Lanyards, by Neil Campbell, is the third book in the author’s Manchester Trilogy. I have not read the previous two works, Sky Hooks and Zero Hours, also published by Salt. From what I can quickly glean online, this current story is narrated by a man who could be around the same age as the author. Their background, work experiences and publication history appear similar. The narrator enjoys reading Knausgaard among many other male writers lauded within certain literary circles. I pondered if Lanyards could be a work of autofiction.
Campbell is a graduate of the Manchester Writing School. On their website his biography is as follows.
“Neil Campbell was born in Audenshaw, Manchester in 1973. While working variously as a warehouseman, bookseller and teacher, he had poems and stories published in small press magazines, and edited the literary magazine Lamport Court from 2003-2008. In 1999 he completed an MA dissertation on the short stories of Raymond Carver at the University of Manchester, and went on to graduate from MMU’s MA Creative Writing programme in July 2006. His short story collection Broken Doll was published by Salt in March 2007 followed by a second, Pictures from Hopper, 2011, and an e-novella, Sky Hooks, in 2014. He has also had two poetry chapbooks, Birds and Bugsworth Diary, and a story collection Ekphrasis, published by Knives, Forks and Spoons Press and had a story in the Best British Short Stories 2012.”
Although much of this matches details shared by our protagonist, the narrator expresses disdain for Creative Writing courses – not least because the working class cannot afford them.
“I wanted to read great literature and try to write great literature and the further away I could get from Creative Writing the better.”
The story being told jumps around in time offering snapshots of the narrator’s life. Opening in childhood he describes: the gift of a BMX bike, hanging out with his friends, stealing from sweet shops. He writes of later when he had a job in a warehouse. This work follows a brief football career cut short by injury. Football remains important but as a spectator sport.
The narrator’s friends include local poets who meet up in pubs. Here they offer advice to upcoming writers along with the opportunity to read their work in public. At one spoken word night he meets the woman who will become his wife, an Asian born British woman who opens his eyes to casual racism.
The bones of the book are the jobs the narrator must accept to earn a living. The agency he signs up with finds him temporary work supporting SEN students and at a call centre – zero hour contracts. Wrapped around this precarious working life are the narrator’s social hours, spent mainly in pubs imbibing copious quantities of alcohol. His partner tries to interest him in theatre but he remains unimpressed, falling asleep during one show he regarded as tedious.
The narrator harbours disdain for many habits of the middle classes while nurturing his personal preferences and grievances. For example, he hankers after the old kind of pubs finding too many are now
“All too clean, somehow, too family friendly.”
The style of writing is conversational, like catching up with an old acquaintance. There are lengthy sections of dialogue interspersed with descriptions of the narrator’s day to day experiences. He recounts: days at work on his various jobs, nights out with friends, outings with his partner, football matches. The reader gains a feel for the life he is living, including his resentments and ambition as a writer.
Despite the interesting style and substance of the prose I did not become emotionally invested in the characters. Travels around Manchester painted a vivid picture of recent changes in the city, with frequent mentions of bypasses and supermarkets, but did not convey if these are more widely regarded as an improvement. At times there are sparks of anger over government policy or as a result of nostalgia. Given the choices the narrator makes I was unclear what it was he expected.
Clearly stated is a desire to emulate the authors he admires alongside derision for writers who hawk their wares on social media. All of this is conveyed within a commonplace existence where jobs are offered and lost with little regard for the worker – sadly, it has always been thus.
And yet, there is something within the tale that burrows into the mind of the reader – a spark of malcontent that demands attention. Within the ordinary life portrayed is a vibrancy, an insistence that good writing is worth pursuing. As readers we can be thankful that such attitudes persist amongst those whose voices should be heard.
My copy of this book was provided gratis by the publisher, Salt.
neverimitate 