When it comes to describing Patrick Gale’s writing, the obvious analogy is food. It even says on the front cover of his latest collection of compelling short stories that the tales within are delicious. Rightly so – the book itself is called Gentleman’s Relish.
It’s a collection that in true Gale form sees the writer hone his skill with all the precision of a beautifully cooked meal. After all, it contains the ingredients of a perfect banquet. There’s love, desire, a dash of obsession and some darker undertones. Yes, here Gale turns his hand to craft some superb ghost stories.
‘Setting and atmosphere is everything,’ Gale told OUTinPerth of what comprises the perfectly served spooky tale. ‘So many ghosts seem almost like emanations of the places in which they appear that if you can get your reader to see and smell the deserted church or desolate hillside, they’re half way to seeing ghosts without you spelling anything out.
‘Just as in scary films, monsters are far more effective when suggested than shown. That said the ghosts in this book are largely benign. However there’s a sort of sex demon in there who really scares me (and disgusted my mother-in-law) and a very nastily suggestive encounter with moths…’
It’s the economy of the short story which excites Gale here. Yes, he is known for amazingly constructed works of literary prowess, novels which compel and haunt and affect in equal measures. But it’s with the short story that Gale unleashes a tight accuracy, one which ferocious in its fleetingness.
‘Stories are often written to a commission that involves a very tight word count or, in the case of radio broadcasts, reading time. This means the writer has none of the luxury novel-writing affords of slow-build or detailed scene-setting.
‘Where a novel can take a whole chapter to fill in crucial back-story to help us understand a character’s mindset, a story must achieve the same effect with a single sentence or clause.’
And then, Gale pointed out, there’s the subject matter.
‘Some subjects just demand a concise, even shocking treatment while others need breadth and time. The knack is to spot in time which is which so that you don’t end up with either a (metaphorically) thin novel or a story that reads like a novel’s severed limb. The ideal story should deliver emotional satisfaction in a short space. It’s never going to give you that four-course satiety a novel can bring, but it can haunt the memory just as persistently.’
So what can readers expect from this latest collection of stories? As Gale himself admits, he has ‘a dark side that rarely gets an airing’ in his longer works, largely because he becomes too fond of and attached to the characters who inhabit those works.
‘Readers who think they know me through my novels will find things they recognise but they might be in for the odd shock. And for readers who don’t want to commit to a whole novel, this could be a good way to discovering what I do. The collection is intensely English – in its tone and many of its settings – as most of my novels are, and, like the novels, it shines lights onto the sort of people writers tend to overlook, the marginalised, the outcast, the overlooked.’
Patrick Gale will be appearing as part of the Perth Writers Festival which runs at The University of Western Australia from February 25 until March 1. For more details visit www.perthfestival.com.au.
Scott-Patrick Mitchell
ALSO TO WATCH OUT FOR @ PERTH WRITERS FESTIVAL
Goldie Goldbloom will be heading back to Perth to discuss her new novel The Paperbark Shoe, which explores the life of two freaks – Gin and Toad – in a rural farming community. Small town bigotry is ignited when two Italian World War Two P.O.W.s arrive, bringing with them a vivacity for freedom and fun… the kind of things which raise more than eyebrows in the backwaters of the outback.
Goldbloom is starkly unique. Her voice has tenacity, a robust electricity of ideas, one which is sure to ignite readers. To add to the already fantastic package that is Goldbloom, she’s an openly queer writer who’ll be bringing with her a little Chicago coolness as she returns home to speak at The Perth Writers Festival about this brilliant work. The Paperbark Shoe is available now from Fremantle Press.
