The Scheme for Full Employment (Paperback)

It is an excellent examination of the human condition of never being satisfied with what you have and in trying to improve and abuse a rather idyllic situation, realising it can all come to an unforeseen end (or foreseen for the reader).

Having now read a few more of Mills' books, I seek comfort in identifying with his dry look at behaviour in society through his prose. His novels are written in the first person and the reader is never given the name or gender of the character whose point of view his novels are written from, which immediately transports you into that situation.

I definitely recommend this, and other novels by the same author, to those who enjoy people-watching and human idiosyncrasies.

While there are lots of nice touches - like the industry-specific slang ("early-swervers," "flat-dayers," "ten off the eight"), or the references to real labour disputes in Britain (beer and sandwiches are sent in to the delegates at one stage, the sole female character has a touch of the Thatchers to her) - the book is still really rather one-dimensional, with far fewer laughs than his other books (though the punchline at the end of chapter 6 is a corker), and precious little depth - unless he has shrouded it in in such a high distillation of simplicity that it simply passed me by.

The blurb goes thus: "The whole concept is so simple yet so perfect: men drive to and from strategically placed warehouses in Univans - identical and very serviceable vehicles - transporting replacement parts for ... Univans. Gloriously self-perpetuating, the Scheme for Full Employment is more than social engineering; it is the unified field theory of the modern working world. And what greater good can there be than honest wages for honest labour?"

Now this is one of those blurbs, like Vonnegut's Galápagos, that is tempting but awfully ill-judged. In fact the book doesn't tell us what the purpose of the Scheme is until halfway through, but any feeling of Sixth-Sense-style rug-from-undering is entirely undone by what the blurb has already told us. It's possible that, if it hadn't been explained on the cover flap, the moment of revelation of what The Scheme is (see above) - which comes halfway into the book - could have been a real Catch-22 moment. But as it is, the book can pretty well be summed up by the last paragraph, which you can read for yourself so as not to spoil the "surprise."

Incidentally the flap on the American edition also calls Mills "the acknowledged contemporary master of the working-class dystopic parable." And I gather he's also in the shortlist for world's tallest dwarf.

"The Scheme for Full Employment" is a grand program that, well, guarantees full employment. Eight hours' worth of work for eight hours' pay. Grand days await those who join the scheme, what with an easy job that pays extremely well and has lots of benefits and perks attached to it.

The Scheme relies on a network of depots/distribution centres, with all that goes with it: a mechanical, almost flawless organisation, workers for every kind of task (from key keepers to gate guards), and, obviously, van - pardon, UniVan - drivers wheeling some kind of materials to and fro, in an never ending merry-go-round of transportation.

As the book progresses we find out that nothing happens to the merchandise being carried... it simply gets carried around from depot to depot on and off UniVans. And, most strangely and comically, that the goods are, well, UniVan parts. Now how stranger can the book get?

I won't go into more detail about the plot, but I can't resists making a couple of remarks about the book and the style. Firslty, Mills uses many symbols but is sufficiently smart and unpretentious so he doesn't leave it up to the reader to find out what those symbols are; everything is cleverly explained leaving no room for doubt. Then, there are hardly any references to the outside world; whilst the reader knows for a fact that such people do exist, the fact is that the narrator only narrates about The Scheme. As a result, we are in a kind of 1984/Brave New World age of social transformation mixed in with a lot of human talent - or lack of it.

Whilst the ending could have been a little more creative it was such a... well, dead pan ending that it is quite in keeping with the rest. I loved this book so much that now I can't wait until the next Mills' novels!