Checker and the Derailleurs
From the Orange Prize winning author of We Need to Talk About Kevin this is a novel about what it takes to make it in music. How charisma is worth its weight in gold. And how jealously can grow until it has eaten away at a musician’s heart.He has that thing that they’d all pay for but can’t buy: on stage and off, the 19-year-old rock drummer Checker Secretti is electric. When he plays with his band The Derailleurs, the natives of Astoria, Queens clamour for a piece of him. But charisma comes at a price. A Salieri to Checker’s Mozart, the fiercely envious fellow drummer Eaton Striker is eager to sow discord among the Derailleurs, that he might replace the exasperatingly popular goody-goody in the close-knit neighbourhood’s affections.An examination of the passion, the jealousy and the friendship of young musicians trying to break out, Checker and The Derailleurs is also about cycling, rock lyrics, glass blowing, the marriage of convenience, and—most of all—the mystery of joy.
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The Borough Press
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
1, London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
Published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2015
First published in the USA by Farrar, Straus and Giroux 1988
Copyright © Lionel Shriver 1988
Cover design © HarperCollinsPublishers 2015
Cover photograph © Shutterstock.com
Lionel Shriver asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it, while at times based on historical figures, are the work of the author’s imagination.
The author gratefully acknowledges permission to quote from the following published works: “Bang the Drum All Day” by Todd Rundgren, copyright © 1983 Fiction Music, Inc./Humanoid Music (BMI), all rights reserved / “Eleanor Rigby,” words and music by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, copyright © 1966 Northern Songs Ltd., all rights for the U.S., Canada and Mexico controlled and administered by Blackwood Music Inc. under license from ATV Music (MACLEN), all rights reserved, international copyright secured, used by permission / “Darkness” by Stewart Copeland, copyright © 1981 Reggatta Music, Ltd., administered by Atlantic Music Corporation / “Dancing in the Dark” by Bruce Springsteen, copyright © 1984 Bruce Springsteen, all rights reserved, used with permission / “Blinded by the Light” by Bruce Springsteen copyright © 1973 Bruce Springsteen, all rights reserved, used with permission / “Save the Life of My Child” by Paul Simon, copyright © 1968 Paul Simon, used by permission, Inc., all rights reserved, used by permission / “Love over Gold” by Mark Knopfler, copyright © 1982 Chariscourt Ltd. (PRS), all rights administered in the U.S. and Canada by Almo Music Corp. (ASCAP), all rights reserved international copyright secured / “The Man’s Too Strong” by Mark Knopfler, copyright © 1985 Chariscourt Limited (PRS), all rights administered by Rondor Music (London) Ltd., administered in the U.S. and Canada by Almo Music Corp (ASCAP), all rights reserved, international copyright secured.
The drawings reproduced in Checker and The Derailleurs are by Lionel Shriver.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books
Source ISBN: 9780007564033
Ebook Edition © 2015 ISBN: 9780007564040
Version: 2015-01-13
To someone who doesn’t deserve it, as he very well knows
Well I have tried to be meek
And I have tried to be mild
But I spat like a woman
And sulked like a child …
And I can still hear his laughter
And I can still hear his song
The man’s too big
The man’s too strong
DIRE STRAITS
“The Man’s Too Strong,”
Brothers in Arms
Table of Contents
4. the house of the fire queen
5. bye, bye, miss american pie
8. hot rocks, or: the igneous apartment
9. in defense of subjective reality
15. it’s hard to be a saint in the city
16. why we fought world war II
21. a cappella in the underpass
22. a little help from my friends
25. spirits in the material world
epilogue. oh, you mean that checker secretti
Checker’s favorite color is red
Foreboding overcame Eaton Striker well before The Derailleurs began to play. Much as Eaton would have preferred to chum obliviously with his friends, he could only stare at the stage as the drummer stepped up to those ramshackle Leedys and the damned skins began to purr.
“Who is that?” asked Eaton, not sure he really wanted to know. The drummer percolated on his throne, never still, bloop, bloop, like coffee in the morning—that color; that welcome.
“Checker Secretti,” said Brinkley, with irritating emphasis. “Where have you been, the moon?”
“He’s talking to his traps!” exclaimed Eaton, in whose disturbed imagination the instruments were answering back.
“Yeah, he did that last time,” said Brinkley the Expert. “Checker’s a bit touched, if you ask me.”
“I didn’t.” Eaton slouched in his chair.
The humidity here was curiously high. A plumbing problem in the basement dripped right on the heater, so the whole club felt like a steam room—there was actually a slight fog; vapor beaded on the windowpanes. A proliferation of candles sent soft, flickering profiles against the walls. With its vastly unremarkable decor, Eaton couldn’t explain the crawling effect of the place as he nestled down in the seductively comfortable chair, taking deeper, slower breaths and saying nicer things to his friends. Eaton squirmed. He tried to sit up straight. He looked suspiciously into his Johnnie Walker, thinking,
