Poetry Forum

This is the first two pages of a novel I am writing. I have nick named it Silver Lit, it's women's fiction.
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BETTER THE DEVIL YOU KNOW

Chapter 1
‘Wow, that was some story,’ thought Joan as she placed the paperback onto the coffee

table. The novel, Chick Lit, was not really intended for her age group, mid sixties, but she’d thoroughly enjoyed it, ‘and why not? The elderly were just teenagers in old skin.’
Joan sat back on the shiny, leather sofa and sipped her coffee. Sparked off by the contents of the book, she reflected on the fifty years she deemed wasted on two dead leg husbands.
‘Jese, that’s half a century!’

The first, fat, flawed and futile, the second and current one, well, yes, the second and current one........’
She drew heavily on the cigarette and made her mind up there and then that she was going to get a life, not just any old life, a young life, a sort of Chick Lit life, a life she’d missed out on all those years ago. ‘Three kids before ones twenty first birthday had been far from a good starting point.’

This had been Joan’s experience, her young fun-life cut short with nappies, bottles, prams and a man-child for a so called husband. An even worse mother-in-law, the type you wish dead on the first meeting. ‘The type you could gladly drop into an acid bath so all trace had gone, well except for dentures.’

She glanced at the calendar and pondered on a date from when her new life would begin.
‘But where to begin? Botox, Crystal-blast, face-lift? I need something. It’s ok thinking chick but when your skin thinks hen…. there’s more lines on it than a Rhode Island road map.’

Dvorak’s Humoresque belted out from the phone and penetrated Joan’s thoughts. ‘Help the aged,’ she answered. ‘Jules! I was going to ring you but I thought you’d still be zedding it. How’d it go?’
‘You’re not going to like this Joan. Are you sitting comfortably?’
‘Go on, what happened?’
‘She’s blonde, tubby and wait for it, about twenty five years old.’
Joan was silent for a moment. ‘Get her address?’
‘Yeah, nice district. Look I’ll come across and we can chat at length. Ok?’

Joan replaced the receiver and went to the drinks cabinet. ‘At least she’s fat.’ She mused.
Selecting the most expensive red, she uncorked it and poured a large, no, a very large glass. Her friend liked red too, as she always said, ‘at our age it’s good for the old arteries.’

Jules arrived in her brand new Smart car; it had made a good disguise the previous evening for tracking Peter, Joan’s husband. She had suspected some time ago that he was playing around although, really couldn’t imagine who would desire a clapped out eighty two year old. He’d recently invested in some new Y-fronts too. ‘Who the hell wears Y-fronts!’ but more to the point, ‘what sort of bitch shags a man who wears Y-fronts.’
The second bottle of red was having a pleasant couldn’t-care-less attitude on Joan’s grey matter. She giggled along with Jules imagining Pete getting his leg over.

I quite liked this, Mrs. Juggles, but I'm not sure I could face a whole novel written in the same tone. A bit relentlessly perky, maybe?

Still, some good lines.

Cheers

David

I'm not sure myself either David, it's my first novel. Thanks for your time/critique

I think it's quite good, have you considered placing an explanation of why she married her second husband, possibly just after the phone call? It seems to me like a good moment for a soul baring monologue .

There's only a small part of it that I don't like and it's:

The first, fat, flawed and futile, the second and current one, undercut, unavoidable and ugly, ‘He’d make a good model for door knockers or gargoyles for the local medieval church. Worse than that, he’s an egotist, a narcissist!’

I feel as though the alliteration and tricolon is overdone a little in the first line, and the description of the second husband as 'unavoidable' seems a little odd in that context. I assume the concept you're trying to get across is that he's suffocating or something similar?

Secondly I think more could be made of the fact not just that he's a narcissist, but that he's a narcissist despite being physically repulsive and seemingly without a glittering personality. I'd suggest something more along the lines of:

"It would be fair to say that after years of marriage she begun to find him increasingly repugnant. His egotism was the worst. She could understand it when she heard how self centred some actors or musicians were, after all some degree of self-love was understandable amongst those with a great deal of talent, or at least physical attractiveness. When it came to Peter however she was at a loss as to how a man possessing not even the slightest trace of either of those qualities could at the same time be one of the greatest narcissists she had ever met. From the meticulous washing, conditioning, and combing of all six of his remaining hairs, to his unshaken, and frequently vocalised, self-belief in his ability to do anything, with the exception of the physically demanding, better than those who in fact did it."

That's my opinion anyway, I hope you crack on with this, it has a lot of potential.

I've already altered the ugly. unavoidable etc since this went up. All the other suggestions you made, jonesy have been covered and come later in but thanks for your time. I've done 66 pages at the moment thinking I was doing great, then realised mine's double spaced, in a book it wouldn't be so it'd amount to about 40 pages
the narcissism is covered here.....[just after a row]

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Joan wanted to say that at eighty two, and twelve years over the promised three score years and ten, he should feel very grateful indeed, but his lips had turned white, so instead, she just stared at him and thought what an arrogant, egotistical twat she had married.
His narcissism had only become apparent to her in the past decade. It had taken her years to understand what was going on with his personality. Looking it up on the internet, it stated that it was a definite personality disorder, nothing much was known about the cause but it was thought that it stemmed from childhood and was possibly genetic. There were nine pointers that could identify the condition and Pete matched them all.
She came to the conclusion that he must have always been that way but because she had fed his ego initially, he had no need in those days to constantly talk and brag about himself. In company he would stand next to her, preening his feathers and sticking out his chest as if to say, ‘See what I’ve got lads, look and weep, she’s all mine.’ He would uncharacteristically put his arm round her to display possession. Once her looks began to fade, he became less interested, and then indifferent. He would walk bent over into a pub or restaurant way ahead of her, as though to say, ‘I’m not with her.’ This hurt her deeply but when the subject was broached, he would never discuss it. It became clear to Joan that he had fallen for her looks initially and not her.