Gibbous Moon

Thanks so much Kate - most appreciated. Mick
I am just about to go on holiday but will take a look at youir manuscript on my return in about a week.

'Everyone used to laugh at him, but not me.
It was me.' - too funny!

'If Norbert had been born a sheep the farmer would have had him put down.' - hilarious

'the smell of mothballs and vomit had moved downstairs and I realised Grandad had felt fit enough to sit in the kitchen' - love that!

Michael, I think this needs work but you are so witty and Banny is such an instantly lovable character. You have great similes and one liners and also some really genuine touching moments with his dying grandfather. Very glad to have read this.
Best,
Kate

'Everyone used to laugh at him, but not me.
It was me.' - too funny!

'If Norbert had been born a sheep the farmer would have had him put down.' - hilarious

'the smell of mothballs and vomit had moved downstairs and I realised Grandad had felt fit enough to sit in the kitchen' - love that!

Michael, I think this needs work but you are so witty and Banny is such an instantly lovable character. You have great similes and one liners and also some really genuine touching moments with his dying grandfather. Very glad to have read this.
Best,
Kate

Very entertaining! I particularly appreciated the voice and the dry humor.
Very little to nitpick: I'd go back and check your commas and quotes and clean them up, and I might drop the opening "Thud!" as redundant, but other than that agree with all the positive comments I see on this list. Really did enjoy it!

Michael, I think this is great! You can write! It's entertaining, touching, genuinely funny and poignant. Well done, backed. Maybe you'd like to take a look at 'Jelly-Boy', about a podgy disaffected kid who has a life-changing experience in a lighthouse with some chocolate and a dead sea-gull. Mmmm...

Thank you Tammy that is so kind of you. Regards, Mick.

Hi Michael,
I’ve read the first three chapters and enjoyed them immensely. Although for me, the story really got going in chapter two. I actually wondered if the current chapters one and two could be switched somehow? The story about the visit to the doctor, using the daughter as pretence, is hilarious! There’s humour in this story, but there’s also an underlying sadness. His father stopped speaking directly to him when he was three years old? That’s horrible! You take something a bit sad, like Charlie’s dads speech after the stroke, and manage to make me laugh with it!
I like the one liners you use to finish off some of the chapters.
This is really good, seems like the kind of book that would one day be turned into a movie, or become a classic.
Six stars from me :-)
Tammy Robinson

Hi Michael,
I’ve read the first three chapters and enjoyed them immensely. Although for me, the story really got going in chapter two. I actually wondered if the current chapters one and two could be switched somehow? The story about the visit to the doctor, using the daughter as pretence, is hilarious! There’s humour in this story, but there’s also an underlying sadness. His father stopped speaking directly to him when he was three years old? That’s horrible! You take something a bit sad, like Charlie’s dads speech after the stroke, and manage to make me laugh with it!
I like the one liners you use to finish off some of the chapters.
This is really good, seems like the kind of book that would one day be turned into a movie, or become a classic.
Six stars from me :-)
Tammy Robinson

Hi Michael

Apologies for the delay in returning the read. Easy to see you have a great sense of humour, this book is peppered with one liners – the farting competition made me laugh!

A couple of things I picked up, though they’re only nit-picky really. The first sentence after ‘Thud’ in chapter 1 felt very repetitive. I think you could just say ‘grandad’s head hit the floor’ and eliminate the rest.

Michael’s gone back down to supper with his granddads puke on him? Although there is humour throughout this, I liked the end of chapter 1. It was very sombre and kind of made me stop smiling almost instantly, and to be able to flit between humour and sadness like that is a sign of a good wordsmith I think.

Sheffield’s best for the steel in his head – LOL great humour and of course, very true. Best steel, ever. His exploits to Paris, whilst funny, felt a little bit odd. Like, how would Michael know that? It’s a good passage so I wouldn’t suggest removing it at all, just re-work it somehow. It has too much info in its present form, but I think if it were the granddad telling him this, then it would make more sense. Just my opinion of course.

Love the Sheffield-isms! ‘Chuffin’ made me smile and ‘the club’ – my granddad still goes to ‘the club’ every Saturday night and when I lived with them, I used to as well. All this stuff is so familiar – great stuff.

You haven't listed it as such, but this reads as a great childrens book to me - as in aimed at early teens.

I really like this. Haven’t got time to read more at the moment but based on what I’ve read this needs to have five stars and a spin on my shelf on the next rotation.

Silva

The pitch and the writing are quite different here. Not a bad thing just meant I was pleasantly surprised by the sprinkle of humour in the opening chapters. Not easy to pull off a characters death and have the reader smiling along. I almost felt bad for enjoying the scene so much (God, I really hope that doesn’t make me sound a bit disturbed). I quite enjoy this ‘out there’ family. It makes for very endearing reading.
My only slight nit-pick (feel free to ignore me, it could just be me missing the point) I wonder if it’s clear enough at the start who the narrator is. Is it the author or the MC, I got a little lost there, sorry.
Overall, a very sweet story. I smiled a lot as I read.
Janny

Hello Michael,
This kind of story really isn’t my cup of tea. Nevertheless, I found that is was an easy read with a fair sprinkling of humour. It gets a bit drawn out and irritating at times like where Aunt Joan is introduced. I’m afraid that I’ve become too cynical to enjoy teenage banter or anything to do with drug or alcohol usage.
Best wishes, Charles Dyer (Mach100)

- Gibbous Moon -

(Based on chapters 1-3)

This is funny. From the pitch, I did not really expect that. It shows some level of skill to deal with a subject as harrowing as the emaciation and slow death of a once proud and hard man and to have the reader laughing throughout. On a personal note, I actually had a similar idea a while back based on my own gradfather who was also your atypical working class hero who succumbed to cancer at a similar age as the main character here. So I found it very moving in places.

The coming of age element is very endearing. We see Michael goof around with the usual teenage awkwardness, get himself involved in an atrociously named band and get some whimsical teenage kicks by lusting after the ideal of some exotic foreign girls.

I'll make a few notes and nitpicks on each of the chapters I read....

Chapter one:
-The line 'Grandma's request was met with compliance,' confused me a bit as at first I thought we were dealing with a universal narrator. It wasn't clear that the main character was narrating.
-'lukewarm' should be one word.


Chapter two:
-I liked this a lot. The Paris story, the dialogue, Michael's mother. The only nitpick was the 'BANG' part. Firstly, it shouldn't really be in speech marks and secondly, I personally would have preferred the sound to have been described rather than set out with capitals. I found that jarred me out of the narrative a little.

Chapter three:
- No nitpicks here. The story of the German girls reminded me of my own teenage romantic horniness when we had Danish exvhange students and Mr Dimmock's awkward homophobia was just plain hilarious.

Very enjoyable. A surprisingly light and easy read considering the weight of the subject matter. Kudos!

All the best with it,

Ross

Many thanks for the comments. Much appreciated. In some cases less is more - this is one of them. Commas where there (or not) for a reason. Mick.

Cute book. I would like to read more. Some tips I have might be to be a little more descriptive (was sick on my best school shirt = with a slight heaving of his chest that was altogether too familiar, the smell of vomit wafted to my nose. When I looked down, sure enough, a wet stain was in plain sight on my very favorite school shirt). Also, there are some easy issues with commas. Other than that, this is a really good book!

Cute book. I would like to read more. Some tips I have might be to be a little more descriptive (was sick on my best school shirt = with a slight heaving of his chest that was altogether too familiar, the smell of vomit wafted to my nose. When I looked down, sure enough, a wet stain was in plain sight on my very favorite school shirt). Also, there are some easy issues with commas. Other than that, this is a really good book!

I read the first 2 chapters and enjoyed them. I think this is very well-written and full of delightful, original humour. I like the vestiosis diagnosis, and the egg line ("you know I can't eat anything out of an animals mouth, I'll have an egg") is superb. The characters are nicely-drawn and distinctive, with apt nick-names. Can't think of any nitpicks. On my WL for further reading and generously starred. Good luck with your writing.

Hi,
Read chapter 5 instead of the beginning. I's amusing and the MC's voice is loud and clear.
In your writing, you could afford to take out 'that' from most sentences and use 'had' sparingly.
Apart ferom that this is great stuff.
Backed.

Gibbous Moon is best described, I think, as a family memoir, if the family in question was extremely colorful. The genius of what author Michael Bannister has done is to present a wacky family that at the same time seems extremely normal, or at least within believable bounds. Each of the quirky family members plays off of main character Michael, who kind of acts as the straight man in the story. It will remind you of your own family in surprising ways as we root for Michael to get through it all and have the normal life he seems to crave. Expertly written, it should capture the hearts and minds of a wide audience.

John Breeden II
Old Number Seven

This a very fine novel due to its readabilty. The character Michael attracted me very much. A well written novel.

All the best.

Joy J Kaimaparamban
The Wildfire

You are totally fantastic, Michael! :) How can I ever thank you enough for backing my memoirs book?
God bless you. :) Love, Susie :)

Perfect short pitch which left me curious to read your submission & I certainly wasn't disappointed. Your writing is full of descriptions and contrasts and it is well polished. I think this will appeal to a wide audience & should do well. Best wishes - Paula Barrett (Cuthbert: how mean is my valley?)

this has good pace and there is pathos mixed with humour, my favourite ingredients. If I may venture, the 'voice' of the narrator does not always ring true, and the writer's own voice peeps through here and there. The story that is being told though, is interesting and well set up. BWP The Tails of Willy Gusty/

This should be published. Thanks for sharing your story with us. I would be more than happy to back this.
All the best, Sana
Saffire Drake and the Three Keys

Chapter 1 is a good description of a frantic schoolday, with everything happening at once, and able to find humour in every situation.

Michael,

You've got a great wit for the darker side of life in Gibbous Moon, and you do a fine job balancing between taking your subject seriously, and finding the humor in tragic situations. It's a tough line to walk but your teenage protagonist manages to guide us through this world rather effortlessly. (Or, at least you make it look that way.)

Nice work! Backed! Looking forward to your thoughts on Head Games!

Kevin Alex Baker
Head Games

good insight into terminal illness

12 August 2010
A concise and intriguing pitch leads into Gibbous Moon and we meet the narrator, a genuine working -class grammar- school boy. I use 'genuine' because the author has managed to reproduce all the elements -- aspects, inflections, opinions, internal dialogue of a teenage schoolboy saddled with supervisory responsibilities. He takes his daily risk of bullying in his stride and has a fairly pragmatic view of life. There is wry humour, waiting in the wings, to surprise the reader (Hype Park Corner, school tie, beards, moustaches and girls). Couched in easy but direct prose this was a joy to read. BACKED. Robert Davidson. The Tuzla Run.

Dear Michael, I love you sharing disfunction family life because it's almost in all families, but hid from the public knowledge, as you'll see in my memoir. What a shocking end - your story - what's next? Before I began to read your book, I was prepared by your pitch,which was very well done. :) Your story is good because you create interest by having short paragraphs & lots of dialogue, which makes me want to keep reading to find out what's going to happen next. I'm "backing" your book: When you back a book, it only improves the ranking of that book, not yours. However, the author whose book you are backing may decide to back your book also, in which case yes, your ranking would be improved...authonomy. :) Please "back" my TWO memoir books, "He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not" & my completed memoir unedited version? "Tell Me True Love Stories," which tells at the end, my illness now & 6th abusive marriage." Thanks, Susie :)
p.s. Remember: Every time you place a book on your bookshelf, your recommendation pushes the book up the rankings. And while that book sits on your bookshelf, your reputation as a talent spotter increases depending on how well that book performs. :)

Vicious sense of humor here. Happy to back it for you.
Please consider taking a look at my book, The Job.
CraigD

Gibbous Moon

I think there is a very good mix of observational and situation humour not often I see them both together – it works well. I like the sharp humour and the one-liners like not catching flu again, are very good. All in all I enjoyed this, it moved me a long at a nice pace. With a great, almost machinegun style of delivery, this is quirky and great. – Good luck

A well written and entertaining story. The imagery is excellent along with your dark sense of humour. Backed with pleasure.

Andrew Burans
The Reluctant Warrior: The Beginning

The metaphor of a dog in heat when talking about the smell invading his nose felt messy and didn't work for me. Maybe pounced or forced or leapt, but invaded didn't seem a proper fit.

The story and set up in general were very good, interesting characters and some funny stuff. There were a few typos that were distracting and need to be sorted out. Things like:
"Egg, bacon, tomatoes and fried bread!" Was my reply...
should be:
"Egg, bacon, tomatoes and fried bread!" was my reply...
or
We heard it all. stabbing....
should be
We heard it all. Stabbing...

these are trivial things easily fixed but there were quite a few of these just in the first chapter and it doesn't give a good impression of the 'script.

I found some of the sentence construction a little awkward. For example:
Everyone used to laugh, but not me.
It was me.

doesn't scan right and reads a bit clumsily.

A lot of it is funny but an awkward phrase can throw off the humour and I felt you had a few sticky patches in there.

I would suggest avoiding cliches like ferret up a drain pipe and come up with either a fresher approach, or a simple relating of actions. Describing how you turned Grandad around like the captain of the QE2 didn't really mean anything to me. How much skill does it take to order a sailor to turn a boat around in the middle of an ocean? i have no idea. I would thing it would be more effective to literally tell the reader what he had to do to get Grandad back to the house.

I liked the general tone, but it wandered around a bit. You introduced us to the history of Adolf and then went on to the next thing, i would expect after an intro like that the man himself would make an appearance. why tell us his whole life story just for the sake of it? Giving backstory for scene setting reasons feels arbitrary and unfocused.

I also think you overuse exclamtion marks. A lot. A matter of taste though.

Best of luck with it.

regards
mood

What humor in such dire settings. Beautifully written and touching. There are some descriptions you give which immediately draws the reader in, to the point where you can almost see them, smell them, taste them, feel them. Excellent work. Good Luck!!!

Carolyn
Fetish: A Love Story

Very dark humour, its so sad but yet funny. Given the choice between laughing and crying I'd laugh every time and I found your work very entertaining from the start. Its a very well written and polished MS and I wish you all the best with it.

Laugh out loud funny. I love this kid. By his observations I know he is going to go through trials and eventually be OK, even though Grandpa probably won´t. This makes me want to read more and more. The only little thing is that early in the chapter when Grandpa had a bluey color, I thought he was dead. Congratulations. Well done. Susan
Flirting in Spanish

If wit were shit it is you who would have diarrhoea (do they use that in spelling bees?). I like this because it's about stuff. Most of the work on here reminds we of what Bob Dylan told The Beatles. This is different. There's the plight of miners as expressed by the Grandfather. There's the state of education as expressed by the French class. As a language teacher I can appreciate what you say about the teaching method. So many games teachers use may be fun for the students, but waste time because they accomplish nothing. But they sure beat endless grammar drills. Evrything in here is astutely observed and commented on, without being preachy about it. I have great respect for what you are doing.

Hi, That was an easy read. I did a double take with the pitch. I remember you saying we shared similar humour. I thought I was about to read a very morbid, depressing story until I noticed the key words. We do share similar traits, finding humour in the least expected places. It's not to everyone's liking, but what is.
This is very well written and extremely funny. I can't wait to read what happens. Have you thought the whole story out, or, like me, do you make it up as you go along. I think that is the best way. This one should do well and I would buy it if it were in print. Best of Luck, Gerry

Expert writing that just carries the reader through the story like a cadillac ride. You have set the scene very clearly and with precision. This is simple, effective and at the same time a superior piece of literary work , more so than the others books i have seen and read. I love your portrayal of Grandpa. Tt's so vibrant that you feel a part of it all.

A pleasure to read.

There was nostalgia here for my youth as well as the emotions you raised with the Grandfather's illness.
I remember the hair fights and the lads who wanted to be Marc Bolan (we wanted them to be Marc Bolan as well).
You've captured that time perfectly and you portrayed a young man's tenderness wonderfully, touching, but without sentiment.
Happy to back this.

Michael, your first chapter reads very well. I like the expression "with the determination of a dog in heat." My only nit is with this sentence. Helping him back into bed (comma) his new weight of.. I've shown you where I think a comma is necessary.

Happy to give this a spin on my shelf.

Joffrey (The Silver Spoon Effect)

This is a story about characters who have many more problems than I do. I wish you'd started the first scene by making Michael a more sympathetic character rather than shouting at his sick grandfather (altho I know exactly why he did that) as he is a better person than that. There's a lot of writing talent here to mesh all of these stories together. Backed. Burgio (Grain of Salt).

The pitch is so touching and crazy, like a whole life worth of drama crammed into a short period of time. Might give too much info and ward off some readers looking for the comedy/romance side of it. The writing is excellent and makes it all feel very real. Heartfelt with enough comedy to keep it from being dark. Well done.

Shelved-
Dan,
Eunice Stubbins, among others...

This is a very poignent story, written by a skilled hand. Very evocative, very sad, very well done. Backed, of course. Richard Bard

From the pitch this might sound a rather depressive read, but your richness of description more than makes up for that. You've solid character construction and it's easy to feel for Michael. The relationship between boy and grandfather is a special one, sadly we only get to see them when they are old and worn down by life, but they lived through so much and part of them exist in us too.
Backed with pleasure
David
Bailey of the Saints

This has a classic feel to it. Sort of a Anthony Powell vibe. It's funny and warm and you have rich characters. At first I thought your dialogue seemed stilted. But then I remembered times when words moved minds. And I enjoyed it.

Good luck with this.
Mark R. Trost
"Post Marked."

Very amusing and yet, in places, touching in a silly, sad sort of way -- much life real life. I enjoy the dialects and the dialogue. It's a great story too, but just a little slow to get moving -- alot like life in that way too! I am backing it now and hope to return to read more later!

Love, Callaghan (The Shouting Tree)

A real life's story, I absolutely love the way you have created your characters and put it all into words, a life that really is. Does that make sense? If not you will know what I mean Michael. I read through it all very quickly and i must admit, skipped a few bits. I found the whole very readable and engaging, and real. I can say with confidence, that if this is not soon published, the publishers do not know what they have missed. Backed.
Norman. The Witch of Hambone Bk.3. Also, Muddledydo.

Hi.

I know there is a lot of humor in this work, but you reeally made me think about my grandfather. He lived with us when I was a teen and older. He had asthma. He used to take me on long street car rides all over Chicago when I was a boy. I watched him get sicker and sicker. Then I went off to college. He died while I was away, but me parents didn't tell me because they knew I would not concentrate on my studies.

Your writing is very real life.

Backed.

Would you take a look at my Jaqmie 7?

Thanks, keep up the good work, and

Keep smiling
Joseph D Palermo

dunno if i wrote on this or not, but basically i'm gonna read this soon even though it's been on my bookshelf for ages... i will get around to it. peace out dude.

OK, your writing style is jarring but exceedingly charming. You pack the perfect amount of information in tightly woven sentences. Bravo. I love the device of finishing with a subject then sicking in the humour. ...then he speuded on my trousers.

it is highly readable and fun - not something i expected. I have come to know a lot of curmugeons and the truth is they all have an amazing sence of humour deep inside. My Grand dad was one and i miss him.

Please let me know if you have the time to help me.

Your pitch sounded like Sienfield type humour; normal guy in wierd world surrounded by wierdos. I am approaching you because of your reputation as a hardass. I need a hardass right now to look a a chapter i have heavily edited. I need to know if i am doing the right things, if there are things i am missing and should recognise and if i am improving or destroying my book by following the advice of others. I have posted the original and the edited version of one five page chapter on my site.

Please help. I am going to start reading your work now.

If you can help me i can e-mail you the un-edited and edited versions of the chapters and you can mark them up and send them back . i will post all edits. To see them on this site go to my page - the second book POV is the two chapters. There is also a Forum but no one is biting yet.

The way you have tempered the horror of grandad's slow painful death with a baleful sort of humour is so utterly realistic. That strange 'getting on with it' attitude that has to be adopted in order to continue day after day.
This book is completely unpretentious and very well measured.

If I could be so bold, I would suggest that your short pitch would be much improved by deleting the last two sentences. They are slightly clumsy and I think unnecesary. "A teenager with a thirst for life, dying to learn, as his grandfather is learning to die." Such a wonderful, short, all encompassing snippet, doesn't need anything else.

Popping you on my shelf with pleasure.

Alethea

Your fabulous opening hooked me. Banny is a colorful, fun character. Brilliant verb choices. For example, 'his soul somehow seeping away.' Effective similies, such as 'gone like a ferret up a drain pipe.' Wonderful humor that had me laughing out loud over and over. And heart-breaking tragedy. A witty, well-told tale. Backed.