Ursula K Le Guin had her Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction; I have my comfy cardigan theory. What Le Guin proposed is that human\u00a0culture, novels included, didn\u2019t begin with technologies of harm, such as flints and\u00a0spears, but with items of collection and care, such as the wicker basket or, nowadays, the carrier bag. And so, if we\u00a0make them that way, novels can be\u00a0gatherings rather than battles.<\/p>\n
Tom Cox\u2019s third novel fashions an escape from the dangerous outside world into something soft, comforting and unfashionable. It might once have been a Neanderthal\u2019s armpit, but now it\u2019s more likely to be a cosy cardigan. Or a deeply comforting story.<\/p>\n
This shambling but intricate yarn of\u00a0friendship, loyalty, alienation and record collecting features a depressed nature writer called Billy Stackpole, who bears a parodic resemblance to such woodcut-on-the-cover authors as Robert Macfarlane<\/a> and Tom Cox. His debut was called Will the Stone Circle Be Unbroken: A Journey Around Britain Through Deep Time. Billy is sitting around his hand-forged firebowl when he utters the woeful\/hopeful plea: \u201cThis sounds weird but I\u2019ve never had a big sloppy cardigan and I wish I did \u2026 Just something you can throw on, at a time like this. Maybe in a nice earthy green, a bit mossy.\u201d<\/p>\n Within earshot is a magical sea creature capable of passing for a dog, but also of hoovering, gardening and reading Barbara Kingsolver novels<\/p>\n As far as Billy knows, he\u2019s speaking to a group of eight human beings. However, also listening in, incognito, is the novel\u2019s cosiest and most unusual character. How you react now is probably a good indication of whether you\u2019ll like Cox\u2019s affable, quirk-heavy brand of literary knitwear. Because also within earshot of Billy is a long-nosed, sleek-haired magical sea creature with 24 fingers who is capable of passing for a large brown dog, but also of hoovering, gardening, reading Barbara Kingsolver novels, speaking six languages, giving wise life advice, and most excellent knitting. Meet Carl \u2013 who, because he\u2019s nice, will secretly knit Billy a cardigan.<\/p>\n Carl is one half of a charming odd couple along with Liverpudlian record dealer Eric. Eric and Carl live peripatetically, though they\u2019ve ended up in rural Dorset; and everywhere they go, and whatever mild scrapes they get into, they meet furiously nice people. Everything Will Swallow You is the story of Eric\u2019s life, without and then with his supernatural companion. But it\u2019s also a materially hopeful \u201cstate of England\u201d novel. Our social fabric may be fraying, but we\u2019re still warm and woolly, most of the time.<\/p>\n Eric\u2019s vocation is nicely chosen. Over the years, his personal fortunes follow those of the long-playing record, and we see it become an index for values of decency and kindness. When vinyl is prized, not just priced, things look up in society. The cynical mid-1990s were a low point, but with gen Z\u2019s fond infatuation with analogue, things have been getting better.<\/p>\n One way of reading Cox\u2019s work, from his Stackpolish nature writing in\u00a021st Century Yokel<\/a> to his recent novels, Villager<\/a> and 1983, is as a counter to cartoonish Brexitshire views of the countryside. Look beyond the M25, and there\u2019s folklore, nature, history, yes, but most important of all\u00a0there are nice people; even if increasingly they spend most of their time looking at phone screens and getting angry with one another. His\u00a0country, he insists, can still be\u00a0a\u00a0loving and lovable place.<\/p>\n Like vinyl records, England may go\u00a0through periods of neglect, but as\u00a0a\u00a0nation, as a folk-nature-history-haunted land<\/a>, there\u2019s still something warm and ultimately dependable about us. As Eric writes in his notebook, and his words equally apply\u00a0to comfy-cardigan fiction such as\u00a0Everything Will Swallow You: \u201cRecords never did a lot of what I\u00a0thought they\u2019d do for me. They didn\u2019t make me cooler or more handsome or\u00a0help me solve the secret of the universe. But they helped get me through some hard times and taught\u00a0me that magic is real.\u201d<\/p>\n