Reviews on The Review

If publishing has leant increasingly on one-line pitches for rising attractions, few can have been as broadly reduced as Magnus Mills. ‘Bus driver turned novelist!’ crowed the press on the arrival of his debut, The Restraint of Beasts. As ever, the truth proved a little less cut and dry. Mills had held a string of menial jobs, including a stint as a bus driver, but prior to publication had also run a neat sideline as a diarist for The Independent, penning a column which was ultimately dropped in favour of a nascent Ms. Bridget Jones. A spare, bone dry comedy in which fence building labourers divide their time between petty squabbles and casual manslaughter, The Restraint of Beasts was Booker nominated and drew praise from none other than the elusive Thomas Pynchon (hard to imagine two more jarring comic tones).

 

Over the ensuing decade he has dabbled with different settings and tones, publishing two collections of short stories and four novels, but The Maintenance of Headway sees Mills returning to familiar ground. A workplace comedy with – that most over-used of adjectives – Kafkaesque undertones, it details the daily life of a nameless bus driver, a limitless series of gripes and repetitions.

 

Hanging over each page, adhered to with messianic zeal by the conductors and bureaucratic antagonists, is the titular philosophy, staitng that neatly prescribed gaps between on-running bus services are key to an efficient service. Naturally this proves impossible, and as the novella progresses the absurdities pile up.

 

At a nose over 150 pages and printed in large copy, this is by no means a heavy read. Nothing is left to waste. Descriptions are limited and dialogue is choppy, short and over-lapping. Characters come and go between shifts with little impact. Most notably lacking is the gleeful darkness of tone which so marked Mills’ first novel, where murders were consigned to casual asides, given equal precedence to the next pint or a clean pair of socks. While the nameless city setting projects a light air of menace, Mills does little to develop the implied creepiness and machinations of the faceless management. Even the mysterious Thompson, an enigmatic former employee guilty of crimes either forgotten or ignored, is explained away in a soft gag which raises titters, rather than guffaws.

 

The lasting effect is one of frustration. Mills is capable of much better. Nevermind, we are tempted to think. His novels are like buses - there’ll be another along, soon enough.