D: The Taxi Queue by Janet DAVEY

Chosen because

That always intriguing premise of two strangers whose paths cross; how will their lives change as a result of that chance encounter and a single, possibly unwise, decision made on impulse?

The Review

From a chance encounter in a taxi queue and its immediate aftermath the lives of a chain of characters emerge. Their stories don’t so much interlock as bump up against one another. We get a first hand account of their largely joyless existence as they struggle to resolve their personal demons.  Set in modern London the sense of place is strong and feels authentic, but the overall impression is of lives caught in the capital’s currents; either unable or unwilling to do anything other than follow the lines of least resistance.

The action is limited; the dramas are of the everyday sort; the lives and characters are therefore real, but a bit dull. Their thoughts, motives and relationships are reported without exaggeration. As the Guardian put it “it eludes the novelistic norms in favour of something more like life”.

Read another?

Unlikely – I think I prefer novelistic norms