Monk Quixote

Note: this novel is cur­rently sit­ting in a drawer, await­ing exe­cu­tion. One day I might go back to it, but it won’t be any time soon.

My first novel is about Tom Esher:

Tom Esher’s unin­ten­tion­ally funny and often sur­real jour­ney towards becom­ing a bet­ter per­son is trig­gered by the untimely death of his estranged father — an event which leads to a dis­con­cert­ing series of dis­cov­er­ies, not least that they’re com­mu­ni­cat­ing much bet­ter now one of them is dead.

It has the work­ing title Tom’s Uni­verse — Monk Quixote — as it was orig­i­nally con­ceived as the first of three inter­linked nov­els. Below is a longer ver­sion of the pitch.…

My very own writer’s block

It tells the story of Tom Esher, a twenty-something man strug­gling with the whole twenty-first-something world, who dis­cov­ers that it is hard — but not impos­si­ble — to apol­o­gise to a dead man. It’s about as hard as it is for that dead man to apol­o­gise to his son.

You just need to break a few rules.

And learn how to peel an onion:

Tom’s uni­verse is turned upside down by the dying wish of Frank, his estranged father — a request that will lead Tom on a very per­sonal adven­ture. Tom finds him­self on a quest for under­stand­ing, for­give­ness and redemp­tion — a jour­ney that will take him from the pecu­liar made-up world between his ears to unfa­mil­iar places filled with strange and dam­aged peo­ple. Some are try­ing to help – his girl­friend Mag­gie, Monk Quixote, his online alter-ego with a very shiny tail, but oth­ers… he’s not so sure about. What should he make of the dread­locked stranger who car­ries a torch for all our sins? Or the Repub­li­can Domi­noes Club?

And who, or what, is the God of Onions?