Beetle Mania by Paula Clamp - 'For twenty years he has been more than just one of family but now Merlin is heading for the scrap.'
Writing with some genius and humour about people and relationships is the great strength of Poolbeg author Paula Clamp. In her debut novel Standing in a Hammock she brought us into the cosy domestic world of a small housing estate in suburban Bangor. Through the keyholes we shared the lives of her wonderfully complex and always interesting characters.
Now in her second novel she introduces us to the Farrell family as through the cleverly conceived vehicle of Merlin, a much loved and well travelled Volkswagen Beetle we experience the joys, heartaches and passion that shaped their lives.
Over the last five years the Farrell sisters have only really got together for births, marriages and deaths. Now they have come to a decision and they really need one another. For twenty years he has been more than just one of the family but now Merlin is heading for the scrap-yard.
Every rusting piece of metal has absorbed the joy, passion and heartache of the dramatic lives of Kitty, Emer and Heather. The backseat has seen lust; the bonnet deception and the wipers have hidden tears.
As their stories unfold, we are drawn into a web of misunderstanding. The truth has long since been twisted and the constant figure, which has seen it all, is about to be discarded. Is it too late to salvage the truth?
Paula Clamp talks about her second novel and her close relationship with her much loved Volkswagen Beetle
I have owned my 35-year-old VW Beetle for the past thirteen years. There is a love-hate relationship going on. Against all-odds, 'Merlin' as I call him (the same as in the book), has burrowed himself into my heart and regardless of the dozens of times I've been stranded at the side of the road, waiting for the recovery van to save me, I could never part with him.
My husband Gerry and brother-in-law Jim discovered Merlin in a friend's garage in Bristol. There was a litter of kittens in the back seat and grass growing through the floor-pan. The two of them spent two weeks putting the car back together, welding things, changing gearboxes and stuff like that. Miraculously, just fourteen days after being discovered, he made the journey from Bristol all the way back to his new home in Belfast without a splutter.
Many of the stories in Beetle Mania are based on real-life events drawn from my fraught relationship with my car; such as the time he broke down on the motorway during rush hour. Because of where the car ground to a halt, the Police had to close all four lanes of the M2 outbound from Belfast in order to get Merlin towed across to the hard shoulder on the other side. The AA man discovered a beetle (the small, six-legged-kind), firmly lodged in the fuel filter. 'Beetle stops beetle stops Motorway!' was the heading in the paper the next morning.
For a long time, especially in the winter months, Merlin was threatened with the scrap yard. Our kids had come along, we were getting older, our lifestyle was changing, but somehow, every time the thought entered my head, he was forgiven his numerous breakdowns, his failures to start, his wipers stopping in heavy rain and such evil thoughts would evaporate.
About eighteen months ago, when Merlin, once again, had one foot in the scrap-yard, my view of him changed forever. One evening, I got a message from my husband that my baby daughter had taken seriously ill and had to be rushed to hospital. I was distraught and could only think of getting to the hospital as quickly as possible. I looked at my old Beetle...'It's up to you' I said. Not only did he get us to the hospital, but also he moved more effortlessly than ever before. In fact, he flew! When my baby was safely stabilised I went back to the casualty front door and my abandoned Beetle and made him a promise that I would never part with him.
Over the years Merlin has worn several 'suits' including 'windowlene pink' and 'midnight blue'. But recently he has had his first full body-off restoration carried out by Dave Wheatly at the Ireland Air-cooled Centre. He now has a tuned 1600 engine and a full stainless Steel Kadron exhaust. I always thought he deserved a bit of attitude so Dave obliged by lowering him all round and fitting eight-spoke anthracite EMPIs with 145x15 low profiles on the front and 195/70x15s on the rear. His 60s retro, suede and orange interior gives him a colourful lift and it works perfectly with his pearlescent amber fire finish. He's also got some little touches that just make driving a 35-year-old Beetle a bit easier - like an electric windscreen washer, heated rear window and seriously powerful Blaupunkt CD system.
He's still part of the family - for the time being! And I've honoured him by making him the central character in this book, which I think is a rarity. He lives and breathes and if there's a hero in the book, it's him.
Like Standing in a Hammock, Beetle Mania is a story led by the characters. Relationships are yet again important, but it is more the people themselves that I am interested in. Whereas my first novel looked at how people behave when drawn together over a two-day period, this book is set over twenty-years. How people and their relationships grow and develop over a period of time was fascinating.
I grew up with two brothers and my mother, so it was fun for me to write about three sisters and their father. A little essence of each of the sisters is 'sneaked' from people I know and whom I would never tell.
I enjoyed creating the father figure, a man you never actually meet in the story until the very end - he is always shouting up from downstairs or on the other end of a telephone conversation. How we perceive people to be and the assumptions we make is certainly an area of interest to me and one I have explored in both books.
Yet again, I hope to have created believable and likeable characters, which readers can recognise and enjoy.
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