by Magnus Mills
‘Watch out,’ murmured Barry. ‘Here come Pressed Rat and Warthog.’
It was the two Andrews, and they were very polite and apologetic. They explained that they’d recently been trying to make contact with us, but they’d been blocked by Phillip who refused to release them from his clutches. They’d only managed to escape when the taxman caught up with him.
‘“Taxman”!’ exclaimed Mike. ‘Two minutes thirty-nine seconds.’
‘“Aahh Mr Wilson,”’ added Chris. ‘“Aahh Mr Heath.”’
Apparently the CRS was on the verge of collapse.
‘You can’t build a society on sunglasses and flowery ties,’ remarked James.
‘Well, Phillip thought he could,’ said the first Andrew, ‘and he funded it from the collection box.’
‘He was last seen facing some very awkward questions,’ said the other Andrew.
We swiftly obtained a couple more seats and the pair were welcomed into the Forensic Records Society. In celebration I went to the bar and bought them a pint apiece. I thought Sandy was quite friendly when she served me, paying me lots of attention, and in consequence I found myself making frequent return visits. At one point she mentioned that I needed reconstructing, or converting, or something along those lines. I can’t remember exactly; it had all become a bit of a blur by then. I only knew that it was the best evening we’d had to date, and the prospects looked even better.
Hours later I woke up alone in a strange bed. I had no idea where I was, but in the next room I could hear music. It was rising to a crescendo, and reminded me of a rogue elephant on the rampage. Finally it came to an end, and was followed by some faint American voices:
‘Yeah, yeah … more, more … nice … play another song … yeah, maybe … hey, what’s happening later on? … what’s happening? … yeah, beautiful … yeah, come on, baby … I got it … yeah, outasight, man; that was really outasight … Ha, ha … I’m helpless, man; I can’t make it … you mean, there’s no more drink, man? ……………………………………… oh, more clothes? …’
* No easy choice for Robinson Crusoe
* Chorus repeated twenty times
* He’d forgotten his key
credits
The author and publishers acknowledge the following permissions to reprint copyright material:
Extract appearing here from ‘The Universal’ words and music by Ronnie Lane and Steve Marriott © 1968. Reproduced by permission of EMI United Partnership Ltd, London W1F 9LD
Extract appearing here from ‘Mr. Tambourine Man’, words and music by Bob Dylan © 1965. Reproduced by permission of Special Rider Music/ Sony/ATV Music Publishing Ltd, London W1F 9LD
Extract appearing here from ‘Waterloo Sunset’, words and music by Ray Davies © 1967 Davray Music Ltd & Carlin Music Corp, London NW1 8BD. All Rights Reserved – Used by Permission
Extract appearing here from ‘The Canyons of Your Mind’, words and music by Vivian Stanshall © 1968, EMI Music Publishing Ltd, London W1F 9LD
Extract appearing here from ‘Jugband Blues’ by Syd Barrett © 1967 Westminster Music Ltd. of Suite 2.07, Plaza 535, King’s Road, London SW10 0SZ. International Copyright Secured. All Rights Reserved. Used by Permission
Extract appearing here from ‘Don’t Think Twice It’s All Right’, words and music by Bob Dylan © 1963. Reproduced by permission of Special Rider Music/ Sony/ATV Music Publishing Ltd, London W1F 9LD
Extract appearing here from ‘Taxman’, words and music by George Harrison © 1966. Reproduced by permission of Sony/ATV Tunes LLC, London W1F 9LD
a note on the author
Magnus Mills is the author of A Cruel Bird Came to the Nest and Looked In and six other novels, including The Restraint of Beasts, which won the McKitterick Prize and was shortlisted for both the Booker Prize and the Whitbread (now the Costa) First Novel Award in 1999. His books have been translated into twenty languages. He lives in London.
Also available by Magnus Mills
The Maintenance of Headway
‘Whereas you can wait ages for a bus and three arrive at once, there could be some delay before such an original work of fiction comes along again’ Sunday Times
‘Mills is a true original in a world of clones. His sparsely written books somehow manage to make the everyday deeply bizarre, occasionally menacing and often funny’ The Times
Enter the weird world of the bus driver, a strange but all too familiar universe in which 'the timetable' and 'the maintenance of headway' are sacred, but where the routes can change with the click of an inspector's fingers. This brilliant short novel is a gently absurd examination of the British bus system and its peculiarities, where the demands of the hapless passengers are virtually ignored and where it is fine to be a little bit late but utterly unforgivable to be a moment early.
‘An excellent, funny [and] intelligent book’ Daily Telegraph
‘Delightful ... This novel should be required reading for those in charge of our chaotic public transport system’ Daily Mail
Click here to order
The Restraint of Beasts
‘A comedy which is as black as a pint of Guinness and as dry as a salted peanut’ Mail on Sunday
‘A heaving cauldron of black humour … You’ll never look at a stretch of high-tensile agricultural fencing in quite the same way ever again’ Time Out
Fencers Tam, Richie and their ever-exasperated English foreman are forced to move from rural Scotland to England for work. After a disastrous start involving a botched fence and an accidental murder, the three move to a damp caravan and soon find themselves in direct competition with the sinister Hall Brothers whose business enterprises seem to combine fencing, butchering and sausage-making.
‘Extremely unusual, finely crafted and funny’ Observer
‘A demented, deadpan-comic wonder’ Thomas Pynchon
Click here to order
All Quiet on the Orient Express
‘Hilariously surreal. It’s a bit like the Coen Brothers directing an Alan Bennett play… Fantastic’ Daily Mirror
‘Mills is genuinely unique, but if he is to be placed anywhere in the jigsaw of literary history, he will have to slot between Albert Camus and Enid Blyton. [He is] one of the handful of British writers to work in a unique fictional universe’ Independent on Sunday
It is the end of the summer. The tourists have already gone, and now the sun is abandoning the Lake District’s damp valleys. Only a lone camper remains, enjoying the quiet. He plans to stay just long enough to prepare for a trip to the East. But then the owner of the campsite asks him to paint a fence and he innocently obliges. Soon other odd jobs pile up until little by little he becomes ensnared in the ominous ‘out-of-season’.
‘Understatedly surreal, deadpan gothic, Mills is a master of the uncanny’ Esquire
‘Mills is a master of the cliffhanger and can make even the most deadpan behaviour compelling and funny… A deliciously sly comic fable’ Financial Times
Click here to order
The Scheme for Full Employment
‘A unique talent … Mills’s novels are among the best and most original in recent English fiction’ Literary Review
‘Mills’ odd but wonderful books combine the language of a children’s story and the strange dry humour of Harold Pinter’ Daily Express
The Scheme was designed to provide an honest wage for an honest day’s labour. Men driving identical, rust-resistant Univans deliver Univan parts to strategically spaced warehouses. Simple, self-perpetuating and efficient, it seems destined to last forever. But when some drivers begin leaving early and developing delivery sidelines, the workforce is divided into two camps: Flat-Dayers and Early Swervers.
‘A British writer to be treasured’
Independent on Sunday
‘An enjoyable novel by a truly original writer’
Sunday Times
Click here to order
Three to See the King
‘Magnus Mills is a genius’ Big Iss
ue
‘Marvellous … a delicious ambiguity, a parable which is both loaded and ingenious’ Independent
Living on a windy plain in a house made entirely from tin, a recluse’s quiet life is transformed by the severely critical Mary Petrie who arrives unannounced with a trunk of her belongings in tow. As a procession of new houseguests begins, our narrator is put under pressure as his previously-isolated existence is turned on its head and he is forced to choose between a solitary life and joining the mass exodus of his neighbours…
‘Pythonesque … Quirky, deadpan and quietly unhinged’ Scotsman
‘Magnus Mills goes from strength to strength…Three to See the King develops his idiosyncratic vision with wry intelligence and wit’ Spectator
Click here to order
Screwtop Thompson
‘As the collection progresses, its humour evolves from a restrained arched eyebrow to a warm guffaw’ Sunday Times
A guest stays at an eerie guesthouse over Christmas without encountering any other residents, despite constant reassurance from the landlord that he would see them if only he arrived for breakfast slightly earlier; a man arrives home to find the family house under siege, with his mother armed, dangerous and firing at the police with a shotgun; rivalry between three cousins over a faulty toy gets out of hand as the cousins unwittingly imitate the toy they’re fighting over…
Eleven stories transport the reader into the strangely familiar and utterly surreal world of Magnus Mills and confirm him as one of the best comic writers of our time.
‘Mills’s fictional universe is entirely unlike anyone else’s going ... Brilliant!’ Dazed & Confused
‘These eleven vignettes are perfectly distilled to their deadpan essences … they’ll stay with you longer than many books ten times the size’ Metro
Click here to order
A Cruel Bird Came to the Nest and Looked In
‘The wonderful thing about the outlandish world of Magnus Mills is that it always sounds familiar’ Guardian
‘Quirky, curious and very funny – a Magnus opus from the master of idiosyncratic peculiarity’ Ben Schott
Far away, in the ancient Empire of Greater Fallowfields, things are falling apart. The imperial orchestra is presided over by a conductor who has never played a note, the clocks are changed constantly to ensure that the cabinet can take tea in the library as the sun sets, the Astronomer Royal is only able to use the imperial telescope when he can find a sixpence to put in its slot, and everyone lives on tick. But while the kingdom drifts, awaiting the return of the absentee emperor, a ‘cruel bird’ is getting closer.
‘A beautiful, singular book: funny and acutely observed’ Independent on Sunday
‘An enchantingly Kafkaesque/philosophical fairy tale … a noel of considerable depth and intellect’ Sunday Times
Click here to order
The Field of the Cloth of Gold
‘The field looks completely wrong now,’ she announced, one blustery afternoon. ‘It’s all gone out of balance.’
The Great Field lies in the bend of a broad, meandering river. Bounded on three sides by water, on the fourth side it dwindles gradually into wilderness. A handful of tents are scattered far and wide across its immensity. Their flags flutter in the warm breeze, rich with the promise of halcyon days.
But more and more people are setting up camp in the lush pastures and with each new arrival life becomes a little more complicated. And when a large and disciplined group arrive from across the river emotions run so high that even a surplus of milk pudding can’t soothe ruffled feathers. Change is coming; change that threatens the delicate balance of power in the Great Field. This simultaneously down to earth and surreal fable cements Magnus Mills’ status as one of Britain’s most original novelists.
‘He has no literary precedent, and he also appears to have no imitators. He mines a seam that no one else touches on, every sentence in every book having a Magnus Mills ring to it that no other writer could produce’ Independent
Click here to order
First published in Great Britain 2017
This electronic edition published in 2017 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
© Magnus Mills, 2017
Magnus Mills has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work. Every reasonable effort has been made to trace copyright holders of material reproduced in this book, but if any have been inadvertently overlooked the publishers would be glad to hear from them. For legal purposes the Acknowledgements constitute an extension of this copyright page.
This is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
The moral right of the author has been asserted
All rights reserved. You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (including without limitation electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, printing, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages
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eISBN 978 1 4088 7838 5
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