm7InCjmWreheWb_7OP3FmclKF0iiWcGjXKHFjQeE/s1600/IMG_0223.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKtUIINyKd15dcbnyRDs55Ak9r5tKcZtAITTo-naBWq6-Z-Xti1_bqIhdRBGXFhtRVfQMDKS6_w_TAl8xtf_mixrj-hhMLvG0dJTnm7InCjmWreheWb_7OP3FmclKF0iiWcGjXKHFjQeE/s320/IMG_0223.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Through that odd, alchemic
process that is creation – and tying into the modus operandi of the second rebellion
– the location for the scene became a gigantic pig farm. So far all the places
I’ve described in Madagascar were based on real locations. Nachtstadt was
entirely made-up, though with a nod to reality: Himmler did have several farms
where he experimented with livestock techniques.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">In keeping with the Homeric
reference, I initially wanted to name the place after Circe’s island but that
is called Aeaea which I thought was too difficult to pronounce; the Roman
equivalent, Ponza, sounded too comic (and Japanese) to me. So I turned to James
Joyce. The Circe equivalent in <i>Ulysses</i>
is set in Nighttown, the red light district of Dublin... which translated into
German is, of course, Nachtstadt.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">N is also for Nightingale<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">I often take a long time to
come up with the right name for a character. In the meantime, while plotting or
writing, I need some signifier (I hate using just A, B, C etc). In <i>Fatherland</i> there is an American diplomat
called Henry NIGHTINGALE. So when I came to write the scenes with America’s
envoy to Madagaskar, and before I had a name for him, I temporarily used
Nightingale. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">I never found an alternative
and as time went on the name just stuck. So I confess indolence on my behalf
rather than some clever reference! In the early drafts Nightingale had a much
larger role in the book – but it got trimmed back. [Spoiler alert.] If you want
to know how he originally fitted into the plot I suggest you compare the
description of him in Chapter 34 with that of the unnamed fourth man at the
table with Rolland, Salois et al in Chapter 13. I based my description on the
assistant director and occasional actor Jerry Ziesmer.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVuLTY5d2wDnRI2Gk6cNoidKom3eVLK6abw5P877K8sowNFWVTSbsJvIN0pRGshtlbXcShQI693zhljsCvQxxz67lz1wkVmxVSNggcTciX1pVySsA89khWwwjt_FLc6vbNa5KHIoFVCOI/s1600/Jerry_Ziesmer_001.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="175" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVuLTY5d2wDnRI2Gk6cNoidKom3eVLK6abw5P877K8sowNFWVTSbsJvIN0pRGshtlbXcShQI693zhljsCvQxxz67lz1wkVmxVSNggcTciX1pVySsA89khWwwjt_FLc6vbNa5KHIoFVCOI/s320/Jerry_Ziesmer_001.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jerry Ziesmer</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-50832795690378828672016-03-06T12:12:00.000+00:002016-04-05T12:18:43.449+01:00R is for the RESERVATIONS<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">[Major spoiler alert for all
of this entry.] One of the first plot elements of <i>The</i> <i>Madagaskar Plan</i> I
came up with was the ending, inspired by the climax of <i>Metropolis</i> (one of my favourite films). Plotting is often like
doing a puzzle. I start with a solitary piece and then have to find others around
it to create a picture. The RESERVATIONS are a good example of this.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3SbtIFW9WhIu8X4rP0qH-GeDiL8x1_nQA2c92je7VOPxUSBKqgAfH7wP2HOkd8Qz9DvhN9_4o9ZjS0Z5aDruhCf3WaQOVG9b5iefglZNBHCUhnnAR0lE5wVxQto_yNWNGYTKR8fXVEaM/s1600/Metropolis-flood-scene-980x520.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="336" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3SbtIFW9WhIu8X4rP0qH-GeDiL8x1_nQA2c92je7VOPxUSBKqgAfH7wP2HOkd8Qz9DvhN9_4o9ZjS0Z5aDruhCf3WaQOVG9b5iefglZNBHCUhnnAR0lE5wVxQto_yNWNGYTKR8fXVEaM/s640/Metropolis-flood-scene-980x520.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Filming the flood in <i>Metropolis</i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">In my very earliest notes
for the book I have the following: ‘Ending = apocalyptic flood’. What could
cause such a thing? The only thing I could think of was a dam burst. There is a
brief mention in <i>Afrika Reich</i> about
Hochburg using dams to harness the power of the continent, so it seemed
plausible something similar was happening in Madagascar. I looked to see if
there were any real dams on the island but there aren’t, at least not of any
significance. Then in my research I came across a lucky find. In 1949 France’s
main electricity company sent a team to Madagascar to survey the island’s hydroelectric
potential. Their report – a document running to hundreds of pages – was invaluable
as it not only listed potential rivers that could be used for electricity but
also the drawbacks of them. I knew the dam would have to be in the north of the
island and by a process of elimination settled on the one proposed across the
Sofia River. Then another great detail – the French team feared the river might
carry too much silt, leading to turbine clogging. Rather than discouraging me
this inspired me – because it said something about Globus’s character: he was
prepared to build a folly.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The next question was why
would so many Jews live in the valley of the dam – a potentially dangerous
site. If the creative process is alchemic (as I’ve written elsewhere) or a kind
of puzzle, it is also like weaving a tapestry; individual threads come together
to form an image. Much of this ‘mind weaving’ is an unconscious process. The Nazis
were obsessed with putting Jews in reservations. The most famous of these was
the Lublin Reservation, often considered a precursor to the Madagascar Plan. It
was overseen by Globocnik. So somewhere in my head I made a link between dams
and reservations and they tied together perfectly.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The only thing left to do
was to visit an actual dam. I wanted a remote one, so when I was in the US a
couple of years ago I made a lengthy detour to Idaho and the Hell’s Canyon hydroelectric
plant – upon which the dam in the book is based. As with my trip to Madagascar,
walking the ground was invaluable, providing details I couldn’t have picked up
from books alone: the constant hum of generators; the faint smell of brine from
the reservoir. It also made for an eventful drive, like something out of <i>Duel</i>... but that is a story for another
time.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCJC14BDaoHwHsWIA10xojsrolaDOjhYltNhSGnA-YqSBshfvHwPd2XUPxXCzA5JZ67BXdiYa5-R1VZom2sf0GxyOMOykhNZ_5noMPB_CiBVsTihZcOltbI1S5tRfo2NUA1cNbzJqaDPU/s1600/IMG_2414.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCJC14BDaoHwHsWIA10xojsrolaDOjhYltNhSGnA-YqSBshfvHwPd2XUPxXCzA5JZ67BXdiYa5-R1VZom2sf0GxyOMOykhNZ_5noMPB_CiBVsTihZcOltbI1S5tRfo2NUA1cNbzJqaDPU/s400/IMG_2414.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hell's Canyon Dam, Idaho</td></tr>
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<b><i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">R is also for Rolland<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Vice-admiral Rolland is the
man who gives Salois his mission. Some of you may recognise the name. Admiral
Rolland is also the character that sets Smith and Schaeffer on their mission in
<i>Where Eagles Dare</i>. He was played by
Michael Hornden. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnxm4hfP0VU6ObTKp7AnQL3Hy8eU15gA821sw-TuDu1KnvGIeP_Jn27Yz45pEbH9LefJ8SI-30dqvtWWLCjGNUjQncms2bZGkSaMTZ14HJL08gL7h61WWRBxj_DQ8nCiysOkKlvcE0QaM/s1600/Rolland.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="167" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnxm4hfP0VU6ObTKp7AnQL3Hy8eU15gA821sw-TuDu1KnvGIeP_Jn27Yz45pEbH9LefJ8SI-30dqvtWWLCjGNUjQncms2bZGkSaMTZ14HJL08gL7h61WWRBxj_DQ8nCiysOkKlvcE0QaM/s400/Rolland.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hornden as Rolland in <i>Where Eagles Dare</i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Originally, I wanted to give
Salois the call sign Smith uses, ‘Broadsword’. But in recent years it has
become too ubiquitous, so I settled instead for another, less well known call
sign, one that subtly ties into the plot: ‘Dragonfly’. I’ll leave you to
discover where it’s from...<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-65765344935601244352016-02-23T13:19:00.000+00:002016-02-23T13:19:47.480+00:00P is for PRORA<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Madagascar wasn’t the only
country I went to for research. I also visited Germany. Part of this trip
included the trip to <a href="http://afrikareichtrilogy.blogspot.co.uk/2011/10/dachau_13.html" target="_blank">Dachau </a>which I’ve already described. A few days later I
caught the overnight train from Munich to the Baltic Sea and what was once East
Germany. My destination was PRORA.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">There, in the 1930s, the
Nazis built the largest hotel complex in the world, capable of accommodating twenty
thousand guests at a time (a record unbroken to this day). It is a truly
megalithic structure, the frontage running along the seafront for almost five
kilometres. Because it never had a military purpose, nor was it connected to
the murderous elements of the regime, the building was not torn down after the
war. In fact the authorities didn’t quite know what to do with it, so it has
simply been allowed to decay. Much of the site is now in ruins, fenced off with
trees growing around it. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6ADw3W3iQGNc9Eaz92CdUeONlwR5WLxrdYypMWPms5Lf1zpAZfBG6rysrYgMa7nUDdVNTk8q2sL8CpYQmn7X0YaDxbnAhpvP5yhOTU2ALXYPOv421pGtJjqtmvPyEyF1VmA3JuZzPKqI/s1600/IMG_0802.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="220" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6ADw3W3iQGNc9Eaz92CdUeONlwR5WLxrdYypMWPms5Lf1zpAZfBG6rysrYgMa7nUDdVNTk8q2sL8CpYQmn7X0YaDxbnAhpvP5yhOTU2ALXYPOv421pGtJjqtmvPyEyF1VmA3JuZzPKqI/s400/IMG_0802.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">One section, however, has
been preserved, and it is possible to get a sense of what it was like during
its heyday. Each room was 5 by 2.5 metres with twin beds, a wardrobe, sink and
beige soft furnishings. ‘A holiday cell’, is how Burton describes it in the
book – and he’s not wrong.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">But my lasting impression of
the place wasn’t the grim rooms but the sheer scale of the exterior. A cycle
path runs along the length of the building so it’s possible to ride from one
end to the other. At a decent pace it took me twenty minutes, twenty minutes of
the same monotonous stone-and-window frontage flashing by. And by. And by...<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Prora was meant as a
prototype for numerous holiday resorts that the Nazis intended to build around
the world if they had won the war – from Sweden to Russia to Argentina and of
course Africa which is why it finds its way into my book.</span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvnNVORuoT_9x1zJc0qqVKZ55OJBDmmvZz7oTD1gKSfVu-iSC4UaSUFiNM1R-DLg0md2956CbjPvnzq76945DyEEBWTIwKWv4lEfKchKK2GCCY02GdsjqF5vxPZCftwNmq7r3E4X814Wg/s1600/Prora_WonderArt.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="232" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvnNVORuoT_9x1zJc0qqVKZ55OJBDmmvZz7oTD1gKSfVu-iSC4UaSUFiNM1R-DLg0md2956CbjPvnzq76945DyEEBWTIwKWv4lEfKchKK2GCCY02GdsjqF5vxPZCftwNmq7r3E4X814Wg/s400/Prora_WonderArt.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This artist's impression shows what it would have looked like in Africa<span style="font-size: 12pt;"> </span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<b><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<b><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<b><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">P is also for <i>PHANTOM
MENACE</i> MOMENTS<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7ongSeZvS0xp0WPUgFwJa2h2ZuD8Ol15tfldjEdEQLnuJBAsl-6UwhAjVMLWiititnn0yiw57_vxpdkDlQYeFJOySDTxkJ7hKnlKJhVEuUMbb0OyWLmkbav2GT2BI6EDaWRzLfuzy2PM/s1600/starwarsshadow.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7ongSeZvS0xp0WPUgFwJa2h2ZuD8Ol15tfldjEdEQLnuJBAsl-6UwhAjVMLWiititnn0yiw57_vxpdkDlQYeFJOySDTxkJ7hKnlKJhVEuUMbb0OyWLmkbav2GT2BI6EDaWRzLfuzy2PM/s320/starwarsshadow.jpg" width="224" /></a></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Having spent so long writing
<i>Madagaskar </i>there were often
moments of doubt, in particular I kept asking the question: is it any
good? It would seem a futile activity spending so long on something if it was
rubbish. I always reassured myself it worked... but in the back of my head one
possibility was impossible to silence.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The Phantom Menace</span></i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"> must surely be the most disappointing film experience for my
generation. For years we waited for a continuation of the <i>Star Wars</i> saga, but when it finally
arrived I, along with millions of others, left the cinema with a heavy heart. Yet
I assume Lucas didn’t actively set out to make a bad film. To his own
mind it must have worked... it’s just that what he wanted was not what his audience hoped for. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">That’s what I kept having as
I wrote <i>Madagaskar</i> – <i>PHANTOM MENACE</i> MOMENTS. I thought I was
doing a good job... but what would others think? You end up too close to your
work to know. At least there’s no Jar Jar Binks...<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-41642102849348383772016-02-11T11:59:00.000+00:002016-02-11T11:59:55.802+00:00X is for the Xs ON THE BACK OF UNIFORMS<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Before I continue blogging
about the research trips for <i>The
Madagaskar Plan</i>, time for a brief interlude.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">An unexpected consequence of my research was that I amassed more material than I could possibly use. Whilst
writing I had to decide how much to include. Put in too little and the
world is insufficiently brought to life; too much and the whole thing gets
bogged down. However, some of the details I discovered simply had to be used.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">One of the most horrific
came from my visit to Dachau (see earlier blog <a href="http://afrikareichtrilogy.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Dachau" target="_blank">here</a>). Most people are familiar
with the striped uniforms of prisoners in concentration camps. Inmates were
also forced to wear armbands that identified their ‘crimes’. The yellow Stars
of David for Jews are well known but there were also red triangles for
political prisoners, pink for homosexuals, green for ‘common criminals’
and so on. See image below.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-Q-uT_zNuRewm_aacFjQHGR2LR8PWqvn74E8jFqQPgMxFsXXQwcfXfd0ltrm0Fbu_HmvpHd068hdopqJ_Ghl6npOlOu1UW8ZxP8emVPXN6_ekcOSuHBIVmdRDaIrTJBHXxmIuLJf0AjU/s1600/KL+PRISONER+INSIGNIA+FOR+BLOG.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="312" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-Q-uT_zNuRewm_aacFjQHGR2LR8PWqvn74E8jFqQPgMxFsXXQwcfXfd0ltrm0Fbu_HmvpHd068hdopqJ_Ghl6npOlOu1UW8ZxP8emVPXN6_ekcOSuHBIVmdRDaIrTJBHXxmIuLJf0AjU/s400/KL+PRISONER+INSIGNIA+FOR+BLOG.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 16px;">At the exhibition in Dachau there was a further, macabre detail. </span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Those prisoners who were
deemed trouble-makers or likely to attempt escape, had uniforms with large Xs
painted or sewn on their backs: the idea being that should they try to break
out, they would make easy targets for the guards.</span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">I hope <i>Madagaskar</i> is rich with such details. Ninety per cent of them are real
(including the most unlikely ones). On occasion I would make something up –
either because the record was lacking or I wanted to create something to fit
with the ‘aesthetic’ of the novel. If I’ve done my job properly you won’t be
able to tell the fake from the real.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-51799176595867580772016-01-26T14:03:00.000+00:002016-01-26T14:03:07.146+00:00D is for Diego<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">DIEGO Suarez – a huge
natural harbour on the northern tip of Madagascar – is the setting for some of
the climactic scenes of the book. It was also the final stage of my
journey around Madagascar.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQbDyIGImfs-kTaydaZkAmzjFf2bPF3_2ZcTUgg5ll2nwsvqqn7QUqFQpqEkY4U0Om6iO6i2_GAhYJaZfyKWyxD5BaBm-ZG7NMeyWAS4azhIooyR85Qs5dK3Ksw0B7iOI7eG-xA0LZErQ/s1600/Welcome+to+Diego.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQbDyIGImfs-kTaydaZkAmzjFf2bPF3_2ZcTUgg5ll2nwsvqqn7QUqFQpqEkY4U0Om6iO6i2_GAhYJaZfyKWyxD5BaBm-ZG7NMeyWAS4azhIooyR85Qs5dK3Ksw0B7iOI7eG-xA0LZErQ/s400/Welcome+to+Diego.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Welcome to Diego!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">I reached the city in the late
afternoon and have two particularly vivid memories of my arrival. The first was
the dense perfume of ylang-ylang plants; the second was having a hot shower! By
that point I’d been on the road for days and although I’d sometimes had the
luxury of running water, that water had never been heated. In Diego I not only
stayed in what was recognisably a hotel, it had decent plumbing. I can’t tell
you how much I enjoyed that shower. Afterwards I sat on the veranda of my room
which overlooked the Indian Ocean. Writing is often a miserable business but on
occasions I can think of no better profession.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Diego Suarez was named after
two Portuguese admirals: Diego Diaz and Fernando Suarez, which is rather forgiving
given that on arrival in 1506 they murdered and enslaved the locals. Despite
attempts to revert back to its native name of Antsiranana most people still call
it Diego. It is a pleasant port city: a fusion of Indian, African and Arab
influences. Bustling and lushly tropical. During my visit hot winds seemed to
blow continually. Just outside the city are empty beaches of white sand and azure
waves. But I wasn’t here as a tourist. On my first morning I had an appointment
at the city’s naval base. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">There’s been a military base
on the site since the French established one in 1885. From my research for <i>Afrika Reich</i> I knew the Nazis wanted to
build a naval fortress here (it’s specifically mentioned in the Bielfeld
Memorandum, their blueprint for the continent if they had conquered it). Over
the years this fortress had grown in my mind until it became a towering polygon
of steel and concrete housing aircraft carriers, submarines and battleships. The
reality was...er... rather different. Although the port impressed with its
sheer size, it was utterly dilapidated, and with Madagascar being so poor its
navy is hardly formidable. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Nevertheless, the Base
Commander, the improbably named Randrianarisoa Marosoa Nonenana, was keen to give
me a guided tour – and once again this walking the ground proved invaluable
when I came to write the final scenes at Diego: from how the landscape tiers
down to the water, to the palm trees sprouting among the barracks; the positions
of the gun emplacements and the layout of the workshops.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0z0v9IkA3mPZeYrZrWZxSorzXN16_vEHV-tCEXwetcZvitWRQJwL_NXO_B5DrN4HQx2gBrUq0OOjnEmB_EXc_LIVDsFxDywPqYw5QPbuAVzno7Q3UiAhYBhsogmPFOpXJdppU9YNveBM/s1600/Gun+Enplacement+DS.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0z0v9IkA3mPZeYrZrWZxSorzXN16_vEHV-tCEXwetcZvitWRQJwL_NXO_B5DrN4HQx2gBrUq0OOjnEmB_EXc_LIVDsFxDywPqYw5QPbuAVzno7Q3UiAhYBhsogmPFOpXJdppU9YNveBM/s400/Gun+Enplacement+DS.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Across the water there was
also a huge runway – which gave me an unexpected motive for Salois’s mission. As
an aside, in the months before my visit, the US military had been wanting to
use the runway as a staging post for bombers to Afghanistan. The appearance of
a strange foreigner fuelled all sorts of rumours amongst the Malagasy sailors.
In the few hours I was at the base word got back to me that I must be a CIA agent
casing the place out. The other alternative – that I was a British writer
researching a book – was dismissed as too improbable.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<b><i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">D is also for DIE HARD</span></i></b></div>
<br />
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkmRfCAV8u_G5um7W4zjhM4Mtn0-iJxN5GqC_t3U33126babDqKB2u-fg3IBo6_AUxsFmwozhRvbUJzdxYszDdSCP5c86_pOtQj4Zf5IB04ljN8snHwH7m1voiB7CRmOZx3do-ZpqRREk/s1600/Die.Hard_.1988.720p.BrRip_.x264.bitloks.YIFY_.mp4_snapshot_00.26.05_2015.04.07_14.17.22.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="170" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkmRfCAV8u_G5um7W4zjhM4Mtn0-iJxN5GqC_t3U33126babDqKB2u-fg3IBo6_AUxsFmwozhRvbUJzdxYszDdSCP5c86_pOtQj4Zf5IB04ljN8snHwH7m1voiB7CRmOZx3do-ZpqRREk/s400/Die.Hard_.1988.720p.BrRip_.x264.bitloks.YIFY_.mp4_snapshot_00.26.05_2015.04.07_14.17.22.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Did you get the reference? This is a clue</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Many readers of the first
book detected multiple references to <i>DIE HARD</i>. As I wrote at the time, none of these were intended, indeed to the
best of my knowledge there’s no allusion to the film anywhere in <i>Afrika Reich</i>. Nevertheless people were adamant,
so when I came to <i>Madagaskar</i> I
thought I’d put an extended reference to the film in the book. Doubtless, this
time round no one will identify it as such! Did you spot it?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-79115789252997644202016-01-26T14:02:00.000+00:002016-01-26T14:02:02.197+00:00M is for MANDRITSARA<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">On a map the journey from
Antsohihy to MANDRITSARA looks nothing: 100 miles along Route 32. The reality
is a bit more daunting. Although a paved road was built in the 1960s very
little maintenance has been carried out since. The annual cyclone season
has battered it for decades. We set out at 7am. In a few places the tarmac was
fine, but mostly it was as pitted as the lunar surface, including several
‘potholes’ that threatened to swallow up our four-wheel drive. At one point our
jeep literally disappeared beneath the surface of the road – something I now
regret not photographing. The journey took seven hours – but whatever it lacked
in speed was made up for by the sheer drama of the landscape. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgy4PhdCRNxd0LfAHzxV7PT_a-zNLiz5Rvlw5JL7TXAnm8lUDcNkaDXJMzPvfbaSBB7XQFv4ZxBECcTo0AlLNUlieVkYclDxRrHtRg-JmhGPc9yGygcIgMnAn2rNh9o7JYL9w-Ltqw3s4/s1600/Landscape+Road+to+Mand.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgy4PhdCRNxd0LfAHzxV7PT_a-zNLiz5Rvlw5JL7TXAnm8lUDcNkaDXJMzPvfbaSBB7XQFv4ZxBECcTo0AlLNUlieVkYclDxRrHtRg-JmhGPc9yGygcIgMnAn2rNh9o7JYL9w-Ltqw3s4/s400/Landscape+Road+to+Mand.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Landscape on the road to Mandritsara</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">I should point out a small
detail about the book and my research trip. <i>The
Madagaskar Plan</i> is mostly set in April, during the rainy season. I
travelled in September when it was dry because many of the roads are impassable
during the wet months. So I had to imagine the landscape I saw not as gold and
brown and taupe – but as a lush emerald.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Mandritsara is one of the
most remote places I’ve ever visited. Even my guide, a native Malagasy with
twenty years of tour experience, had never been there. On the long, torturous
drive we stopped at a village and so unusual was it to see a tourist that
everyone in the village (or so it seemed) wanted to say hello and shake my
hand.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Finally, under grey skies
and an oppressive heat, we reached Mandritsara. It sits in the Sofia Valley
(see R is for...) and in the book is the location of a secret Nazi hospital
that conducts unspeakable experiments. There is a real missionary hospital in
the town – which is where I stayed during my visit (the town not being
over-blessed with alternative accommodation). The hospital – with its
courtyards and carmine brick walls – was to become the basis for the hospital
in the book, though the latter is on a much bigger scale. I should also add
that there is no connection between the two. Indeed the real one is a
missionary hospital that does work for the local community and surrounding
area. I was shown round by its administrator, Dr David Mann. I always feel
humbled by people who give up their lives for the sake of others.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOAsVPAzNKwo6__bl4beZ-p4a_Z_nnDUJGuHfosqTgL55JT59s4Nm8BYRsINgR2kHEHnjWCUronSz33n0ZeWpDRBDRsNQEyfgW5KKgn47KU5VmOVB2Iyxzkc-aoTip35l0QWzAlgTldRs/s1600/View+of+hospital+from+water+tower.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOAsVPAzNKwo6__bl4beZ-p4a_Z_nnDUJGuHfosqTgL55JT59s4Nm8BYRsINgR2kHEHnjWCUronSz33n0ZeWpDRBDRsNQEyfgW5KKgn47KU5VmOVB2Iyxzkc-aoTip35l0QWzAlgTldRs/s400/View+of+hospital+from+water+tower.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Part of the hospital, as seen from the top of its water tower</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">It was sobering to see the
primitive conditions of the hospital in comparison to what we expect in the
west. If ever you complain about the NHS or equivalent – you should come to a
place like this. But enough moralising. The tour of the hospital prompted many
unexpected ideas for the book. At the end I climbed to the top of the water
tower and had a spectacular view of the valley as the sun began to dip. In the
distance I could make out another complex of buildings and as dusk approached I
went to visit. [Spoiler alert.] It turned out it was an abandoned colonial
school from the 50s, and exploring it as the night descended, alone and with a
vague sense of foreboding, I had a moment of inspiration for when Burton
reaches the hospital at Mandritsara...<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<b><i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">M is also for MICROCLIMATE<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Later on in my trip I
visited Montaigne D’Ambre national park. It has nothing to do with the book
(though Salois does mention it towards the end) but since it is a couple hours
drive from Diego, and since the chances of me returning are slim, I
thought I’d take the opportunity to hike and camp there. One detail about the
place I must share. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-jSpn0Jc6FbXW1d59IHkVkUGDmR-zXU7UXgtZFAHhkdckB6l9-70g_DP6GxOrb_fkBBiYmtvSDVf3O9usRkljkNuzmckHj2GtJsj-O1x2sgqt-7bqwVzmjd38YfVYoFCf69g6Es3luaQ/s1600/CIMG2742.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-jSpn0Jc6FbXW1d59IHkVkUGDmR-zXU7UXgtZFAHhkdckB6l9-70g_DP6GxOrb_fkBBiYmtvSDVf3O9usRkljkNuzmckHj2GtJsj-O1x2sgqt-7bqwVzmjd38YfVYoFCf69g6Es3luaQ/s320/CIMG2742.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">One of Montaigne D'Ambre's many waterfalls</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Montaigne D’Ambre has a
MICROCLIMATE, the park being enclosed by a ring of mountains; a microclimate
much chillier than the surrounding landscape. I noticed it as soon as I entered
the park – but more so as we left. By that point I’d been there three days,
three days of cold rain and being wrapped up in T-shirt, shirt, hoodie, jacket,
two pairs of socks and a hat. As we (guide, driver and me) left the park we
passed out of the micro climate and in the space of no more than ten foot went from
being cold to sweltering. It was like stepping through a barrier. We had to
stop the jeep, pile out and strip back down to our T-shirts. One of the more
bizarre experiences of my trip.</span></div>
<br />
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<br /></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-81666650091729885142016-01-26T14:01:00.000+00:002016-01-26T22:09:34.083+00:00A is for ANTSOHIHY<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">From Tana I took a plane to
Mahajunga (Mazunka in the book, where the radar station is). Internal flights –
on the unfortunately named national carrier, Air Mad – are a hair-raising
experience of propellers, turbulence and crazy pilots, but necessary given the
size of the island. At Mahajunga I was met by my guide and driver who would be my
constant companions over the next few weeks of travel; luckily we got on well.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Our first destination was Ankarafantsika
National Park where I spent several days trekking through the jungle to get a
sense of what it would be like for Burton and the other characters as they
moved around the island. Particularly memorable was a night hike, the forest
thick and loud with insects and tree frogs. As it happens, nearly all these
journey scenes were cut from the book (word length again) but it was still a
useful experience to understand the physical demands put on my characters.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRUE4Wt9NvaKLF9UeFRcvW38hXAKhxqXbWC_kbkzkonblqJguDiMOvcOVWMXIe52r6zLzAId5tzFGCJERPSt-HmiaXkvgcZ39StuJfXF4aXisawH73fRNcpKrzve6LsfwmMi547u4FxLk/s1600/Heads+Mahajunga.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRUE4Wt9NvaKLF9UeFRcvW38hXAKhxqXbWC_kbkzkonblqJguDiMOvcOVWMXIe52r6zLzAId5tzFGCJERPSt-HmiaXkvgcZ39StuJfXF4aXisawH73fRNcpKrzve6LsfwmMi547u4FxLk/s400/Heads+Mahajunga.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sculpture at the entrance of Ankarafantsika National Park<br />
<br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Next was the town of ANTSOHIHY,
a ten hour drive from Ankarafantsika; we had to be there by dusk. Travelling on
Madagascan roads is not advisable after nightfall, a combination of poor road
conditions (and obviously no lighting), wild animals wandering into your path,
and banditry. So we left first thing. In the year the book is set, 1953, the
drive would have been through dense jungle but all the forest has long since
been cut down. Deforestation is a major issue on the island. Several times on
my journey I saw the land either side of me literally being slashed-and-burned.
There’s something apocalyptic about travelling along roads bordered with fire.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Antsohihy, or Antzu as it is
called in the book, is one of the key locations of the narrative. In reality,
it’s a forgotten, nowhere place in the north-west of the island that merited
only six lines in my guide book. Tourists rarely come here; it’s one of the
most obscure places I’ve ever visited. I arrived at dusk to the most dramatic
of sights. A lilac sky, growing darker by the second, and in the distance the
ridge of a hill on fire (more slash-and-burn) giving the impression of a great
sickle of flame around the town. It was an image I used at the end of Chapter 43.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">With little tourism, there’s
not much call for accommodation so my base for the next few days would be one
of several dilapidated bungalows inside a compound – the closest Antsohihy has
to a hotel. The first thing I remember about arriving at the place is the
mosquitoes. I’m rarely bitten by insects but the second I stepped out of the
jeep the air around me was electrified with them, my arms black and crawling...
a detail I incorporated into the book. Another detail which you’ll recognise
when you’ve read <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i>
was my room: corrugated tin roof, breeze blocks painted white and behind a
partition, a bucket of water that was my ‘shower’. Dinner was served in an
outbuilding and I assumed I would be the only guest but as I entered I heard
voices. English voices. It turned out that the BBC camera crew filming David
Attenborough’s series on Madagascar was also in town.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">There are no street maps of
Antsohihy and wanting the scenes there to be as accurate as possible, the
next morning I set out to draw my own. Since foreigners are so rare here, my
guide felt uncomfortable leaving me by myself so together we explored the streets
and backroads, sometimes on foot, sometimes in the jeep. It was punishingly
hot. But the experience furnished me with a wonderful array of details that I
could only have learnt by being there. There was the lie of the ground and how
the whole town slopes down to the river; an old colonial mansion painted a vile
acid green; the abundance of mango trees and great spewing fountains of magenta
bougainvillea; a long, snaking road named after a man called Boriziny, though
who he was or why the road had been named after him was lost to the
inhabitants.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">On the final day I made my way to the docks. Antsohihy is on the Analalava River which connects it
to the coast. Years ago barges brimming with plantation crops made this
journey. Now most of the agriculture has gone. The river is quiet, the docks
rotting. And on a warehouse I came across some graffiti. I did try and think of
some clever link between it and the end of this section, but the picture
probably says it better:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrZfLRH4Lbn5M3cSch50e6iZ2i5qxC1irFK8ZaV8q6GRoH8Ybyug-j9Bf46bTH6O61kXNoUtXXAFwMbbeOD_A2IDd_M6g_9pzyqfBlkASXb_Z1wql6HVrLEmbTJYklhRWdAGbQulT8bqM/s1600/Antzu+Graffiti.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrZfLRH4Lbn5M3cSch50e6iZ2i5qxC1irFK8ZaV8q6GRoH8Ybyug-j9Bf46bTH6O61kXNoUtXXAFwMbbeOD_A2IDd_M6g_9pzyqfBlkASXb_Z1wql6HVrLEmbTJYklhRWdAGbQulT8bqM/s400/Antzu+Graffiti.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">A is also for ANKARANA<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">After Antsohihy I travelled
to Mandritsara (which will be the subject of my next blog entry). Mandritsara
is literally on a road to nowhere, so once I finished there I had to retrace my
steps and spend another night in Antsohihy before heading north again to the ANKARANA
Special Reserve. This doesn’t feature in the book but is worth mentioning for
its geological rarity.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Ankarana is a limestone
massif that rises out of the jungle. It is a strange and extraordinary
landscape, riddled with crocodile caves and one of the few examples in the
world of ‘tsingy’: protrusions of limestone that have been eroded by rainwater
to form jagged pinnacles. Too sharp and delicate to walk on, you view them from
above on swaying bridges that reminded me of that scene in <i>Indiana Jones & the Temple of Doom</i>.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilHRvU73fn5PmQggLNC5ZyNzaeEnwKhnUEfp-G-ss-7rcRO3fJUy37YFKyfOPs_YnGbANDFXV2PtxUM9HuRJYJ51aSbizMT7onVsOPgzYfXgAnuTmOx-20lRJ6C4PC7MzSP96KUmyKQOk/s1600/Swing+Bridge.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilHRvU73fn5PmQggLNC5ZyNzaeEnwKhnUEfp-G-ss-7rcRO3fJUy37YFKyfOPs_YnGbANDFXV2PtxUM9HuRJYJ51aSbizMT7onVsOPgzYfXgAnuTmOx-20lRJ6C4PC7MzSP96KUmyKQOk/s400/Swing+Bridge.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-19820324802108454942016-01-26T14:00:00.000+00:002016-01-26T14:00:00.965+00:00T is for TANA<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHSlhDbHydnlbZS__otONGqGnXeaPszvr4QGe1W_n6_TKPQxlAivfOHab4hg6kDWD1LqkTa64hvauOo2mk0SY7pw6ax73rOwQqumdnxShFcEvPph2x2l3pOgKBg6jVM2v1vxYyJ4eFs4o/s1600/Standing+nwhere+WH+stands.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHSlhDbHydnlbZS__otONGqGnXeaPszvr4QGe1W_n6_TKPQxlAivfOHab4hg6kDWD1LqkTa64hvauOo2mk0SY7pw6ax73rOwQqumdnxShFcEvPph2x2l3pOgKBg6jVM2v1vxYyJ4eFs4o/s400/Standing+nwhere+WH+stands.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Standing where Hochburg stands</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">TANA – or to give it its
full name Antananarivo (literally: the city of a thousand warriors) – is the
capital of Madagascar. It’s a long journey there: London to Paris for the
connecting flight, then eleven hours down and across Africa to the Indian Ocean
and southern hemisphere. Arriving was not for the faint-hearted. The plane landed
at what looked like an abandoned airport. Along with four hundred fellow
passengers I had to hurry across the tarmac into a suffocatingly humid arrivals
hall. There were no queues, just an interminable scrum to get through.
Immigration documents had to be filled out by hand, in triplicate, and
presented to two different desks in order to get my passport stamped. The diary
I kept while travelling simply reads, ‘ABSOLUTE CHAOS’. However, no matter how
wearing it was (the heat, the press of bodies, screaming babies, an hour to get
to the front), it occurred to me that it would have been nothing compared to the
bedlam millions of Jews would have faced arriving in Nazi Madagaskar.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Next morning I began my
exploration of Tana proper. I was staying in the suburbs and to get to the
centre had to drive past shanty towns and brick factories, paddy fields, and canal
banks with literally miles of washing laid out to dry on them. Tana reminded me
of many big Africa cities: overcrowded, chaotic and slightly shabby, a
bricolage of colonial architecture and more recent concrete blocks. It was also
full of colour and a vibrancy that cities in the developed world just don’t possess.
The lower town is truly labyrinthine, navigation around it made all the harder
by the fact many streets don’t have names or that the names change regularly
depending on which dictator is in power. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">My most vivid memory is the
main marketplace, especially the butchers where sausages and great racks of
zebu rib (the local cattle) hung beneath red canopies, dripping blood and buzzing
with flies. There was no sign of any refrigeration. I’ll leave the smell to
your imagination.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiO841dkAJxVEhwA3ngCvY9WHobkYcqrOsfB2TDByyiduvLg0zM8CibNd288LnYiSpU6BbLhQ4v4oFif8CkDMxpC0D1SlnN0nvZ3kfWxJ6RcRV5azREKRdGahPMtzCQTnF4vRtrib7LvJ8/s1600/Meat+Market.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiO841dkAJxVEhwA3ngCvY9WHobkYcqrOsfB2TDByyiduvLg0zM8CibNd288LnYiSpU6BbLhQ4v4oFif8CkDMxpC0D1SlnN0nvZ3kfWxJ6RcRV5azREKRdGahPMtzCQTnF4vRtrib7LvJ8/s400/Meat+Market.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Tana is built on a twelve
hills, the highest of which is crowned with Queen Ranavalona I’s palace. Erected
in the mid-19th century, it was destroyed by fire in 1995, leaving just the
stone shell and has been in a state of permanent renovation since. From here I
had a spectacular view across the plains as they shimmered in a heat haze. A
warm breezed licked my face... just the way it does when Hochburg stands in the
same spot in Chapter 16. The palace was the model for Globus’s headquarters in
the book, not least because its rocky foundations are steeped in blood.
Ranavalona, known as ‘the wicked queen’, was notorious for hurling those who
displeased her off the walls of her palace. It seemed an appropriate base for
the SS. <span style="text-transform: uppercase;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<b><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">T is also for TAFT<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3Q2bjQMzukwpLYRMr49UWmdusyZkqmb22hi7M9ht7bJFkzzOnA__wV68UWgyc4iFaploiIl0t2RAhfXxhyECrMo6aRu9MT88XusyxBXDTVhuHlYTHOr0Hy2Wa_h5HD_KU2eQo2gRmzuA/s1600/Taft+for+President.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3Q2bjQMzukwpLYRMr49UWmdusyZkqmb22hi7M9ht7bJFkzzOnA__wV68UWgyc4iFaploiIl0t2RAhfXxhyECrMo6aRu9MT88XusyxBXDTVhuHlYTHOr0Hy2Wa_h5HD_KU2eQo2gRmzuA/s400/Taft+for+President.jpg" width="301" /></a><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">[Spoiler alert.] One of the
arcs that runs through the trilogy is America’s involvement in Africa: from disengagement
in <i>Afrika Reich</i> through to being a
full player in Book 3. America’s role in the world order is a key part of the
plot in <i>Madagaskar</i>. For this I needed
a president who was isolationist but not slavish so, as well as one with an
ambiguous attitude to the fate of the Jews. At first I thought of making up a
character, but given that most of the historical figures in the book are real,
I felt obliged to do the same with my president. So I started scouring all
presidential candidates and hopefuls of the 1940s and early 50s.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The biggest difficulty with
this was how real history affected my choices. For example, Eisenhower became
president partly on a war-hero ticket; other candidates were popular because
they were tough on Communism, a stance that makes little sense in my world. I
therefore had to disentangle these elements from my selection. Luckily, one
figure soon came to the fore: Robert A. TAFT, a senator from Ohio and son of William
Taft, the 27<sup>th</sup> President. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Taft had narrowly missed
securing the Republican Party’s nomination for president against Eisenhower in
1952, so was a highly credible possibility given my altered timeline. Taft had
another advantage. He died in July 1953 – i.e. three months after the events of
<i>Madagaskar</i> – so if the narrative for
Book 3 changes I have an excuse to ditch him!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-84354824308588871772016-01-23T09:51:00.001+00:002016-01-25T19:25:16.239+00:00T(1) is for TRAVEL, an introduction<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Blink... and five months
have passed since I last posted an entry on this blog. Where does the time go?
It’s quite shocking the speed at which life passes. Anyway, I’m soon to be
moving on to pastures new so I’m going to make a determined effort to finish this
blog. Expect an entry a week now till it’s done. This new determination is
going to start with the TRAVEL I undertook for <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i>.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">One of the things that
disappointed me about the first book was that I never visited the places I was
writing about (see <a href="http://afrikareichtrilogy.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/q-is-for-quimbundo.html" target="_blank">Q is for...</a>). Mostly this was because they were too
dangerous. Although Madagascar is one of the poorest countries on the planet,
it is safe; so for the second book I was determined to travel there and walk
the same ground as my characters. There’s something about being in the real
locations that gives you an edge over just reading about them: it’s
understanding the topography from a specific point; the hue of the light at
sunset; the smell of the earth. All details you could never imagine. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipJKGqw1UASYl6waYkkXm_Ty9IfVxymVcIE3qW0zA0MqSmbc2N7o8Ybvx35i9RP8_dpbYzOPQkmhb68BwaQNYsoMGqgbS5x29B6YM5AS8wmeSDKc7D7Pu1aTq4v-kpU3dsYYyc-ThXSOc/s1600/madagascar-map.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipJKGqw1UASYl6waYkkXm_Ty9IfVxymVcIE3qW0zA0MqSmbc2N7o8Ybvx35i9RP8_dpbYzOPQkmhb68BwaQNYsoMGqgbS5x29B6YM5AS8wmeSDKc7D7Pu1aTq4v-kpU3dsYYyc-ThXSOc/s400/madagascar-map.jpg" width="281" /></a></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Another reason for making
the trip was that some of the locations in <i>The
Madagaskar Plan</i> were so obscure there’s very little information about them
to be found anywhere, either on-line or in specialist libraries. Going was the
only way of knowing.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Early on in the plotting of <i>Madagaskar</i> I knew Burton would follow a
certain route and I wanted to travel it myself. So I’m going to dedicate
several entries in this blog to the places I visited, starting with Tana, one
of the key locations for the exchanges between Hochburg and Globus, the
governor of Madagaskar.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Before then you can get a preview of my research trips in this piece I wrote for Bookbrunch:</span><br />
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><a href="http://www.bookbrunch.co.uk/article_free.asp?pid=researching_madagaskar" target="_blank">Click here to read on...</a></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-12388786536030678112015-08-23T19:00:00.000+01:002016-01-23T09:24:03.782+00:00I is for INFLUENCES<div class="DefaultTNR">
<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The Afrika Reich</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt;"> was very consciously influenced by other works: from Conrad’s <i>Heart of Darkness</i> to films like <i>Where Eagles Dare</i>, from which I took the
‘Men on a Mission’ formula and played around with it. Writing <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i> I made an equally
conscious effort to be less influenced.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">That’s not to say the book
is without INFLUENCES. I’ve already mentioned <i>The Empire Strikes Back</i>; and Sergio Leone looms large again,
especially in the fantastic realism and interweaving narrative strands. I also
drew on Marek Edelman’s accounts of the Jewish uprising in Warsaw (which
inspired the infighting between the Jews in the face of annihilation) as well
as childhood passion for Homer.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">In terms of other literary
influences, two books were significant: William Boyd’s <i>An Ice Cream War</i> and <i>The
Great Gatsby</i>, though traces of them may be hard to discern. The Boyd is set
during the East African campaigns of World War I, all German colonialism, suffocating
cities and rain lashed jungles. It helped with the tone. As did <i>Gatsby</i> which constantly made me reflect
on the purpose of characterisation and concentrated my mind on sentences that were
fresh and precise. I suppose these two books were like stabilisers on a bike: I
had them either side of me during the first drafts but eventually freewheeled
off in my own direction. Having said that, one scene in <i>Madagaskar</i> was heavily influenced by <i>Gatsby</i> – the ‘showdown’ between Jay, Tom and Daisy in the Plaza
Hotel... expect in my version I’ve added the danger of a loaded pistol.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhi6J5MvtJK4GiDjLvDrJQbuEHzMd_u0aOKSwtpA3ANC3kUjKqK7Vz2wGDG6BAkpghkqsb4s1bVpjcoIg9HS8m_ViYO686gGXGrrIVydDY_fJChXGVj3zfoM8OllUqVQyDLkrKEBkgJlqk/s1600/Influences+Blog+Photo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="181" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhi6J5MvtJK4GiDjLvDrJQbuEHzMd_u0aOKSwtpA3ANC3kUjKqK7Vz2wGDG6BAkpghkqsb4s1bVpjcoIg9HS8m_ViYO686gGXGrrIVydDY_fJChXGVj3zfoM8OllUqVQyDLkrKEBkgJlqk/s400/Influences+Blog+Photo.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Levi, Boyd & FSF</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Another important book, for
obvious reasons, was Primo Levi’s <i>If Not
Now,When?</i> a novel based on the true story of Jewish partisans fighting the
Nazis. This informed much of the background of the Jewish uprising and
specifically Salois’s character. Levi’s novel is replete with extraordinary,
vivid details. For example, one of the things I’d never considered before was
how hungry freedom fighters must be surviving in the wilderness. Hunger was
also a painful motif from Marek Edelman and so it became a central theme in the
<i>Madagaskar</i>. On a more light hearted
note, my favourite scene in <i>If Not Now</i>,
apparently based on fact, is when Gedaleh gathers the pumpkins. For all its bitter
logic there’s something rather Leonesque about it, which is why I have Burton
and Tünscher do the same in Chapter 33.</span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-7757929667921145562015-08-09T21:00:00.000+01:002016-02-18T20:06:02.281+00:00Z is for ZELMAN<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">ZELMAN is one of the new
characters in the book and has replaced Kepplar as Hochburg’s deputy in Kongo.
Although he only appears in a couple of chapters he will take on a more
significant role in Book 3. His name comes from the psychedelic, original
version of <i>Afrika Reich</i>, where he was
an engineer building an opera house in the jungle, a character constantly
goaded by Uhrig (remember him?). As I’ve written before I’m quite happy to
recycle names from unpublished projects.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">In fact <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i> is populated with unused characters. In the first
version of <i>Afrika Reich</i> there was
also a sardonic mercenary called Tünscher. And Jared Cranley comes from an
unpublished pirate novel I wrote called <i>An
Oyster for the Devil</i> (I always liked that title).<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The issue of names is
fitting for <i>Madagaskar</i> because one of
its motifs is names and how we use them. Throughout the book names are either
avoided, or changed, or morphed, or used for dramatic effect. This was not a
conscious choice, rather something that crept into the text and I became aware
of at a later stage. Once aware of it, I emphasised it more. Names are
essential to our own identity but we rarely consider them so, perhaps because they’re
as familiar, as taken-for-granted, as limbs. I always wonder, for example,
whether Sting’s closest friends, call him Sting or Gordon (his real name). Similarly
with Michael Caine / Maurice Micklewhite. Did anyone dare call John Wayne
Marion Morrison? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">This is salient to my world
because the original surname of the Hitler family was Schickelgruber; Hitler’s
father changed it in 1876 (thirteen years before his son was born). This may
have been the most devastating name change in history. Some historians believe
Hitler could never have risen to power with the name Schickelgruber. The massed
ranks of Nazis shouting ‘Heil Schickelgruber!’ certainly has a comic ring, and
comedy never led to war or death camps.</span></div>
<br />
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Elsewhere no name in the
book was chosen at random. Mrs Anderson, Pebble, Dr Pavel, to mention a few, are
all references. I’ll leave it to you to discover their origins...<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-46519269574675935292015-08-02T09:00:00.000+01:002016-01-23T09:13:18.783+00:00K is for KEPPLAR<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">You may be surprised to find
KEPPLAR returning for <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i>.
Kepplar?! Wasn’t he burned at the stake in the first book? As it turns out, no.
I always knew he was going to be a main character in the sequel. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">In the first draft of <i>The</i> <i>Afrika
Reich</i>, there was an extra scene that explained Kepplar’s true fate, leaving
the door open for him to appear again. It came at the end of Chapter 34, after
Hochburg threatened to burn him alive. Thirty-Four is the longest chapter in <i>Afrika Reich</i> and this additional scene
stretched it out too far. In subsequent drafts, I therefore moved the scene to
Chapter 37, including it as a flashback while Hochburg looked over the map of
central Africa. As it happens, 37 is the shortest chapter in the book and this
time the Kepplar scene affected the clipped pacing I wanted. Its inclusion
didn’t feel right.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">‘Feeling’ is important to me
as a writer. There are a whole series of technical and structural
considerations when writing a novel and for the most part these guide my
writing. Sometimes, however, things can be technically correct (there was no
reason why the Kepplar scene couldn’t be included in 37) but instinct tells me
otherwise. Writing is a pirouette of technique and intuition. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">In the end I decided to cut
Kepplar’s final scene altogether... which led some readers to point out what
they perceived as an error. When Hochburg’s helicopter takes off in 37 there’s
only one pyre beneath him i.e. Dolan’s. Now you know why: Kepplar was never
burned; his story makes better sense across the two books. I filed away the deleted
scene, and with a few tweaks, it appears as originally written in Chapter 17 of
<i>The</i> <i>Madagaskar Plan</i>. So Gruppenführer Derbus Kepplar is back...<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdPHeprvyi4ar1b7HrsV_FHPJuVGR6eBQFETMYHudESwxTRlbDUYMNf2tWaHSdipBUHRY4iOwr93bWrwuWrXt-CKk88UOZjkBF4ZVltPu9c5H8KLwolZNHL-cfZ0R9SQswVBqbMk9-pQ4/s1600/BTSraiderswaterbig.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="193" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdPHeprvyi4ar1b7HrsV_FHPJuVGR6eBQFETMYHudESwxTRlbDUYMNf2tWaHSdipBUHRY4iOwr93bWrwuWrXt-CKk88UOZjkBF4ZVltPu9c5H8KLwolZNHL-cfZ0R9SQswVBqbMk9-pQ4/s400/BTSraiderswaterbig.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">An even more famous deleted scene... see PPS below</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Except he’s been demoted, to
Brigadeführer. And with his demotion a change of character. Nazis are often
portrayed as fanatics in fiction, but Kepplar is a disillusioned fanatic; a man
increasingly distant, and weary of, the cause that once inflamed. He is also
grappling with the issue of violence. One of the criticisms about the first
book was that people said all the Nazis were violent sadists... when this was empirically
not borne out by the text. Kepplar does not commits a single act of violence in
the whole book. The same is (almost) true in the sequel.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">PS – just in case you miss
it, his parting line in <i>Madagaskar</i> is
meant as a joke!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">PPS – I could think of no
photo to illustrate this entry, so I put ‘deleted scene’ into Google. As you’d
expect hundreds of movie stills came up... but I was intrigued by the one I
have used. It shows Indiana Jones in <i>Raiders
of the Lost Ark</i> clutching hold of a U-boot’s periscope... this explains how
he manages to get to the island where the Ark is opened. I always wondered how
he survived the sea journey. Sometimes you can cut things and the audience
doesn’t notice; others times they are left scratching their heads in
bewilderment. Apparently the scene with Harrison Ford was half-filmed before Spielberg
decided to cut it altogether.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-49234646652802172732015-07-26T19:00:00.000+01:002015-07-26T19:00:22.397+01:00B is for BUTTERSCOTCH<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">Much is made of the ‘Point
of Divergence’ (PoD) in alternative history: the moment where real events end,
and imaginary ones begin. Indeed I’ve written about the subject before (see <a href="http://afrikareichtrilogy.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Divergence%20Point" target="_blank">previous blogs</a>). Most people view the PoD of my world as the British defeat at
Dunkirk. However, as previously stated I don’t view Dunkirk as the moment
history takes a different path; I see it merely as the symptom of a much
earlier change. The true deviation is more subtle and comes before the Nazis
have taken power.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Some people have asked
whether the PoD is the beach burning scene in the first book... those readers
are on to something. But to get to the bifurcation you have to go back even further.
In </span><i style="font-size: 12pt;">The Madagaskar Plan</i><span style="font-size: 12pt;">, the true
Point of Divergence is revealed for the first time. It is Hochburg’s use of the
word ‘BUTTERSCOTCH’ to describe the skin above Eleanor’s heel. I like the idea of
how the course of the 20</span><sup>th</sup><span style="font-size: 12pt;"> Century might turn on a single, illicit
adjective. It strikes me as a more intriguing idea than whether a battle was won
or lost.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjz-gNZs3lX4sDdCnrNbjUXyXjja0_9RmTaWRWgOUOeCB_xJ23bq8noDIZjPUDWFgCa0q8z0iG95Y-ZHim2L_Yv-NaZbnhjAHo0zBpCyl27OOKy7nwTS-PcCp4sX-e6vPijMzKbxii9cHo/s1600/Butterscotch+Feet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="206" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjz-gNZs3lX4sDdCnrNbjUXyXjja0_9RmTaWRWgOUOeCB_xJ23bq8noDIZjPUDWFgCa0q8z0iG95Y-ZHim2L_Yv-NaZbnhjAHo0zBpCyl27OOKy7nwTS-PcCp4sX-e6vPijMzKbxii9cHo/s400/Butterscotch+Feet.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The point I’m trying to make
is that history is not decided by headline events, men of destiny or the fate
of armies – but in the obscure moments of our personal psychology. We make
seemingly unimportant choices and these ripple through time in ways we can
never imagine, informing much later decisions that can have profound effects on
the world. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">The misuse of the word
‘butterscotch’ leads to a multitude of other events and in the prologue of Book
3 you will see the full geopolitical implications of it (which admittedly tie
back to Dunkirk). All this grows from that one misplaced word. History pivots on
the trivial, the insignificant, as all our lives do. Though I should add, you
don’t have to read the book in this way. If you’d prefer to keep Dunkirk as
your PoD, that is your privilege as a reader!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<b><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">B is also for BAYERWEED<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<br /></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">One of the main new characters
in <i>Madagaskar</i> is Tünscher, an old
friend of Burton’s from the Foreign Legion and now an </span>Obersturmführer <span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">in the SS. He’s meant as a trickster figure, someone
neither the reader, nor Burton, knows whether to trust completely. [Spoiler
alert.] To add an extra piquancy to this, and make him more unpredictable, I
gave him a drug habit. Tünscher is a user of BAYERWEEDS.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKbFzEmNGrh6amLFMwbIplPW23iF0NX263QDqpD94v_vr0GL84QAGEuNLLuXp14oJ-KgVfafGa0B3l8S1V6FxnLuosZ0oqD6Z8dB1mMNLTBkberLJfGLRTbENsR2rexnBLKs2Jb6tUOUw/s1600/Tun+Cig.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="217" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKbFzEmNGrh6amLFMwbIplPW23iF0NX263QDqpD94v_vr0GL84QAGEuNLLuXp14oJ-KgVfafGa0B3l8S1V6FxnLuosZ0oqD6Z8dB1mMNLTBkberLJfGLRTbENsR2rexnBLKs2Jb6tUOUw/s320/Tun+Cig.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="DefaultTNR">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt;">During my research I read
how Germans on the Eastern Front were prescribed cigarettes laced with heroin
for lung injuries, and how some soldiers started smoking them to counteract the
freezing air of the Russian winter. A
trade in these cigarettes soon began and it seemed a likely thing for Tünscher
to get involved with. I coined the slang term ‘Bayerweed’ from the German pharmaceutical
company that first developed heroin. Its name: Bayer AG.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4865964480875330371.post-18137426385112958172015-07-16T00:00:00.000+01:002015-07-31T23:31:51.759+01:00OUT NOW!<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitEvhlCwFtR-a5n3Jbv6c4MicaYzbasFM60en2HSD77Zrxd7naw3ucSSIC5LkJn0Gvu7w_eLDRrytEwDv91PaPkb36MyXoRI5ddqhZN8iKITQO8_slu80wyGhbcxJlPsSuJIL0orjQRTU/s1600/Madagaskar+Final+Cover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitEvhlCwFtR-a5n3Jbv6c4MicaYzbasFM60en2HSD77Zrxd7naw3ucSSIC5LkJn0Gvu7w_eLDRrytEwDv91PaPkb36MyXoRI5ddqhZN8iKITQO8_slu80wyGhbcxJlPsSuJIL0orjQRTU/s320/Madagaskar+Final+Cover.jpg" width="208" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">UK hardback cover</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<br />
More than five years after I first sat down to start
writing it, <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i> is
finally OUT NOW! The UK edition was published in hardback today – 16<sup>th</sup>
July 2015.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
There are plenty of previous blog posts that attest to
the trials and tribulations I’ve had writing it and why it has taken so long,
so I won’t repeat them again now. Instead, all I ask is that if you enjoyed <i>The Afrika Reich</i> please do buy the new
book. For US fans, you’ll have to wait another couple of weeks. <i>Madagaskar</i> is published in North America
on 4<sup>th</sup> August. Foreign translations will follow in 2016.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGWNf_vn1bOIagvOr4yofGzG0WOgNtoVW_ndS8mRCvWKGs_mNBxLI5LktR_rZr7L6oMINh323rvyZQ-21Gfr-UUHR-OdU__Y4LGZW0lv_6WEgEByHAmd249SUxBCP9bH1qGk6qroJ4HcM/s1600/US+front+cover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGWNf_vn1bOIagvOr4yofGzG0WOgNtoVW_ndS8mRCvWKGs_mNBxLI5LktR_rZr7L6oMINh323rvyZQ-21Gfr-UUHR-OdU__Y4LGZW0lv_6WEgEByHAmd249SUxBCP9bH1qGk6qroJ4HcM/s320/US+front+cover.jpg" width="212" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">US hardback cover</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
And now, I’m going to hand this particular page over to
you: the readers. Here are some of the first reviews by bloggers. I’ll add more as they come in. (NB - these do include spoilers, so if you'd rather not know plot details, may I suggest you look at them after you've read the book).<br />
<br />
<a href="https://parmenionbooks.wordpress.com/2015/07/03/guy-saville-madagaskar-plan-review/" target="_blank">Parmenion Books</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://graemeshimmin.com/the-madagaskar-plan-book-review/" target="_blank">Fellow alternative history writer, Graeme Shimmin</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://manoflabook.com/wp/book-review-the-madagaskar-plan-by-guy-saville/" target="_blank">Man of la Book</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://bookmuseuk.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/the-madagaskar-plan-by-guy-saville.html" target="_blank">Bookmuse</a></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<br />
If you’d like your own blog included, contact me via Facebook. If you’re not a blogger or don’t have a review
site, feel free to leave a comment below. I always like hearing what you think.</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
Which just leaves me to say that I hope you enjoy <i>The Madagaskar Plan</i>, and as always thank
you for your support.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNoSpacing">
-Guy<o:p></o:p></div>
Guy Savillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02783684707279806529noreply@blogger.com15