Roger Atwood – no relation to poet, author and activist winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award, Prince of Asturias Award for Literature, Booker Prize, and Governor General’s Award – has recently begun to confide to friends, acquaintances and work colleagues that he believes he has the capacity to write a successful fiction novel.

The Ashfield-based marketing manager has begun reducing his time spent playing World of Tanks in favour of making brief and cryptic notes in a leather-bound journal he purchased in June at the Roselle markets. “In my job I meet a lot of people, and I think that that’s a great way to develop a character study for the book”, he observed, leaning against the jukebox he purchased with his tax return in 2010 and which was the primary subject of his causal dinner-party conservation for 2010 through to 2013.

The few willing to identify as a friend of Roger expressed scepticism to The (un)Australian  about the claim, however. Judy, who declined to provide a last name, noted that while Roger does have a comparatively large personal library, the majority of those volumes are non-fiction. Of the books that remain in his library, 13% have the word “Bourne” in the title, and those remaining volumes, most likely to have been discussed in the London Review of Books are the least likely to have creased spines.

Alex Kasper, who regrets giving Roger his telephone number when they met on jury service last year, has recently been a sounding-board for Atwood’s derivative concepts. “It mostly takes the form of something-meets-something ideas,” Alex observed. “The last time we spoke it was adult fantasy. I asked him if he really wanted to go head-to-head with George R. R. Martin, but I’m not sure he got my point.”

Fortunately, The (un)Australian understands Roger’s journal is likely to end up in storage next to the Spanish guitar he purchased in 2007.

Peter Faulkner

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Categories: Arts

Tags: dull man, novel, Peter Faulkner, The unAustralian