Intricate &; Infinite Tale of How the World Works

An Intricate and Infinite Tale of the Way the World Works?

A kitchen light flickers into life in the fifth story of a block of
flats in Altona, Germany. It's late. The sky is empty of stars, the
light cut from the world by a motionless blanket of menacing cloud. The
streets are as silent as the sky but for the dizzying hum of the
streetlights and the purr of sleeping electricity. In the kitchen the
flickering light strikes the sleek surface of a silverfish that
scurries frantically back into darkness before the heavy footfalls of
the writer reach the room. He stumbles in, wiping his eyes with the
backs of his hands, dressed only in his underwear. A hand swings out on
auto-pilot and strikes the kettle switch, sending a surge of energy
into the cold water and turning it into the promise of tea. The fridge
swings open and gin is pulled from behind the bag of decaying salad. A
cigarette is lit, the window is thrown open, air floods into the room,
the fridge is closed, lemons and tonic crash onto the gin, the kettle
boils, ash falls into the sink and then all is suddenly silent and
still again. The air smells like wasted time.

The writer is leaning over the sink now and nothing is moving. Moments
don't exist for a while as time freezes in the absence of purpose. On
the table behind him there is a thick notepad open on page three
hundred and sixty five, each numeral handwritten neatly in the top
right hand corner of the page. The page is blank. The pen next to it is
full of ink and the only sounds come from the hum and purr of power and
the steaming of the kettle. The writer turns around to look at the
table and stops moving again, but the moments are as heavy as boulders
of concrete in the air. He takes two steps across the room and sits at
the table, one hand pulling an ashtray into reach and the other placing
the glass of gin on the surface and reaching for the pen. Before the
ashtray is in place, the pen has struck the page and an oddly familiar
title is scribbled quickly?"An Intricate and Infinite Tale of the Way
the World Works". It is intended to be immense in scope and sub-atomic
in depth and detail; the ultimate epic novel; a Ulysses for the next
generation - the most revealing and intimate snapshot of the human
condition that the world has ever known. Every evening the same thought
strikes him? "There is a thought in my head, an idea that will manifest
itself, and tonight I will begin the story that the idea becomes, and
it will be a stunning masterpiece of the greatest kind".

More gin and tonic is drunk before any words are written down. The
cigarette lies unattended; the promise of tea in the kettle remains
just a promise of tea in a kettle. The only noise is the hum and purr
of power. The first words go down. A year passes by quietly and
unnoticed beneath the unseen blinking eyes of the stars. The work is
begun?

An Intricate and Infinite Tale of the Way the World Works

A kitchen light flickers into life in the fifth story of a block of
flats in Altona, Germany. It's late. The sky is empty of stars, the
light cut from the world by a motionless blanket of menacing cloud. The
streets are as silent as the sky but for the dizzying hum of the
streetlights and the purr of sleeping electricity. In the kitchen the
flickering light strikes the sleek surface of a silverfish that
scurries frantically back into darkness before the heavy footfalls of
the writer reach the room. He stumbles in, wiping his eyes?