The Scheme for Full Employment - Softcover

Mills, Magnus

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0007151322 ISBN 13: 9780007151325

Publisher: Harpercollins Pub Ltd, 2004

Synopsis

Book by Mills, Magnus

About this title

Review:

A self-perpetuating means of creating employment provides an allegory for welfare programs and a light meditation on the working class in Magnus Mills's novel The Scheme for Full Employment. Making appointed rounds in UniVans to pick up boxes (containing, what else, UniVan parts), our unnamed protagonist stays the course (mostly, except when he couriers a birthday cake and charts unknown--and unauthorized--territory) while labor unrest stirs between those who champion the eight-hour day and those who want to cut corners and slip out of work early. It is refreshing to see a plot-driven novel come along that is devoid of self-absorbed narration, but the book bounces along on one note; it lacks the depth necessary to be a truly evocative commentary.

Mills's prose is sufficient and the story is well paced. As for the glory of "The Scheme," Mills tells us, "What could be nicer than an excursion in a UniVan on a bright spring morning?... Every so often, when I caught sight of my vehicle reflected in some huge glass-fronted office building, it seemed there could be no better way to earn a living." For a light-hearted, amusing read, The Scheme for Full Employment is worth a quick spin. --Michael Ferch

About the Author:

magnus mills's work has been translated into no less than twenty languages. He is the author of a book of short stories, Only When the Sun Shines Brightly, as well as three novels: Three to See the King, All Quiet on the Orient Express and The Restraint of Beasts, a novel which won the McKitterick Prize, and was shortlisted for both the Booker Prize and the Whitbread First Novel Award.

About this edition

• Publisher: Harpercollins Pub Ltd
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0007151322
• ISBN 13: 9780007151325
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 255