Hamilton Coe, Author at Hamilton Rising

The First Noel

By Hamilton Coe on Tuesday, December 10, 2019

Psychic investigator Hamilton Coe surrounded by allies and adversaries. Featured characters include Annabella Lwin, Mark E Smith, Donna Tartt, Dashiell Hammett, Robocop, Patricia Highsmith, Cornell Woolrich, Robert Morley, Ming the Merciless, Jean Seberg, Del The Automator

Dateline Drumfeld – Friday

Wednesday – My first Christmas cards arrived this morning. No advanced graphology skills were necessary in identifying Hazel Eadie’s savagely embedded scrawl. Not having heard from Hazel since September, I’d hoped that she might have embarked upon some fresh fixation. Apparently not. Her annual newsletter contains its usual trite fantasies about our life together. Does Hazel seriously imagine that normal couples use their Christmas newsletters to subject acquaintances to such nauseating innuendo? At least the reference is veiled. Last year’s was so hideously explicit that I took the precaution of passing a copy to our community police officer.

Neighbourhood Watch

A Furtive Donation

By Hamilton Coe on Friday, November 15, 2019

Psychic investigator Hamilton Coe surrounded by allies and adversaries. Featured characters include James Ellroy, Susan Tully from Grange Hill, Jean Seberg, TV Smith, Judge Dredd, Poly Styrene, Miranda Richardson, Jilted John, Honey Bane, Michael Redgrave as Maxwell Frere, Robocop, Debbie Harry

Dateline Drumfeld – Thursday

The Oslers, I’ve noticed, are keen joggers – usually setting out around seven p.m. and returning an hour or so later. Steven, invariably, starts the stronger, but is trailing by the time they return – on reflection, this seems fairly typical of the man.

Book Group

Gnawing on the Bone of Contention

By Hamilton Coe on Friday, November 15, 2019

Psychic investigator Hamilton Coe surrounded by allies and adversaries. Featured characters include James Ellroy, Mark E Smith, Del the Automator, Jean Seberg, Poly Styrene, Bette Davis from Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, Robocop, Patrician Highsmith, Jilted John, Dr Who Impersonator

Dateline Drumfeld – Wednesday

Pauline has set up a Facebook page for the Hawthorne Crescent Book Group. I thought it best to contact Christine who saw fit, after all, to ignore my reservations and introduce Pauline in the first place. “For goodness sake, Hamilton,” she snapped, irritated by the fact that I‘d interrupted a meeting by inferring a ‘family problem’ “It’s just a bit of fun!”

Film Club

The High Country

By Hamilton Coe on Saturday, November 9, 2019

Dateline Drumfeld – Tuesday

As a favour to my sister, I invited Mark Gavigan – one of her clients and, in Christine’s words, ‘a real Western buff’ – to participate in tonight’s show, a tribute to the films of Sam Peckinpah. Arriving ten minutes late and already unsteady on his feet, Gavigan embarked on a long, incoherent explanation – on air – throughout which he made frequent use of the ‘f’ word. At this juncture, at least, he was still affable. As the show continued, he became increasingly rancorous, at one point demanding an explanation as to why I ‘kept banging on about Sam fucking Peckinpah.’

Film Club

The Omega Man

By Hamilton Coe on Tuesday, November 5, 2019

Psychic investigator Hamilton Coe surrounded by allies and adversaries. Featured characters include Patricia Highsmith, Donna Tartt, Roots Manuva, Susan Tully, Judge Dredd, Robocop, Hayley Mills, Shirley Jackson, William Reid and Keith Harris and Orville.

Dateline Drumfeld – Sunday

Spencer and I watched the Omega Man. I can’t help but feel sorry for Charlton Heston. Even his once fabled physique seems inadequate – as he pulls off his shirt to display an expanse of vaguely defined midriff, he resembles nothing so much as a father who persistently embarrasses his children in public.

Uncategorized

How He Played the Game…

By Hamilton Coe on Monday, November 4, 2019

Psychic Investigator Hamilton Coe surrounded by adversaries and allies. Featured characters include Donna Tartt, Dennis Hopper, Patricia Highsmith, Vladimir Nabokov, Shirley Jackson, TV Smith, Roots Manuva, John Kennedy Toole, Judge Dredd, Keith Harris and Orville, Honey Bane

Dateline Drumfeld – Friday

Since introducing Jackson to the table tennis club, I’ve had to warn him about gamesmanship on four separate occasions. Team Drumfeld has written rules that specifically forbid offences involving goading or distraction of opponents. Over-celebration is also discouraged. Although there are no written guidelines on winning gracefully, common sense should suffice: a ‘high five’ exchanged with a doubles’ partner is acceptable; a fist belligerently pumped in the direction of a vanquished opponent, Jackson’s customary gesture of triumph, is not.

Book Group Neighbourhood Watch

‘Memories of Frost’

By Hamilton Coe on Monday, November 4, 2019

Psychic Investigator Hamilton Coe surrounded by characters associated with film noir and crime fiction. Featured characters include Orson Welles in Touch of Evil, James Stewart in Rear Window, Hayley Mills in Tiger bay, Richard Attenborough in brighton Rock, Clifton Webb in Laura, Robert Mitchum in Night of the Hunter, roman Polanski in Chinatow, Margaret Rutherford as Miss Marple, Ivor Novello as The Lodger, Patricia Highsmith, Lino Ventura, Alain Delon Gene Tierney

Dateline Drumfeld – Wednesday

Spent the morning reading some of Anne-Marie’s poems. They seem very accomplished – sensitive without being cloyingly so and illuminated by flashes of insight. In ‘Mission Statement’, for example, a cat sits on the window ledge, staring back at the narrator with an expression of ‘insolence and regret’. This, I assume, is a metaphor for friendships lost and opportunities squandered. Later, in the same poem, she follows ‘a shadowed path, leaving parts of myself in its puddles.’ Is this, I wonder, the path that led to Steven?

Book Group Neighbourhood Watch

Book Group – Death on Credit

By Hamilton Coe on Monday, November 4, 2019

Psychic Investigator Hamilton Coe surrounded by allies and adversaries. Featured characters include Chester Himes, Roots Manuva, Judge Dredd, Patricia Highsmith, Dennis Hopper, Donna Tartt, Genesis P Orridge and Jean Seberg

Dateline Drumfeld – Tuesday

Tonight’s book group was at Christine’s. A pointless and rancorous exchange about Celine’s ‘Death on Credit’ – my suggested novel – which nobody else had bothered to finish. Pauline, in fact, confessed – apparently without embarrassment – that she hadn’t even started, an admission I thought should have invalidated her presence at the meeting. The evening might have been wasted were it not for Izzie’s revelation that she went to school with Anne-Marie Osler. “We weren’t particular friends, but she was nice,” she said. “Jessica keeps up with her – she writes poetry…”

Haunted Scotland The Trossachs Weird Tales

Gartmore – Sputum and Temper

By Hamilton Coe on Sunday, October 27, 2019

Psychic investigator Hamilton Coe surrounded by allies and adversaries. Featured characters include Mark E Smith, Vampira, Terry Thomas, Patricia Highsmith, Hayley Mills, Donald Pleasence, Honey Bane, Dennis Hopper, Judge Dredd, Miss Marple and Margaret Rutherford

Dateline Drumfeld – Thursday

To Gartmore where I addressed the local historical society on the subject of Haunted Houses – focusing on Ballechin House and Glamis Castle. An attentive and agreeable audience with the exception of a sickly looking character – prominently seated – who coughed throughout, his complexion (already ruddy) turning an increasingly dangerous shade of puce. At one point, completely distracted, I referred to the door between this world and the next, adding that “some of us are already half-way through.” On reflection, this was poorly judged and the rapport I’d enjoyed with the audience started to dwindle – a process of alienation that culminated in an ill-tempered Q and A.

Later, as I waited for Christine to pick me up, I noticed the invalid smoking a cigarette and expectorating a strand of sputum into a drain.

Neighbourhood Watch

Meet The Oslers

By Hamilton Coe on Friday, October 25, 2019

Psychic Investigator Hamilton Coe surrounded by allies and adversaries. Featured characters include Anthony Blunt, GZA, Smiley Culture, Ewen Bremner as Spud, Debbie Harry, Donald Pleasence, Roots Manuva, Divine, John Maus, Judge Dredd, Erkan Mustafa as Roland Browning

Dateline Drumfeld – Monday

My new neighbours have finally moved into Number 12 – the Oslers: Anne-Marie seems agreeable but I was less fussed about Steven who appeared five minutes into our conversation and, on being introduced, demanded, “So what do you do?” As I offered a precis of my employment history, he stared at me with a strange expression that might have indicated belligerence or incredulity – before I could finish, he turned to Anne-Marie, grimaced and disappeared into the kitchen. I think that he was trying to be humorous in the genially blunt manner adopted by boors and numbskulls, though it occurred to me later that he might have incurred an injury in the process of moving – solvent exposure, for example, or a blow to the head.