Simon FairbanksCritiques

The Sheriffs wander the clouds to keep the peace across Nephos. Sheriff Denebola is recruited by young Toby to help rid his village of a winged demon. The demon has tormented the people of Angel's Keep every night for the past week so Denebola vows to capture the creature. However, the demon is not the only shadow cast over Angel’s Keep. There is the strict priest, Father Osmond, who detests all magic. There is Gideon, a man with wings, claiming to be an angel sent by the Lord. And there is also the matter of the Red Witch, who threatened the village five years before the demon’s arrival.

Denebola soon finds himself caught up in a mystery where angels, demons, heroes and villains are not all that they seem.

From the Author in exchange for a review. Denebola is a Sheriff (but most definitely NOT a lion) is returning home to see The Maverick, after intervening between the humans and their noisy Witch neighbours. The latter have been keeping everyone up at night whilst they keep setting of lightening bolts and it needed a Sheriff to intervene, but it resulted in Denebola with one all mighty hangover.

He gets waylaid by Toby, one of the inhabitants of a neighbouring cloud - called Angel's Keep - with a request that he helps protect the cloud from a demon who has been causing mayhem for the last week. As a Sheriff he cant really say no, so finds the cloud has not only humans but Angels, Demons and Witches, which all make for an interesting few days.

The presence of the Angel (who Deneobla recognises as one of the more lazy and unfit members of the Featherfolk and not an Angel really), has stirred up belief in the Old Religion and caused fear in the rather small community. It also means that people are unwilling to reveal their "gifts" - that little bit of magic that meant the original people were chosen by The Clown to inhabit Nepos. I wont say more due to potential spoilers.

As you can tell from the synopsis above - this is a story about another world, which has been set up decently, with no resorting to the overwrought world building some writers adopt. The writing style has a light, humorous tone and isn't overcomplicated, which means that this book is also appropriate to younger readers, with Toby being a suitable young hero who shows bravery and nerve to become the Sheriff's Deputy. Nephos has been set up to be big and complicated enough to have more stories to be told without the fear of future stories being shoe-horned in.


About this author
Simon Fairbanks studied MA English Literature at the University of Birmingham. He has been a member of the Birmingham Writers' Group since 2011 and acts as the committee member responsible for new membership enquiries. Simon's first novel, The Sheriff, was released in March 2014. The following month, The Sheriff was chosen to participate in the One Big Book Launch organised by CompletelyNovel and Literally PR. Simon's debut short story collection, Breadcrumbs, was released in October 2014. It contains twenty-one short stories, including a new adventure starring the characters of The Sheriff. Simon was one of ten writers who participated in the Ten To One project. Their collaborative efforts resulted in the novel Circ which was launched in November 2014. Simon's character, Mungo the Clown, was voted the winner of Ten To One. Not only have I reviewed Circ previously but there is also a further author spotlight on Simon here.

The Summary

Razvan Popescu lives in a flat overlooking the seaside town of Skegness. He keeps himself to himself and few know the man at all. Even fewer know his past, which he has tried to leave behind in the Romanian woods. But when a tattooed man is found murdered on the beach, it is clear that some of that past has followed him to this tacky seaside town. As battle erupts within the criminal fraternity, dark forces gather around the town and Popescu’s acquaintances find themselves dragged into a world of violence, fire and fairy tales. One thing is certain: the circus has come to town. Ten To One is a novel writing project in which ten authors write a novel together, seeking the approval of a judging panel and a public vote to keep their character in the story. Circ, the first Ten To One novel, is written by Simon Fairbanks (http://www.simonfairbanks.com/, @simon_fairbanks), Maria Mankin (June 2007), Yasmin Ali, Jason Holloway (http://www.twitter.com/batlleth), Livia Akstein Vioto, Luke Beddow, Danielle Rose Bentley, William Thirsk-Gaskill (http://www.twitter.com/wthirskgaskill), Sue Barsby and Giselle Thompson. Edited by Iain Grant


The Setup

This was provided in ebook format by the publishers (Pigeon Park Press) a local Birmingham UK publisher, in exchange for a review. The novel was written in an unusual way, as explained to me by Heide Goode from Pigeon Park Press:

We ran a project to select 10 authors from around the world and then got them to write a novel in a knockout style.

It worked like a TV gameshow - each writer took control of a character and then at the end of each round of chapters there was a public (facebook) vote and a judges' vote to see who would get dropped.

What was really interesting was that the writers didn't get overly competitive, they really just wanted to make the book as good as it could be. Circ, the first Ten To One novel, is written by Simon Fairbanks, Maria Mankin, Yasmin Ali, Jason Holloway, Livia Akstein Vioto, Luke Beddow, Danielle Bentley, William Thirsk-Gaskill, Sue Barsby and Giselle Thompson.

The Review:

For a book that has been written by multiple authors, it is gratifying to find that it has come through with a consistent voice - I suspect through the hard work of the authors and editor rather than luck or fate.

It starts ordinarily enough with the body of a murder victim found on the beach in Skegness, a seaside town that has lost much of what little glamour it once had. As the book progresses, there are more murder victims, graphic violence, the small town organised crime boss that is being threatened with take over by the Romanians. In turn, the Romanians have an interesting and useful business in the meat processing plant just outside town.

Quite a few of the adults are damaged in some way. Mungo the clown has descended into drink after the circus had burnt down 10 years previous and as the book goes on, we find out more about both Mungo and the night of the fire. Popescu is now an old man and has to confront what happened when he was working as a policeman in Romania. Bobby, the local crime lord has a bodyguard who may or may not exist outside of Bobby's mind, and both of them become more dangerous as the book moves along.

Because of the way the characters were chosen there were some that inevitably got discarded along the way, some through more violent means that others. I wont say who lives, dies or disappears, because of spoilers but I think I understood why those who faded out did so. The remaining characters in the final scenes were, I think, the right ones to be there, and it was a strong, if occasionally graphic in it's violence, ending.

Ten to One is certainly an interesting way of producing a book and I think that on the whole it works. Whilst reading the book, I certainly didnt miss those characters that faded into the background, but in reading the last chapter where it referenced some of them, I thought "oh yes, them....". I dont think I would have missed them if they'd not been referenced again at the end, but since they were, I felt a little....short-changed? As Iain Grant states in his editor's notes, things had to be removed, some of it fabulous and I dont know if any of the stuff that was removed would have made me feel different. Small niggle in the grand scheme of what was ultimately a decent book produced in an interesting way.

I have recently done an interview with Simon Fairbanks, who is one of the authors, and it can be found here. Some additional information on the way the book was written can be found over on that post, as well as details of Simon's other works.

I enjoyed this a fair amount. Like many people who reviewed it, I expected it to be a bit messy but things came together well. I initially reviewed it at 3 stars but it's stuck with me and I recall it fondly so I bumped it up to 4. Different and interesting.

I've read about 40% of the book and it just hasn't grabbed me. I think it is clever in the sense that 10 authors have collaborated on the book and it is quite coherent given that. But I guess the story hasn't engaged me in the way I was hoping it would. So I'm leaving it aside for now. I may come back to it later.

I got this book through LTER so I felt obliged to finish it however I didn't enjoy it.
It is written by 10 different writers in a kind of talent competition style where characters disappear throughout the book.
To start with, there is a bit of who is who but without enough background/details which stopped me From getting a sense of the people. I often forgot who was who.
The story takes place in British seaside town and the characters are trying to be a bit to quirky.
I really didn't enjoy the gangster scene. It doesnt mean it wasn't an interesting story, it just wasn't my kind of book.

A brilliant, sassy and surreal read, I totally loved this! The cast of characters are all unique and I loved the way their stories came together. There's a pleasing amount of action and excitement too, which is great. The ending is frankly superb and very moving. More please.

Recommended!

I received this book through Early Reviewers (thank you very much!). When I read that this was written by 10 different people, I expected it to be a little disjointed. But all of the characters, who are introduced in the first chapters, have a relationship with each other. Some through the circus, some through life circumstances, some that they don't realize. So what's realistic about a dreary seaside town with a burned down circus and the remainders (people) including a sword swallower, a drunk clown and an old police man. I thoroughly enjoyed how this book came together - or how the characters came together. It held me throughout and I would highly recommend it.

I am generally a reader that will read a single book in 2-3 days or less depending on how much I enjoy it. This book took me a few weeks. The first 40 or so pages were so slow, I would read a few pages and put it down because I couldn't keep myself interested. However it definitely picks up, and if you can make it past that point (which I suggest you do) I think most people will find it enjoyable enough. There were times when I really just wanted to start skipping pages, but I'm glad I didnt because the beginning is really there to introduce you to everyone throughout the book. Although, you do lose a few on the way it was never too abrupt. It was a cohesive story, even though it was written by 10 different authors, cohesive enough at least. I would definitely read another book by 1 or all of these authors again.

Circ is a book written by ten different authors, each in charge of a different character. Through social media, characters were voted off one at a time after each chapter, allowing for the story to evolve while being written. I found Circ to be incredibly enjoyable, and the back story behind its creation made it even more fascinating. I was impressed with how the different writers were able to collaborate to create a cohesive, complex story even though the original idea behind the conception of the book was a competition between the authors. One downside was that the book started out very scattered with so many characters introduced at once, and I had a hard time keeping track until later in the book. However, it was very fun to see the story changing as characters were taken out of the narrative, and by the end I was definitely wanting more. Overall, great book and I hope this Ten to One project inspires more like it!

I received this book through one of LibraryThing’s Early Reviewers giveaway programs in exchange for a review.

"Circ" is a novel written by a committee of 10 authors. The authors competed to write the novel and to keep their characters present in the novel with various characters being “voted off” and leaving the novel in a variety of ways. This combination of authors’ committee and the voting off of characters is a gimmick that is much mentioned in the publicity for the novel and is possibly responsible for some of the novel’s unexpected twists and turns but is handled so well in the novel in itself that, unless one has read the publicity blurbs, it is not obvious and the novel retains its integrity and coherence from start to finish as a result.

The novel is a mystery set in Skegness, a British seaside resort town, and has a large cast of characters who share the spotlight. The cast of characters is wide and varied, some are unlikeable in the extreme, some are lovable and, pleasingly in a mystery, the role of villain shifts and twists continuously as characters and their stories are developed. This results in a rare depth and raises some very thought provoking questions as to the nature of good and evil and – very appropriately in this setting – what really makes something a work of art.

"Circ" is beautifully written and with a remarkable coherence and consistency. It is a very satisfying book to read and runs the full gamut of emotions with moments of humour, horror and poignancy. Its ending is very neat and tidy – perhaps a little too neat and tidy – but does manage to avoid the generic blandness that is such a feature of the talent show competitions which the publicity blurbs use as reference points in the novel’s marketing. In fact, I can’t help but feel that the marketing emphasis on the competitive nature of the novel’s writing and the authors’ committee does the book a disservice. It is a very polished and enjoyable novel that is quite capable of standing alone on the merits of its writing and doesn’t need to be hyped for anything else. I not only enjoyed it thoroughly but hope this committee of writers comes together again, without the competition aspect, because they work well together and it would be a delight to read another well constructed work from them.

Oh wow. This was a ride from start to finish! Engaging, well written, historical, tragic...and based in Skegness of all places. Seriously a brilliantly put together book from all the authors. I really enjoyed it.