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After setting his debut novel in the glamorous world of the
Hollywood movie mogul, Dominic Holland has chosen a more down-to-earth
environment for his follow-up effort: a struggling football club
languishing in the lowest recesses of the league.
The proud but declining fans of Middleton Edwardians start
a valiant, but seemingly doomed, campaign to save their historic
club after carpet-bagging developers buy its valuable ground,
ready for the inevitable luxury flats once the dismal team finally
loses its weakening grip on the Third Division.
But a bizarre chain of events, triggered in true chaos theory
style by a disgruntled bakery worker who one day decided not
to fill his doughnuts with jam, escalates this small-town tale
until it encompasses high-flying politicians, multi-millionaire
star players and the unseen hands of the PR industry.
Although the theme is football, it's far from a fans-only
read. In fact, Holland goes to such efforts to explain the smallest
workings of the modern game that it could be the first football
book for people who don't really like football.
He has a breathlessly entertaining style; there's always something
going on and precious little effort is wasted getting from one
scene to the next. Perhaps his eye's on getting a lucrative film
deal, as the book reads something like a film novelisation
heavy on set pieces and dialogue, if scant on characterisation.
And everyone knows how Hollywood (and Ealing) loves tales of
the little guy standing up to powerful forces.
Yet while plenty of the figures that populate this novel are
little short of caricatures, especially bad guys like the greedy
fat-cat capitalists, the petulant-if-fading star player and the
oleaginous agent, it doesn't seem to matter. The twisting story's
so compelling you always want to know what happens next. Anyway,
I'm guessing football's ridden with real ogres far worse than
any caricatures an author could imagine.
Holland's also masterful at keeping all the threads moving
along simultaneously, occasionally intertwining in the most unexpected
way to provide a rich narrative texture. That pretty much the
whole novel is a consequence of such a trivial act of defiance
in the doughnut factory is testament to that.
It's a shame, then, that this cracking tale only reaches its
conclusion via a jarring deus ex machina a flukish contrivance
that sits uncomfortably with the rest of the story's logic. After
330 pages of fine, plot-driven adventure, it's a shame that the
last 20 rely on such an incongruous device to tie up all the
loose ends.
Aside from this, though, it's a real page-turner. Not perhaps
laugh-out-loud funny but then so few books are more
of a brisk, jolly yarn. That it takes in all the issues blighting
football in modern times will give it a resonance with any devoted
or downcast fan outside the Premiership that it's a damn good
tale will be more than enough for everyone else.
Steve Bennett
February 17, 2004
The Ripple Effect is published by Flame at £6.99
Click
here to buy from Amazon at £5.59
 For
a review of Dominic Holland's first novel: Only In America
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