The North of England Home Service By Gordon Burn

The writing career of Gordon Burn has, thus far, possessed something of the Midas touch. Alma Cogan, his debut novel, was praised extravagantly, sold well, and secured the Whitbread First Novel award. His non-fiction, too, notably Somebody's Husband, Somebody's Son (on the Yorkshire Ripper) and Happy Like Murderers (on Fred and Rose West), have both met with considerable commercial success and critical acclaim. With The North of England Home Service, his third novel, Burn attempts to examine the legacy of post-industrialisation and the subsequent rise of the "leisure" society. It's an ambitious attempt to come to terms with the fall-out of the most fundamental economic and social upheavals that have affected the country during the past 20 years, which, alas, he totally fails to illuminate.

The writing career of Gordon Burn has, thus far, possessed something of the Midas touch. Alma Cogan, his debut novel, was praised extravagantly, sold well, and secured the Whitbread First Novel award. His non-fiction, too, notably Somebody's Husband, Somebody's Son (on the Yorkshire Ripper) and Happy Like Murderers (on Fred and Rose West), have both met with considerable commercial success and critical acclaim. With The North of England Home Service, his third novel, Burn attempts to examine the legacy of post-industrialisation and the subsequent rise of the "leisure" society. It's an ambitious attempt to come to terms with the fall-out of the most fundamental economic and social upheavals that have affected the country during the past 20 years, which, alas, he totally fails to illuminate.

The novel features two protagonists: Ray Cruddas, a washed-up working-class comedian of the old school who sold out to the Tories and now, in the twilight of his career, has been forced to return to his north-eastern hometown to run a grim variety club that has more than a few shades of Peter Kay's Phoenix Nights about it; and his sidekick and general dogsbody Jackie Mabe. The more successful aspects of the novel deal with Jackie and, in flashback, his past career as a boxer and habitué of the seedy London demi-monde of the late 1950s. But the novel comes unstuck in two major departments. While Burn can handle the London nightlife of the 1950s well, it's obvious that he has no real empathy for the setting and the people - the northern working class - that Ray and Jackie now move among. They are described in the clumsiest of broad strokes: the men in a café, Ray reflects in the opening chapter, are products of "the old industries - the heavy industries - that had created the character and culture of that part of the world", yet, beyond a few facile remarks that flat caps and pit boots have given way to sports gear and fluorescent trainers, that culture is never explored in anything like a credible or convincing fashion. He also has the habit of representing Geordie accents phonetically - "The pair yiz. Whatta yous like" etc, that creates the unfortunate impression that working-class Geordies are cartoonish, Viz-like stereotypes of the crassest sort.

The other major failing is the narrative technique itself. Throughout the novel, Burn asserts details of character, psychology, theme and so on, without ever evoking any of the drama inherent in the subject. One example illustrates this failing perfectly: "The longer he had lived in the village," states the narrative, "the more Jackie had become aware of the parallels between the... worlds of the pits and boxing. In both there was the ever present possibility of unexpected and violent death. And the continual presence of danger made the physical and instinctive contact between men very highly developed." This is a perceptive insight that demands to be examined fully, in the complexity of its detail. Yet, beyond a few sketchy remarks in the subsequent two paragraphs, it is never explored. There it sits, flat and inert on the page, an assertion to deaden, not sharpen the interest of the reader, and one which is typical of this lifeless novel as a whole.

In fact, so inept is this novel, so clumsy in its basic technique and frustrating in the treatment of its subject, that it has the cumulative effect of throwing Burn's past achievements into doubt. Is this really the work of a writer who won a Whitbread First Novel award? The North of England Home Service is a hurried, shabby work that leaves its reader dulled, disappointed and puzzled as to why Burn's evident writing talents have deserted him so categorically here.