Nik Jones’s 9987

‘The Queen’s face is spattered with blood. This is strange for a Wednesday.’

In 9987, the debut novel from Nik Jones, there’s the pervading sense of everything being slightly…off. We follow the unnamed narrator through his frequently meaningless life: from his Total Rental video store, to his cramped bedsit, to the house of his parents, who fall somewhere between ‘Mother’ in Psycho and Mrs. Robinson. At points the narrative becomes almost restrictive or enervating, and it’s all you can do to not swipe away the ever-present thermos of tepid coffee.

For the first half of the book, this proximity-as well as the monotony-overshadow any semblence of plot and leaves the reader to wonder where the story is going. It begins as a sort of specualtive horror: bloody footprints track around the store, sex noises permeate the background of every phonecall, movie characters assume metaphysical roles. Mix in a romantic-cum-bunny-boiling (see: Fatal Attraction) relationship and we’re all ready to wait. Some exchanges with a co-worker and calls to deliquent renters provide comic relief, but still we sit with this hapless bastard. Our sympathies shift, though, when a visit to his parent’s house unearths some photographs and a painful revelation. After that scene, the innocently restrictive narrative tightens into a tactile claustrophobia, one that envelops you until you realize the book is over but you’re still hearing quiet moans in the next room.

Coupled with the superb trick of pacing, Jones extends the film/video idea, creating a novel-length metaphor of disconnection and relativity. Movie characters integrate themselves among the customers. The majority of the narrator’s relationship is through the lens of a camcorder, or in mental vignettes culled from too many Cary Grant movies. And his attempt to seduce her using his pedantic film knowledge goes drastically wrong in a funny but cringe-worthy exchange. In the end, it’s one of the most effective themes in recent memory, and perfectly suits the character and the world he inhabits.

Review by Nik Korpon

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