I spent my teenage years writing comedy short stories. Eventually I would join a writers’ circle and read these out, but that’s as far as they ever got. Around the year 1999 I decided I wanted to become a serious writer, and got into some very pretentious high literature, such as James Joyce, or Juan Goytisolo, and I dreamed of literary stardom and making a difference. I conceived of a book which would be so special that it wouldn’t even have a name, that’s how pretentious I was back then. At the time, I was young, enthusiastic, newly out, with my first partner and my first flat. My hobby was travelling all over the world, and I really thought I was going to be the most famous writer who ever lived. Ha!
I wrote the book between 2000 and 2004 and then promptly never looked at it again. I never sent it anywhere, and I never let anyone read it. The only thing I did with it was to take the entire second part and make it into a play, ‘Fuselage’, which actually won a theatre writing competition and was performed / rehearse read over two nights by a professional company at the Northcott Theatre in Exeter. That was in 2008. And I hadn’t looked at it since.
Until the other day, when I found the damn thing on a memory stick. It was saved in twelve different parts, so I’ve just spent all of today gluing them together as a word document, (I didn’t use word back then), and the book is now complete for the first time. I’ve decided to give it a title, too – ‘Orbs’, after one of the main characters.
Anyway, I’m not going to do anything else with it. But I thought you might get a kick out of reading the synopsis so that you can see just what a car crash the thing was. It was written in Devon, Copenhagen, Toronto and New York, which is probably the only notable thing about it!
Orbs
Robert Garnham
Part One
Chapter One : Cassandra meets Lucas on a train. She is, apparently, recently bereaved of her boyfriend Aaron. The chapter is narrated by Mister Collins – apparently an ex-lover of Cassandra’s. On the train, the conversation between her and Lucas is overheard by Orbs who announces that Lucas can, if he wants, bring Aaron back to life through literature. Of a sudden the train grinds to a halt.
Chapter Two : Lucas insists on leaving the stranded train. They walk through the woods to a mansion house where they are expected by Mrs Ohspander. Cassandra is insistent that Lucas write Aaron into existence for her. They stay the night. Over dinner Lucas decides not to do as he is asked. Orbs arrives and takes Cassandra out to a chapel in the grounds of the house dedicated to the life of Aaron. Orbs explains that Aaron – (despite being dead) – is the narrator of the chapter.
Chapter Three : Cassandra is distraught. She wanders in the forest and returns to the house. She cannot find her way in. Instead, she spends the night in a heated greenhouse. Lucas arrives and they make love. They discuss the re-invention of Aaron and Lucas declares to her his love. Cassandra drowns Lucas into the pond and returns to the house. In the library she meets Orbs who says that Mr Collins has been watching her. Orbs hints that Cassandra is, in fact, dead, and that it is Mr Collins who has invented her for a character in a book. Aaron is very much alive.
Part Two
Chapter One : Lucas and Jakub have crashed in the desert. Jakub is injured, Lucas cares for him, and a bond of love develops which Jakub does not reciprocate. One day Orbs arrives and cures Jakub’s injured leg, finds them food and water and solves many of their problems. Lucas is convinced that Orbs is an evil spirit intent on separating them. When no-one is looking, Lucas sabotages the radio equipment.
Chapter Two : Orbs organises the makeshift camp and ensures that food and water are available, and Jakub’s leg begins to heal. Lucas is afraid that this will result in the end of his association with the older man. He remembers the cacophony of their crash-landing. A sandstorm blows in and, unnoticed by Jakub, Lucas murders Orbs.
Chapter Three : Jakub questions Orbs’ disappearance, Lucas finally admits to killing him. He walks off into the desert and is rescued, eventually, by Grainer and Shelley, who come back for Jakub and drive them to the nearest city. Grainer asks where Orbs is but Lucas remains silent. Jakub then admits to having crashed the plane on purpose.
Part Three
Chapter One : Rozetta is a curator at a museum of writers in Paris. Meek, ineffectual, she wishes she were more like Jakub, an adventurer who always gets what he wants. They are sent to the mountains in order to secure precious artefacts pertaining to the poet Michael Afff, but there is something about the small kingdom which they both find intimidating. Rozetta rests in her hotel room and hears footsteps approach, menacingly, on the veranda.
(The paragraphs of this chapter have been numbered and mixed up. The reader must choose from three possible combinations in order to read them. Only one is correct. Superfluous, ‘rogue’ paragraphs have also been inserted.)
Chapter Two : Back in the city, Rozetta feels herself changing into a confidant, brash young woman. Jakub, meanwhile, loses all his confidence. Rozetta also feels herself inundated with words and poems. A representative of the mountain kingdom, Orbs, reveals that, in an attempt to bring back Michael Afff, his DNA has been injected into them both. However, a mix-up has resulted in Rozetta being infected with Jakub’s DNA, and vice versa.
(This chapter has footnotes which explain Orbs’ motivations. The footnotes also have footnotes, which spell out a short poem. This, too, has footnotes.)
Chapter Three : (Takes place after Chapter One). In the mountain kingdom, Rozetta walks around, dazed. At the cathedral she watches the High Priest of a cult based on the work of Afff – Orbs himself. Jakub meets Orbs in the park – he explains that this was the only way to bring Afff back. It is hinted, though, that rather than being a mix-up, Rozetta actually is infected with Afff’s DNA, and the poet is taking over.
(This chapter is written entirely back to front. The reader must determine this for themselves. Also, a new mark of punctuation is used, the explanation of which is also contained within the narrative.)
Part Four
Chapter One : Deni is trapped inside a poem in ancient Greece. Rozetta is coming to his rescue armed with a copy of Micheal Afff’s poetry and a river-boat, deep in the jungles of the Amazon. The expedition comes across a statue deep in the foliage of Rozetta herself. Orbs appears in the poem and offers advice to Deni, and then he appears on the river boat as an interested observer. It is hinted, however, that it is Rozetta who is trapped in a poem and that Deni is the author.
Chapter Two : Deni, as the author of Rozetta’s adventure, is himself trapped in a cage in Vienna during a masked ball. Orbs visits him and implores him not to tamper with the narrative, it is having a negative effect on Rozetta’s existence. Meanwhile, in the jungle, Rozetta and Orbs investigate a mysterious abandoned city. Back on the river, their boat is attacked by natives and it sinks below the water.
Chapter Three : Deni is in a cabin of an ocean-going container vessel, he is also an amateur artist. Rozetta and Orbs are travelling through the jungle on an overnight train. In the restaurant car Orbs plays piano jazz, romance is a possibility. The container vessel picks up a man floating in the sea in a life-raft, it is Orbs. On the train in the jungle the brakes are applied – Orbs and Rozetta investigate and discover a container vessel, lifted out of the water and placed one hundred miles from the sea in front of them.
Part Five
Chapter One : Deni and Robert are lovers, living in a caravan at a seaside town. They are conducting a theatrical experiment in which members of the public, unwittingly, are participants in a secret play. Deni’s ex-lover, Orbs, arrives, and they reminisce – Robert feels jealous. After a night of partying in which Orbs’ intentions are frustrated, they wake to find the caravan – and themselves – hundreds of miles away.
Chapter Two : Deni and Robert have been transported to a sand dune and a wide beach, a desolate landscape. Deni bemoans the loss of his desk and his project. Orbs helps reconvene the project in their new location. Robert sees Eeon, a deck-hand on a pleasure boat. Wandering in the sand dunes, he discovers Deni’s desk. Later, on the same pleasure boat, Robert tells Deni that he has seen the desk and Deni reacts angrily, forces the boat back and runs off into the dunes, never to be seen again.
Chapter Three : Robert, Eeon and Orbs are staying at a lighthouse. Robert continues Deni’s project. Eeon picks up foreign stations on his radio, incomprehensible speeches. Robert falls in love with Eeon. Orbs is worried about his place in the universe and his ever-decreasing sense of youth. During a thunderstorm Eeon and Robert listen to the radio – the speaker hints at religious and cultural conflict. Eeon feels lost and uneasy. The foreign speaker then starts mentioning aspects of their private lives, their deepest fears. Running to tell Orbs of this, they discover that it is he who is the speaker.
Part Six
Chapter One : Ostensibly a meditation on my own childhood, the autobiographical sections give way to a narrative based on the imaginings of Eeon’s own childhood in tandem with my own. A kindly relative, Orbs, has spotted the doubt in myself and proclaims to know of a solution – that life should just be lived.
Chapter Two : A comedy tracing the career of Cassandra, a modern artist working in New York, and Robert, a poet, each of whom has run out of inspiration. To advance Cassandra’s career, Robert spends a night in her studio and concocts works of art on her behalf, aided by the janitor, Orbs. On realising the futility of art in life, Robert decides to kill himself by jumping off a crane into the river, but Orbs saves him. Arcs is revealed to be a manifestation of Orbs’ imagination. Examples of Arcs’ work as an artist are placed within the chapter as visual representations.
Chapter Three : Robert is a poet in New York, seemingly without friends or success. His sister, Cassandra, is the subject of a retrospective at the modern art facility. Robert feels left out. At the launch party, he feels distinctly out of sorts, until he sees Cassandra slumped in the corner, depressed by fame. The next day he goes back to the gallery with the help of the janitor, Orbs, and he replaces the works of art in Cassandra’s exhibition with posters of his own poetry. Lost in the gallery, he meets Stefan and they fall in love. Robert becomes successful and he and Stefan host a magnificent party.
Robert Garnham 