E.R.M.: Hmm... looking at this bun tray... I do not see any irradiated currant buns with coloured sparkles...


P.L.S.: Umm... The candy spangles are under the cabinet by the coffee turreen...


E.R.M.: I think you mean...no, by gosh, you're right, it IS a tureen!
Why? Why not an urn? Never mind, I see the inscription... Aggh! How disgusting.


P.L.S.: Just so, old fellah.


E.R.M: Remind me why I'm here?


P.L.S.: You are a short person on the short list for writing a short book.


E.R.M.: Novel.


P.L.S.:Right, but it is paginated and between reasonably hard covers, right?


E.R.M.: Yes, but so is an Health Inspector's Manual.


P.L.S.: Exactly. And if the author of said manual was a short person on a short list...


E.R.M.: Ahhh.... So. Anything for a bit of drumming up of interest, or so my agent says. All right, then. Let's talk about the book, then.


P.L.S.: Is is true that you wrote most of the book while in traction from a biking accident on the M5?


E.R.M.: No.


P.L.S.: Is it true that you wrote the book under strange cicumstances of some sort?


E.R.M.: Depends upon your definition. I was listening to the same track on a Chieftains over and over again during most of it.


P.L.S.: Which track?


E.R.M.: I forget. It was one of their hits. Something with a bodhrain and some bagpipes, I think. Sung in French, I think.


P.L.S.: You are so very fascinating. What's your favorite colour?


E.R.M.: Uh, it's toward the purple end of the spectra, un, it begins with a 'w' and Van Gogh absolutely hated it...


P.L.S.: Okay, back to the book. How long did you take to write it?



E.R.M.: Which one are we talking about? I've worked on so many recently, since I discovered the template program on my Powerbook.



P.L.S.: "Fishwive's Choice". How many books have you written?



E.R.M.: Uh, let me consult my Palm Piglet... Twenty-seven... Ah, "Fishwive's Choice", that's the one the reporters keep asking me about... Ah, and you are asking me about. What are you asking me about it?


P.L.S.: Well, what is it about? Can you give us a synopsis?



E.R.M.: You haven't read it?


P.L.S.: I've read it. I thought you would like to tell us in your own words.


E.R.M.: I did when I wrote the book. Isn't that enough for you? I'm not some grandpa, well, I am, but that's another story. I'm not some oldster sitting around the campfire night after night telling the same stories over and over. I wrote the damn book. Why should I have to reiterate it over and over again?


P.L.S.: Sorry, didn't know it bothered you. I thought the book was an utterly useless waste of time designed to please certain elements of the academic literary community and certain elements of the led-by-the-nose reader's community, with the hopes of a movie sale somewhere down the line. I thought this book was a pay-the-bills sort of thing that once it paid off would allow you to do what you really want to do...


E.R.M.: Why, you little! Uh...that's exactly right. How perceptive of you. I had actually thrown it away twice and had it placed back on my desk by the cleaning lady. I was about to just burn the stupid thing when my agent came over to filch some coffee off me one morning, and a currant bun, without sprinkles, and I hated him just enough at that moment to thrust the stupid thing at him and tell him to earn his fees. Took him less than a week to get a bidding war between vanity publishers going, and I think it cost him less than 2000 monetary units to get it published in it's first run of 800 copies. He sent all the copies to reviewers. Five of them actually read it. One of them mentioned it on a TV show and a website. It took off from there.
Now, it's been picked up by a major junior college printing house that normally does key maps and chapbooks for the blind. Then it was submitted to, oh, I don't know, some kind of small press initiative contest supported by a regional council and thence to the current brouhaha contest. I am now famous and interviewed all over the place.
My agent has now retired and raises bonsai poodles for fun.

Are we done now?


P.L.S.: I suppose we must be. Thank you.



E.R.M.: Thank you.


P.L.S.: This has been P. Lingo Sploy, for Irritating Public Radio. Thank you for listening and tune in next week when we will be interviewing Earon G. Bra, the author of "That Star Just Moved!".
Good evening.