Every
novel has its own soundtrack. In Lord of
the Flies by William Golding there is the roar of the ocean and the buzz of
incessant flies. The Secret Garden by
Frances Hodgson Burnett moves from
the miserable sound of winter rain against the windows to rising birdsong as
spring unfolds.
My new
novel Illegal (Meadowside Books,
March 2012) is the second book in my cycle of three novels set on Hayling
Island. So the soundtrack includes the sounds of the Island – the tide pulling
over the pebbles on the beach, the wind in the pines, the rattle of the shrouds
from the boats moored in the channels. But each of the three books in the cycle
has its own particular soundtrack.
Illegal has a soundtrack
to match the mood and action of the book. Fifteen year old Lindy’s family have
been rocked by the death of two year old Jemma. Mum doesn’t get dressed anymore
and sits round all day drinking, Dad spends his time in the bookies, the two
older brothers are in prison and nine year old Sean nags for food. Vulnerable
and lonely, Lindy thinks her cousin Colin has come to rescue her. But she soon
realises he has trapped her into the shadowy and dangerous world of
international drug dealing. Lindy is terrified she will end up in prison like
her brothers. Support comes from a surprising quarter, fellow misfit fifteen
year old Karl, who is mute. But Karl is resourceful and intelligent. Together
they embark on a desperate path to ensure Lindy’s freedom.
There are
lots of illegal things in this book. Karl rides around on a motorbike,
underage. The soundtrack fills up with a
variety of effects from roars to putters to the squeal of brakes. Karl's friend Jimmy, who is deaf and communicates only with sign language, rides a 1953 Triumph with a side car. The volume of motorbike noise goes through the roof when a group of Hells Angel wrinklies on Harley Davidsons rush past
them near the pier.
Lindy’s
job is to look after cousin Colin’s cannabis farm in a house down the back
lanes on Hayling Island. But Lindy is spooked by all sorts of noises in the
house, creaking and scraping, thuds on the floor upstairs, with the sound of
the motorbike in the lane outside. Lindy half thinks the house is haunted and
has a very nasty experience one evening.
Part of
the soundtrack of this novel is silence. Karl doesn't speak at all and Lindy
finds herself very drawn to Karl’s silent world. Why
waste words? Lindy wonders. Probably helps the environment if we breathe out less. The
problems both Lindy and Karl experience from their difficult home backgrounds
reflect my experience as a special needs teacher for 25 years. I worked with
young people who were mute for all sorts of psychological reasons. Mutism
isolates young people from their peers, holds back their education and is a
difficult condition to treat and overcome. But I was also interested in the
whole issue of communication and young people. Lindy enjoys Karl’s silence.
Most of her verbal exchanges with her family, her teachers, the other kids at
school, the drug dealers, are negative, In Karl’s silent world she feels that
they can almost read each other’s minds and this helps to strengthen the
growing bond between them.
My
soundtrack flows between the engine sounds of bikes and motorboats, the cries
of seagulls and the rush of the waves over the beach. There is the spitting of eggs frying, mobile ringtones and laptop start-up sounds, the crack of gunfire and the gloop gloop
of mud in the harbour. And in the third novel, Stuffed, Ian Dury and the Blockheads play in the background.
What is
the soundtrack to your novel?
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