The first chapter of my new novel ‘Stranger in Taiwan’ is available here:
stranger-in-taiwan.blogspot.com/
I am currently in discussions with a man down the night market, and as soon as the price is right I’ll buy the printer ink and get the book published.
But there might not be that many copies.
Let me be the first to say: God, Hartley, you’re not funny at ALL. Now, with that out of the way, I suppose I should take a look at your book, now that I’ve given it my critique and all, like.
Kept me reading till the end. I felt as confused as one of the Taiwanese students . 
What’s the punchline?
Don’t tell Broon Ale about this. 
Can you put some bloody double spaced line breaks in there? It’s really hard to read.
Thanks for a good laugh Hartley.
When I started reading it, I thought (well, apart from what Muzha Man said) “Oh no, I don’t want to bloody read about teaching English and see crappy learner English - I get enough in real life.”
However, I kept reading the bugger and it made me laugh out loud. The “passive voice” stuff actually had me doubled up.
Keep up the good work.
Stranger than what?
Hemel Hempstead. And it IS. There’s no Sainsbury’s, for a start.
Buttercup.
Hartley, nice work.
Anita must go “psychoxiajie” in chapter 2.
‘xiajie’? Nah, Hartley wouldn’t write those kind of stories…
xiaojie xiaojie xiaojie
Good stuff man. Agree with the double-spacing.
Also, the colour scheme is a bit… girly.
P.S. “ball” only has two "l"s
P.P.S. Why the American English?
zender, this belongs in the “dream threesome” thread. And try to be a bit more specific, please.
I’ve always wondered why sandman has a picture of Hartley as his avatar while Hartley doesn’t have an avatar.
couldn’t sleep at all last night…
And yeah, the russian porn site theme is not the best color scheme for this story so far so you’ll have to put some sex into the second chapter preferably with pics.
I like how you structured the chapter to be really boring at the beginning, ordinarily boring in the middle and then slightly titillating at the end with the flat-chested bit and then it ends, leaving the reader slightly disappointed and still waiting for the sex. If you do that with every chapter, people will come back for more.
‘always leave your reader hanging’ ~ anonymous author in ‘How to Write a Best Seller even if you’re illiterate’.
[quote=“irishstu”]P.S. “ball” only has two "l"s…
P.P.S. Why the American English?[/quote]
Because they like ballllls with many “ls”.
No fucking way am I reading another word, let alone a whole chapter, about teaching English in Taiwan. Hang on, I “wrote” a book about teaching English in Taiwan. God awful thing. Absolutely vile. Then again the second book I wrote about teaching English in Taiwan is actually pretty good so I dunno. Anyway, good luck.
Reads very like the ESL teacher passages in Tony Parson’s Man and Wife. He’s sold millions.
He was Mr Julie Burchill, though…