My Criminal World

Henry Sutton
My Criminal World

Harvill Secker, 2013

David Slavitt is a middle-aged crime writer, the author of the thrillers of medium popularity, father of two children, obedient husband. In the morning he drives the kids to school, then writes, and in the evening serves to the university colleagues of his wife cooking for them one dish and then another. And not that David is depressed about his life, it seems like the wife loves him, his books have readers, even though he’s not recognized on the street, and yet the writer's life has lost some direction. The new novel is not written, though deadline is rapidly approaching, the agent presses and requests from David more violence in his books (as an example pointing to a young talent, for whose novel publishers fought at the auction), his wife Maggie distences away from him and spends more time at work.

Slavitt does begin writing his new novel, staying in trend, with a female cop as the main character, and squeezes out a scene ot two every day, while he begins to suspect his wife having an affair with a student.

World couldn’t bear another novel about a writer’s block if My Criminal World wasn’t a subtle satire on the publishing world and the lives of middle-class suburbia. And this satire is quite softie, as David himself.

David himself has no intention to scoff at someone or laugh at something. He is depressed from all sides, he isn’t resting, and he does not dare to argue with anyone. His editor avoids him as a hopeless author, his agent is coddling him and tries to lead to the right path (ie the path of the bestseller), his wife shrugs off and complaines about tiredness. And inner uncertainty pushes the protagonist to such actions, which at other times he would not have thought of. So, a stay-at-home dad turns into the character of moderately suspenseful domestic thriller.

The publishing world is extremely prudent in this novel, so it is relatively easy to make fun of it. Course for commercialization fiction has taken finds his way in My Criminal World. David himself, perhaps, is the last of all the characters who think about money, but everyone else is trying to milk the author of the books before throwing him away. Publicity team prepares a U.S. tour, the agent teaches the writer how to write, the editor meets only with those who bring in cash.

Simultaneously with the main events of the novel we read manuscripts and fragments of the new Slavitt book. His novel is a typical British police procedural, callous, clumsy, with the change of POV in each chapter. Surprisingly, Henry Sutton managed to stylize these fragments from an average thriller. Compared to this Sutton’s novel, Slavitt’s novel looks pathetic. Slavitt is a nice guy, but what a mediocre writer he is.

Henry Sutton returned the faith that the novels about writer’s block could still be exciting and well-written. I will read more from Sutton with a great pleasure, but I wouldn’t ever read Slavitt.

Meltdown

Ben Elton
Meltdown

Bantam Press, 2009

The economic crisis of 2008 has hit the six university friends hard. Jimmy, Robbo, Lizzie, Henry, David and Rupert graduated from university in 1993, then got wives and husbands, children and homes, the high statuses and high-paying jobs. Friends, swimming in cash, were in the chocolate until the crisis hit. Elton tells how they all came to the situation they had come.

In the center of the novel are financial trader Jimmy and his wife Monica. Jimmy wanted to be a director and make documentary films, but once tried to be a trader at a major office and realized that it is rock’n’roll! Jimmy himself made the reality, not the reality made him, and money poured in. He began at once to get more money than his friends; every day bought new clothes because there was no time to go shopping. Jimmy gradually began to spend all the money on booze and drugs, and would have been in rehab, if not married to Monica, who worked in the catering company and distribute sandwiches to offices in the same building where Jimmy worked. They married, celebrated their honeymoon in the United States, Jimmy gave up bad habits. They had three children, and the eldest, Toby, at the time of the crisis has already been in a private school. The family did not count the money, giving thousands of pounds for charity, buying a five-story building with an elevator and a few cars, hiring an Australian nanny who served the entire family. Jimmy has invested in a new project, buying an entire street, where a construction of expensive homes had begun. But then the crisis came.

Writer Elton is from the category of professionals, which do not write badly. They are not great prose writers or prominent novelists, but they know their craft. They rarely jump bar genius, but rarely fall low.

«Meltdown» is strong work, ephemeral novel, but surely written with refined drama, with lots of details, flavored with tasty little words and expressions. Obviously, the book has been written on the topic of the day in the wake of the headlines. The financial crisis is behind us (and if it ever was), and the situation described in the novel is a little bit dated. However, the book reads voraciously and cardboard heroes here look more authentic than in many novels. All university friends from the novel are character types, characters from jokes and anecdotes, stilted models, giving the author the opportunity to build his attack on the different strata of British society. Part of the jokes and understanding the problem will be lost, because you need to know some aspects of British life, to understand political structure, economic situation etc etc. But even if you do not know the half of it the book would still be funny and sometimes very funny. Elton writes brilliant dialogue and tries his hand at satire, and at the sitcom, and at economic analyst.

Evolution of university friends is prominently: ordinary young men and women come to a crossroads, try themselves, climbing gradually higher and higher, turning into pretty nasty characters. People are losing their human form until the collapse occurs.

The characters of the book are unpleasant, but Jimmy is a success. At least from the type he turns into an ordinary person, who sees life around, life that can be fun.

Elton adds action in the politicial/economic satire. Death of a friend, the inspector, illegal trading, the fire in the house - it all fit into the plot, making it more refined.

The novel is hardly the top of the British prose, but this is a strong work, worth reading.