My Offical Author Photograph Session

In order to celebrate the completion of Clear History, Harper Collins has booked me into a studio for my official author photograph session. I stand in the middle of the white room which is unnecessarily huge and evaluate the lighting setup. Then I remember that I am a terrible photographer and look away.

When I finally read Chris’ alterations to the manuscript I was impressed and even a little jealous. His word choice and sentence structuring injected the text with an exhilarating sense of urgency that got me excited reading my own book. I emailed him and suggested he take another pass at it. “Feel free to make as many changes as you like,” I wrote. “You’ve greatly improved chapter twelve but I still think you can make it even better. Perhaps you could expand upon the themes you’ve introduced in chapter twenty-eight to show how certain characters are affected. Also, don’t forget you always wanted to make Agent Beechill’s entrance more heroic.”

When he simply replied – almost immediately – with “I HOPE AND PRAY TO EVERYTHING THAT IS HOLY THAT YOU ARE FUCKING KIDDING ME” I wrote back refusing three of his word corrections that I picked arbitrarily from the text. I also pointed out a spelling mistake. He never got back to me and I discovered shortly afterwards that the spelling was, in fact, correct.

Still, the next day one of the PR crones called me to arrange this photo shoot. I asked them not to attend as I find their presence deeply upsetting. Since then their assistant has been dealing with me.

The photographer is ‘Beat’ Nishikori. The assistant who greets me and leads me to the studio tells me that he is one of the top ‘author portrait artists’ in the business. I ask what specific qualities an author photographer must possess compared to, say, a photographer who takes pictures of anybody else on Earth. She shrugs and says, “I’m still learning.”

Nishikori is a tall Japanese man who is wearing tight black jeans, a frilly white blouse and a pink rose. He barely touches my hand when we meet and calls me ‘Daaaarling.” He may be gay. “Call me Beat, please,” he begs me, but for some reason I call him Nish for the next hour. “You need some makeup!” he cries, pointing at a pretty girl in one corner of the room who waits for me with a small brush.

“I thought we might go for the natural look,” I say.

“You need makeup for a natural look!” he cries. I don’t like exclamation marks so just assume he cries everything from now on.

“I do have a spot,” I say. “Typical of one to come up today.”

He scrutinises me. “I don’t think makeup will cover that completely.”

I cover my chin. “Oh God. How bad is it?”

“It is a big lump.”

“Jesus.”

“The makeup cannot hide the shape. Unless we do latex.” I think he is joking. “I can do a bit of Photoshop, Christopher. It’s OK daaarling.”

The makeup girl – I don’t listen when she tells me her name – coats me with foundation. “I could have been a model,” I tell her.

“Really?” Her disbelief irritates me.

“Someone from Elite said I had an ‘Interesting face.’ She wanted to take a few test photos and I laughed at her. I was twenty-one, I had my whole life ahead of me. I thought I was going to be a famous film director. I could have been rich.”

“Probably not,” she says. Then, backtracking, “Only because it’s such a difficult business. I gave everything I had to modelling but I could never make the breakthrough. I came close…”

“Really?” I ask for revenge, then feel bad almost immediately.

“Still, you’re making something of yourself now, aren’t you?” she says. “A successful author…”

“Yes,” I agree. “Yes I am.” She is still working on my face. “Are you starting again?”

“I need slightly more makeup than I realised,” she tells me.

“Why? I’m only thirty-one.”

“Yes, but you’ve done some damage, haven’t you?”

“Have I?”

“You have a bright red nose and red cheeks from boozing but your eyes really stand out. You look like you’ve fallen asleep in the sun wearing sunglasses.”

We look at each other for a few seconds and I don’t feel bad for insulting her anymore.



I stand awkwardly in front of the camera while Nish coos orders at me, coaxing me to open up in some way I can’t grasp.

“You must relax, Christopher,” he tells me.

“Then stop shouting,” I shout, irritated.

“It is OK that you are not smiling,” he says. “The novel you have written is such a dark, intense work of art that I know it can only have come from a dark, intense person. You fascinate me.” The flash blinds me three times in quick succession.

“Is that was it says on the notes they sent you?” I ask, trying a variety of poses, none of which feel remotely relaxed.

“They sent me the book and I loved it,” he says.

“Yeah, right.”

“It is true. I always flick through the books but I read Clear History in two days.”

When the latest flash dissolves from my vision I look hard into his eyes. He is telling the truth. I call him Beat from that moment on. “Beat, I have my suspicions that my own wife has not read my book.”

“Not everyone can appreciate great art,” he claims.

“Well, thank you.”

“Now Christopher, will you work for me? I am getting the misery and pain loud and clear. Now I want to see some of the bitterness and loathing that will make this photograph sell to those horrible chain stores.”

“But you just made me happy.”

“Damn,” he says, firing off another few shots without looking through the viewfinder. “Quick, think about your mother’s funeral.”

“Well, it wasn’t great, but the Vol-au-vents at the wake were really nice.”

“Okay. Err…soon your wife will want babies and your life will be ruined.”

“Getting there.”

“You have a shift at Bid TV tomorrow.”

“Okay, let’s try now.”

Beat keeps snapping away and I bring everything I can to the event but still he is unsatisfied. “What else can I do to help you?” he asks. “Anything you want, just name it.”

“We’re standing in a cold sterile white studio,” I say. “There’s an unnecessary amount of people standing around.”

“What do you want to do?”

“There’s a little river out there called the Thames. It’s a cold cloudy day. The river is dark and dirty and full of romance. The bridges are old and huge and imposing. A man in a suit with no tie in London in late March leaning on the embankment in black and white while pretty tourists flit by, ignoring him…”

“Sounds perfect,” he screams and then just he and I run outside and create beautiful pictures on the north bank of the Thames, Beat with two cameras and a flash and an imagination. When he stops talking the mood creates itself and silently, eye-fucking the camera, I finally give him what he needs and another slot in the puzzle is filled.