An exclusive satirical story of what it means to 'Take Back Control'...
Plus details of our 2024 submissions window
Happy Friday Scribblers,
It’s a strange time - I feel like I’m still in Winter (hello even rainier Britain as climate change rears its head), that an election could be due at any moment, and its almost time for open submissions at Fly on the Wall, so things are about to get even stranger (in a good way this time!)
Today, I’d like to share a story with you from short story collection ‘The State of Us’ by Birmingham’s solution to Kafka, Charlie Hill. It’s been a while!
Through Charlie Hill’s signature dark humour, the story satirizes the anti-elite, anti-immigrant populist narrative that became a driving force behind the Brexit campaign, depicting it through the eyes of an obsessive man on a bizarre personal mission against petrol prices. It captures the contradictions and conspiracy mindsets that coloured parts of that political movement.
I do hope you enjoy it.
Taking Back Control
Nigel woke, as he did every day, in an inexpensive guesthouse and to the promise of a long drive. Today – if there were no developments before he left – he was travelling from Morpeth to Plymouth Hoe, a journey of some 400 miles. In many respects this was the optimum distance, necessitating only the most minor of diversions. Sometimes his destination would be closer by and he’d have to plan more significant detours, wasting half the day on roads he didn’t need to travel. Once he’d struggled terribly with a nightmare trip of barely 60 miles. That morning, as he did every morning, Nigel plugged in his laptop, checked his email for overnight developments. There were none, and no new messages on his mobile either. So today was a done deal: Plymouth Hoe it was. He switched on This Morning, clipped his nose hair and took a shower.
Nigel got his information from a network of contacts he had nurtured over two decades of life on the road. For twenty years he had traversed the cities and shires of England, selling driving gloves, car coats, handbrake covers, thermos flasks and heated seat cushions. He was retired now and had nothing to sell but he had taken care to keep in touch with his former customers. Because although there were websites that supposedly offered the same intelligence, Nigel was in no hurry to announce his intentions to The Surveillance State. And Nigel had unfinished business.
He had learned things on the road. About injustice and oppression and the evils of the world. About how people were abused and exploited on a daily basis by the faceless functionaries and unaccountable officialdom of a corrupt and wasteful bureaucracy. And how, of all of the millions of people under the jackboot of the state, it was the motorist that had it worst of all. Their treatment had awakened something in him, a defiant spirit, something of Olde Englande, something of Shakespeare and Nelson and Robin Hood. Because Nigel was a motorist too and if there was one thing he would not tolerate, it was being taken for a fool by his so-called lords and masters.
By the time he was out of the shower Nigel had two messages. This was no surprise. His informants were conscientious and vigilant, their eyes on every forecourt in the land. He read the texts. The news was good. There were stirrings in the Midlands. After the Plymouth Hoe he had already pencilled in the Oadby – although it had let him down recently and he’d had to sputter on to the fall-back stop-gap in Wigston Magna – but now there was also word of a promising – if anomalous – Harborne, a fortnight hence. Before that, Penrith at 1.26, an Orpington trialling 1.257, the maverick in Bude as low as 1.246…
Nigel breakfasted, as usual, on a Full English. He replenished his thermos, put on his car coat. He put on his driving gloves and went to his car. A call came in, then another. The next few days had filled up nicely. He would stop at the garage down the road, avail himself of what he knew to be the cheapest petrol in the whole country. He would take a full tank, of course, to make sure he got every last drop of his money’s worth. Then he would set off for the Plymouth Hoe, driving so as to arrive with an empty tank and ready to do it all again, to stick it to the Man, a proud Englishman standing up against the world, unbowed, unbeaten and always – always – one step ahead of the game…
The guidelines are comprehensive, correct and godly. But mostly, I hope, they are simple. I promise you it is simply your writing I am interested in, so don’t panic about formatting, fonts you don’t have ect. And please don’t submit early. This year, I’ve provided a cover letter template on the submissions page. I hope it will be useful! It is my way of getting to know you a little better.
On the 1st of May, I will set up an automatic reply on my emails. Check your spam! If you receive this email, I have your submission, and I will be in touch when I’ve read it. If you do not receive an automatic reply, feel free to email to check that I received your email, after a couple of days.
If you don’t hear from me, this is a good thing: there are no issues with your submission. Not heard from me roughly 6-8 weeks since the submission window closed in July? Even better, I am clearly chewing over your work, and deciding if we will be able to publish your book. Not heard from me in over 2 months since the submission window closed in July? Feel free to chase me.
Please do not update your manuscript after submitting it to me. I promise that extra comma, or new chapter three, will not massively change my perception of your work. DON’T PANIC, SCRIBBLERS. Every year, there tends to be panic in my inbox! You’ve got this. Now go read a good book?
Talk soon,
Isabelle x
