A couple of years ago, I uploaded my novel, TAXI, onto the Harper Collins website Authonomy. com. The idea is you share sample chapters of your work with fellow writers who then critique and vote on each others books. At the end of the month the five highest ranking novels are selected for a review
from a Harper Collins editor. Like it or loathe it, it can become a very addictive site, offering many writers their first opportunity at finding, readers as well as like-minded budding authors.
Any way at the end of March I created something of a record by reaching the 'editors desk' with two novels at the same time. My epic fantasy novel, Tribesman, soon to be published by Cogwheel Press, and my genreless, gritty, urban drama, TAXI (click on the link to read some sample chapters) Below is the review from Harper Collins. If this is your first visit to my blog why not follow me or click the Facebook thingie to 'like' my fan page.
Taxi by Paul Freeman
This is the story of Danny Coyne, a Dublin taxi
driver whose whole life is turned upside down when his cab hits and kills a
teenage girl on the street. Although he is acquitted of any wrongdoing, he
cannot move the guilt from his mind, and soon turns to alcohol, pushing away
the people who love him.
There are several positives aspects of the novel.
The most significant of these is simply the quality of the writing. Freeman
clearly has a sound understanding of structure, character arc, and the trick to
weaving a convincing narrative. The main character Danny is likeable and,
through a series of ‘asides’ (Danny’s thoughts written in italics throughout
the story) we get some insight into the sheer panic and constant guilt which
plague him, and which eventually lead him to seek some kind of vengeance. The
fact that Danny is in every scene and that we get to see his paranoia gradually
engulfing him allows us to witness constantly the unrelenting nature of his
torment, as he moves from extreme happiness with the woman of his dreams to a
drunken, angry wreck.
Even though this sort of guilty-paranoia angle is
nothing new in fiction and doesn’t feel particularly novel or original, it is
rendered quite convincingly in TAXI. On top of this, Freeman has managed to establish
through plot the sense of frustration that Danny feels. The more Danny tries to
pull himself free of his remorse, the more he gets dragged into an increasingly
troubling and dangerous situation. These are definitely the most encouraging
parts of the novel from a Publisher’s perspective.
There are several issues with the writing that let
the work down, however. These are certainly issues that can be addressed,
problems with real solutions, and I believe that making these changes would
make the book more sellable.
One of the main issues which occurred to me is
genre. To make a book marketable, and get readers and retailers interested, it
has to fit into at least one recognisable genre type. TAXI lacks the excitement
and suspense one would expect in a suspense thriller. And, whilst a crime sits
at the heart of the story, there is no investigation, no element of mystery,
which would make it a true Crime novel. On the face of it then, considering the
story (a man’s psychological decay) it should be literary fiction. And yet,
while the story certainly makes for an interesting read and we do sympathise
with the main character, the content and the rendering of the story do not
contain the metaphor, depth, even psychological insight one would expect from literary
fiction. If the author tends more towards the crime novel, I would suggest
creating an extra element – the investigation. The idea of Danny’s actions
being scrutinised externally as well as internally immediately raises the
stakes. Then the question becomes Will
Danny be able to convince himself AND the police/another external accuser that
he’s innocent? And this holds some exciting possibilities.
There is also the fact that Danny seems to be
rather reactive – he only confronts
one of the ‘killers’ from his taxi when he happens to bump into him in the
street, having made no previous attempt to find them. It is fine to have a
reactive main character, but the deficit in willpower needs to be made up in
psychological insight and analysis. I don’t feel that this was strong enough.
Meanwhile, though the asides in italics give us some sense of the blind panic
he feels, they are not insightful enough to carry the story.
This also brings us on to the lack of tension. To
build suspense, there has to be some build-up of tension. The author doesn’t
leave the feelings or situation to mount long enough before releasing all
tension and moving on. For example, again when Danny meets the killer (the
chip-eater), the tension is only allowed to mount for a couple of hundred words
before the chip eater is killed off. As
a result, the excitement which the reader could potentially feel if the
situation were drawn out, the tension raised, Danny driven insane with the
frustration of his own inaction, is lost. Because, surely it’s the inaction,
the build-up, that makes a moment dramatic. It’s the inner turmoil, Danny
spotting this foul creature and thinking ‘look what I’ve become because of you’
and yet doing nothing (at least for a while), which makes the situation interesting.
It may sound like a contradiction, but the pacing
is actually one of the strengths of this novel. While there is possibly a
weakness in terms of genre definition, the plot moves with pace from one scene
to the next, rarely drawing out any scenes longer than necessary, and showing
as a result how quickly Danny descends to the depths of his guilt and despair.
The challenge will be to keep the pacing, to keep the reader turning pages,
while also adding tension and moving the book towards a real crime novel.
Without the tension, set-ups and pay-offs which the crime novel brings, I worry
that there would not be enough interesting stuff to maintain the work to full
novel length.
It is important to remember that each character is
the protagonist in his or her own story. Danny is a very strong main character
but many of the characters in TAXI felt like little more than 2-dimensional
plot devices. The characters have to be the
story, which in turn informs structure. Everything has to flow from the
characters, and while this is achieved through Danny’s character arc, the
author should be wary of adding characters merely for the purpose of moving the
story along.
In its current form, the commercial value in this
work is questionable. It may appeal to some people as it is undoubtedly
well-written and an interesting read. But positioning this title would be a big
challenge. The author has produced the makings of a good novel, but until
certain things are added or altered it cannot become a real crime novel. Genre
is not everything, but genre exists for a reason – a work can fly or fall on
how comfortably it fits a certain market. If it cannot be defined as fitting
into a genre, it may not find an audience.
I feel that the author perhaps needs to ask himself
what would shake up this novel. What will make this novel stand out? How can
tension be added? This might be changing one of the main characters, changing
the setting or time, perhaps even introducing some kind of intelligent
non-linear narrative form, which when done well in crime stories can be
extremely effective. But whatever changes, the author must bear in mind the
need to define the genre. Taking this into consideration
and addressing the issues outlined above could make this eventually a publishable
novel.
