Content Provider: Merrywhile, #1.2

By Gareth J. Southwell

His memory is not what it was. Whose is? Sometimes, it's true, he forgets things. But writing a whole book? Who would forget that?

 

But there are even reviews of it. In fact, three of them. And no one –not the bookstores, not his publisher, nor even his wife – seems in the least bit concerned. Does this mean he's going crazy?

 

But the next one is already overdue, and though each day the screen stares blankly back at him, he must push on. For it's not like this book is going to write itself – is it?

 

Set in the near future, Content Provider is a satirical insight into the life of the jobbing writer, the enduring mysteries of married life, and what happens to our thoughts when there's no one there to think them.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Gareth J. Southwell
• Release date: Mar 12, 2023
• ISBN: 9781739300555

Book preview

Content ProviderTitle Page

Content Provider

Gareth Southwell

First edition published by

Gareth Southwell, January 2022

This edition published by

WoodPig Press, March 2023

Copyright © 2023 Gareth Southwell

Cover design: Copyright © 2023 Gareth Southwell

ISBN (ebook): 978-1-7393005-5-5

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, organisations, incidents, locales, etc, are either the product of the author’s imagination, or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance of these fictional elements to actual persons, organisations, etc, is entirely coincidental.

Every effort has been made to trace or contact all copyright holders, or it has been assumed that material used is in the public domain. However, the publisher will be pleased to make good any omissions or rectify any mistakes brought to their attention at the earliest opportunity.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without written permission of the copyright owner, except for the use of quotations in a book review.

For any queries relating to any of the above, please contact the publisher:

www.woodpigpress.com

For Julian Till

the Poet

of Constitution Hill

Contents

Content Provider

Leave A Review

The Merrywhile Books

About the Author

Acknowledgments

Content Provider

Come on, she says, this book’s not going to write itself.

Sadly, the cursor appears to agree with her, blinking blankly back at me, stubbornly unmoving.

Which is a shame, really, for all concerned: the commissioning editors, the project managers, the copy editors and proofreaders, the typesetters, formatters, illustrators and designers, even (should I be so lucky) the translators – the whole many-handed beast that is modern-day publishing. How relieved would each of them be, I wonder, if their task were suddenly automated? Were somehow suddenly whipped out of their hands? Not a little, I suspect. And of course, most relieved of all would be me, about to embark on what feels like – a slight shift of angle, a little tweak in format – the exact same book I’ve been robotically rehashing for too depressingly many years to count.

I turn to make some quip along these lines, but she’s already gone.

And not just these hands, of course, but the nameless pairs of global mitts the book will pass through on its journey from brain to page: the printers, somewhere in India (or possibly China); the drivers and pilots of those diverse vehicles that will convey it to its various destinations; all the warehouse staff, the logistics managers, the invoicers and invoicees, the manifest checkers and checkbox tickers. And then there are the publicists and social media marketers, straining (and failing) to find some sexy new twist to make it stand out from the steady stream of digital dross; the book reviewers and podcasters, the bloggers and vloggers, on whose teetering piles of unread complimentaries it is fated to sit (unread); and let’s not forget the legacy media, the supplements and features editors, the TV and radio researchers, the toilers in the mines of segments and soundbites, forever