My Novels

My Novels

How should my novels be interpreted? I wrote them, so I should know. There are two: Bad Patches and The Space Trap. The first title suggests both bad patches in a life and bad patches in a person—and their interplay. The second title might suggest a science fiction story, but actually refers to the fact that we are trapped in space existentially. David Green is the anti-hero of BP and Alan Swift is the protagonist of ST. Green is unripe, Swift is fast-moving. Dave is a coarse foul-mouthed would-be artist on the make; Alan is a mild-mannered insurance worker with a wife and family. BP is about the tension between art and morality; ST is about the tension between home and abroad. The characters are trapped in these tensions, riven by them. The first is a punk existentialist novel, the second a domestic drama set on two continents. The first is first-person narrated, the second third-person. Both are comedies with nasty bits. The author puts them through it, chuckling in the background. Neither character is remotely like him. It would be hard to say that either character is very likable, especially the artist (pungent is the best you could say of him). Alan is a bit of a blank slate in search of an identity; he has a punishing imaginative life. He seems on the brink of fading away. Dave is very in-your-face.

What are the literary antecedents to these tales of modern man? BP looks back to Oscar Wilde (The Picture of Dorian Grey) and James Joyce (Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man) and before them Plato. It drastically updates these works, and even surpasses Martin Amis for grimy yob characters. The reader is drawn into reading about Dave’s “adventures” in 1980s London—he or she feels the lure of art, even when morally transgressive. In the case of ST, the obvious references are to Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels and Homer’s Odyssey: the contrast between domestic life and the life of Elsewhere. Alan is both claustrophobic and agoraphobic, full of fear. His imaginary self leads another life altogether. He escapes from Holloway (geddit?) to New York and a new identity, only to be forced back home. We don’t know what will befall him. Dave Green ends his story bored and restless after seeking security and love. Neither escapes the tension in which they are enmeshed.