Excellent…my first advisory warning! Cthul-You went out as planned earlier this evening proceeded by a fantasticaly stern warning. I think most of the nasty bits were succesfuly toned down in the editing but if someone looked hard enough at the subtext they might find it a bit disturbing…with any luck the story will generate a huge wave of complaints and establish my reputation with the BBC as an enfant terrible of audio fiction!
So whats hearing my first national broadcast been like? Listening to it live added an odd frisson, knowing that x thousand people were listening at the same time. Even the relatively small BBC 7 audiences are much, much, much, much, larger than any readership I’ve reached before. But there is an inverse relationship between the size of the audience and the quality of the relationship you have with them. I’ve read stories at spoken word nights and got really engaged feedback from everyone. The stories I’ve had in small press magazines and anthologies hve generated reviews and commentary. But I in all likelyhood I’ll never hear anything from anyone who hear the story tonight and didn’t already know me. Partly thats also to do with having something mediated. Whilst novelists might get less exposure than other writers, they build a very close relationship with their readers. Whereas TV or screenwriters who reach audiences of millions are on the whole anonymous. I should quantify this as some kind of equation. The size of audience (a) divided by the number of layers of mediation (m) is inversely proportional to the number of fans generated ($).
Hey…Walter’s First Law of Fiction!
Damien Walter 
Hi Damien
Just listened to Cthul-you on the BBC’s fab ‘listen again’ thingy. Really enjoyed it. Nice one!
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oooooo well done damo … just logged on to say am right about to ‘listen again’
hellooo steve!
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hellooo ivy! (sorry damien – holding a conversation across your board like that!)
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god that story! … you are sick damo sick!
and funny damo funny!
got the creeps now and it’s broad daylight …
how are ya steve? is it word tomorrow? think i’ll go xxx
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Please, go ahead.
Thats a mighty scary eye you have there Steve!
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yikes i have still got the willies …
do you LIKE having that sort of mind damien?
(i agree scary eye steve … brrrr)
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Absolutely. Wouldn’t have it any other way.
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Eye schmeye. You should see the beard. It’s like wrestling with topiary. It’s like the end of The Shining in face form.
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i think that … plus the thought of the little noise you make when putting on your socks steve … plus weird stories and damien’s enjoyment of his own strange mind … have put me a in a very strange frame of mind indeed …
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Oh my, a scary eye and a topiary beard. This will be an interesting WORD.
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Came here as a result of hearing your story live on BBC7 – really enjoyed it. WTH are you?
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Hi Matt, and thank you for enjoying the story and taking the trouble to track it down to its source. WTH am I? Hmm…thats a complex question. I have a bad habit of refering to myself as a writer, although I’m starting to accrue some evidence that this may in fact be the case. please feel free to root around the blog if you’d like to know anymore – there are some other stories on here and plpenty of random mutterings.
Damien
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