and how often I used to stand there as the foghorn woke me

[ashlyme]

It might still be in the twenties tonight. It's almost eleven and there is still some light in the sky; it's cobalt up there, shading to peacock at the horizon. Tried a miniature of Minorcan gin: heavy on the juniper, velveteen one sip, edged the next. My body has been rebelling or performing little tricks I'd rather it didn't in the last few days - IBS, heartburn. Tonight one of my lower eyelids turned inside out in the shower. If that's a response to shampoo in my eye I'd rather have a good oldfashioned nictating membrane. I'll have words with my DNA.

I'm halfway through Gert Loschutz's Dark Company and I really don't know what to make of it. It seems to be the account of a German merchant sailor who lost his boat and has exiled himself to some soggy inland village. The only water that courts him now is rain, and each rainy night evokes another in his past where he was witness to or on the fringe of some murksome event: disappearances, a possible murder by folk-magic, arson. He's warned early on about the dark company - men and women in black who're ill omens to sailors - by his grandfather, who I'm starting to think is a dead man. He's gathering his own company along the way, it seems. Is he an albatross, a haunted man? It's not quite noir or straight-up weird or picaresque. Maybe a mashup of the three. There's just something missing in the novel itself - it's not an explanation; it's never bothered me if things stay a riddle, I love that  - is it a question of atmosphere, or the writing, or the translation? I want to like the novel a lot, but the rain won't quite touch me.

ETA: Shoutout to rydra_wong , thisbluespirit  and sovay - I've found out what happened after Assignment Six! They changed career and moved to Leicester.

Comments

[sovay]

If that's a response to shampoo in my eye I'd rather have a good oldfashioned nictating membrane. I'll have words with my DNA.

See if you can get yours to cough up some gills. One of us should get them.

I want to like the novel a lot, but the rain won't quite touch me.

Oh, that's frustrating. It sounds like it should have all the ingredients for a haunting weird mystery and it does not sound like it's pulling it off. Maybe it would have worked if Sean O'Brien had translated it.

They changed career and moved to Leicester.

Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.

[ashlyme]

*One of us should get them.*

It should be you. I wouldn't trust gills to filter the canal water round here.

*Maybe it would have worked if Sean O'Brien had translated it.*

Oh God - that'd be great. He'd write great noir.

*Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.*

Pretty much my reaction! They'd be back if an anachronistic plaque came in to be engraved. Or maybe there's just a huge amount of time-breaks in Leicester.

[rydra_wong]

Or maybe there's just a huge amount of time-breaks in Leicester.

SEEMS PLAUSIBLE.

Founded in 1980, too. Must be by fans.

[thisbluespirit]

Bodies do grumble about changes; mine doesn't much care for the weather turning warm, either. (Even though I am on the NE coast and generally a little cooler than most people.)

And that S&S thing! 0_o

Feel free to visit us in person or if time or distance is an issue just call

0_o Seriously, if you call yourselves Sapphire & Steel, you don't write that in the first paragraph of your website. S&S are stuck in a mundane AU! Send in Silver! (I wrote that once, although not an engraving company in Leicester; real life always trumps the imagination...)