MAGNUS MILLS

'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 In 'Hark the Herald', 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; in 'Only When the Sun Shines Brightly' Aesop's fable about a competition between the Sun and the Wind to get a man to take his coat off, gets a new look involving a railway arch, a builder and a piece of plastic sheeting; in 'Once in a Blue Moon' a man arrives home to find the family house under siege, with his mother armed, dangerous and firing at the police with a shotgun, and attempts to appease her with an invitation to seasonal hospitality; and in the title story, rivalry between three cousins over a faulty toy gets out of hand as the cousins unwittingly imitate the toy they're fighting over. Magnus Mills has published two collections of stories - Only When the Sun Shines Brightly and Once in a Blue Moon - which are collected here together with four new stories for the first time to make a set of twelve.

No pasa nada importante en esta narración de la vida de tres obreros itinerantes que construyen, a desgana, pero con pericia, vallados de alta tensión. Nada, excepto la muerte de varios personajes. De estos episodios, narrados con laconica comicidad, surge el retrato de tres hombres sometidos por la logica del empleo precario. Una historia sobre cercas y muerte que lleva al lector a descubrir una revelacion de naturaleza casi religiosa.

En un paisaje desolado y aislado vive un hombre en una casita de hojalata. Es feliz. La casita de hojalata le resulta acogedora y lo mejor de todo, se halla a muchos kilómetros de sus vecinos más próximos. Vive solo y en paz. Un dia viene a verle una mujer que conocio tiempo atras y se instala a vivir con el. Poco despues un vecino viene a visitarle, seguido de otros... De repente, su existencia comienza a tomar una forma demasiado amistosa y poblada, mientras descubre que los pocos habitantes de las casas de hojalatas estan abandonando sus hogares y muchos otros llegan a estas tierras para reunirse con un tal Michael Hawkins, un maestro de la construccion que, al parecer, ha llegado con un mensaje revolucionario.

Es bastante mañoso. O, al menos, eso es lo que parece creer míster Parker. Da igual; pronto iba a estar de camino a la India y dejaría atrás este cámping junto al lago. Tan pronto como terminara la tarea que le habia encargado mister Parker. El verano tocaba a su fin. Los otros campistas ya se habian marchado, y con ellos desaparecieron el sol, el agua caliente en las duchas y hasta la cerveza buena del pub. Males menores a los que apenas se presta atencion entre tantas tareas por hacer. De cobrar, hablarian mas tarde. Y ademas, estaba empezando a hacerse un hueco en la sociedad local Tal vez el viaje podria esperar un poco mas. En su segunda y brillante novela, regresamos al ambito rural que Mills ha hecho suyo. Hay la sensacion desconcertante de que todo y todos estan conspirando contra nuestro heroe, de que la fatalidad o el terror se ciernen sobre el La vida en el campo que nos muestra es hermosa, aterradora y deliciosamente banal. Mills se regodea con las conversaciones y las situaciones cotidianas, que pasan a ser surrealistas e hilarantes. Un poco en el estilo de los hermanos Coen (Daily Mirror). Encuadernacion: Rustica con solapas.

A wonderfully original fable which will appeal to readers of all ages, from ''a British writer to be treasured'' (Independent on Sunday)Of course, if this had been any other country The Scheme would still be going today. In any other country it would have been regarded as a national treasure. Planned to the finest detail by people of vision, The Scheme was watertight, and could not possibly go wrong. Except in this country. ''Life on The Scheme is like being in a great big feather bed. You''ve got your full uniform provided, winter and summer, subsidized cups of tea and sandwiches, the opportunity for a quiet doze in a lay-by while you wait to clock off, and a generous weekly wage. And all you''ve got to do is turn up for work every day! But it could all so easily come to an end. Already, workers are beginning to divide into opposing camps, and a new superintendent has arrived, intent on sending The Scheme the way of ''all those other failed social experiments, like public transport, school dinners and municipal orchestras''. Might the chill winds of change spell an end to our glorious summer?

Life on the scheme is like being in a great big feather bed. You've got your full uniform provided, winter and summer, subsidized cups of tea and sandwiches, the opportunity for a quiet doze in a lay-by while you wait to clock off, and a generous weekly wage. All you've got to do is turn up for work every day! But it could all so easily come to an end. A wonderfully original fable which will appeal to readers of all ages, from the author of 'The Restraint of Beasts' and 'All Quiet on the Orient Express'.