The Domestic Terrorist - Goodnight Steve McQueen

"GOODNIGHT STEVE McQUEEN" - Louise Wener

If you were born between about 1970 and 1980, then sometime in the mid 90�s, you probably either wanted to be, or to shag, the author of this book. Since the demise of Britpop�s underdogs Sleeper, Louise Wener seemingly disappeared from view. Instead of giving up and going back to the day job, she instead forged ahead with writing (like all debuts) a heavily-autobiographical debut novel which shows, perhaps surprisingly, that her talents are best placed as either being an author, or postergirl for 1995.

�Goodnight Steve McQueen� is no "Citizen Kane" style debut. Instead it�s a solid, sturdy entry from a talent who may very well grow into greatness. Despite being cynically marketed to the same type of audience as Mike Gayle�s insipid lovefests, and cursed with a tacky, simplistic cover, Wener�s first book shows that she could easily, and without much effort, become the female equivalent of Tony Parsons. And probably much much better.

It�s not all sweetness and light. With a strangely prosaic plot - that of late twenty-somethings final stab at the big time of rock stardom - �Goodnight Steve McQueen� suffers from the off. It has the worst opening paragraph I�ve ever read (and one that was, quite rightly, lambasted all over the internet when it first appeared), and for those of us who aren�t immersed in Pixies trivia and the back pages of the NME, it may, on occasion be difficult to get all the references.

Thankfully it�s all an improvement from there, as characters are realistically drawn, and events unfold at a natural pace. Wener also avoids a common temptation - that of characters behaving irrationally and stupidly in order to advance the plot along. The touch of realism is oddly convincing. She�s not a great writer, but a damn good one, and what she lacks in style and flair is made up for in a deceptively easy style and surprisingly successful adoption of a male lead.

Overall, the novel oddly echoes essential �High Fidelity�, even down to the supposedly-strong but ultimately weak-willed female lead who tries to impose her will upon the lead character before succumbing to another few years of poverty and memorising old vinyl catalogue numbers. That�s not giving the end away : there�s a lot lot more to it than that. Struggling musicians in back street pubs pooling their remaining cash for a pint, rock star ex-friends who turn out to be unsufferable aresholes, failing relationships, cheap drugs, battered transit vans, groupies, and the odd bit of domestic deception.

So business as usual for a rock memoir. It�s never as earth-shattering in its expose as �The Dirt� nor as personal as �High Fidelity�, instead �Goodnight Steve McQueen� straddles the middleground between genius and ambition, and promises much for it�s successor. A talent to watch.

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