On 30th Sept, we had a very fun launch party at our local bookshop, Jaffe & Neale, in Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, UK, to celebrate the publication of Under Vixens Mere by Kit Fielding. The book is about a community of people living on houseboats in a rundown marina in the English countryside. When Kit’s agent, Peter Buckman, first sent me the manuscript in 2023, I was quickly captivated by the writing, the set-up and by the characters, who are such a pleasure to spend time with. I also loved the atmosphere and the dark humour. On the night of the launch, I asked Kit to read the following passage, which sold the book to me before I’d even finished it. The passage features Pigman Pete, who lives alone on a boat named Saddleback. He’s a simple soul, hard-working, helpful and kind-hearted although extremely fond of a drink and not always very clean. Here it is:
‘In all the time he’s been working for Broome Pork Products – fourteen years and counting – Pete has kept to the cardinal rule of caring for the animals but not getting too attached to them. Sure he can love them, appreciate their finer points, laugh at their antics, but it’s got to be from a step away, as he knows that there’s only one place they’re heading for. Even so, it’s not always been easy; he’s had several weaners that he still remembers to this day but there’s been none quite like Phyllis.
She’d been a cocky upstart from day one, a right little madam, latching onto her mother’s teat and hanging on for grim death despite all the pushing, shoving, and burrowing from her peers. As she grows, Pete’s sure she waits for his visits, catches his eye, sees him scrape and brush her quarters. She’s alert for him and Pete watches her, knows every line to her clean smooth body, can clearly pick her out among her brethren and, as stupid as it sounds, it seems she’s pleased to see him. Her ears definitely twitch, her tail wags. Then, what should never happen happens: she touches his heart and he gives her a name, Phyllis.
But of course she grows, and when she, along with her batch, is nine months old and ninety kilos in weight, she’s herded off to slaughter. Phyllis is taken on a shift when Pete’s on a day’s break and that should be that. Pete turns in for work next day to a depleted but milling mass of weaners who all look the same and squeal beyond loud for their feed. ‘Phyllis was just an animal,’ he tells himself. Just one out of many that he’s helped onto the breakfast plate. He puts that thought into his mind every time his soft heart intrudes on his consciousness. It works for a whole week, until today. This afternoon, in fact, when Pete’s taken a turn in the butchery department. He really shouldn’t be on this shift but a regular has called in sick and dab-hand Pete is deemed the best man for the replacement. There’s several carcasses on the block and Pete and an older colleague, Sam, are slicing, sawing, hacking and chopping the chilled corpses into the primal cuts of shoulder, loin, leg and belly. The radio’s playing away and Sam’s singing along to the Seventies and telling Pete, ‘Now that’s what you call a real tune.’
Pete thought it was until Sam renders his version aloud. But he’s all right is Sam, and every three quarters of an hour he calls out a fag break. They stand out the back, take a quickwarming from the afternoon sun, relieve their chilling from the meat. On this external visit Sam looks at his watch, ‘Well, this’ll be last for today, Pete, and then we’re done.’
Then he says that he’ll just pop down to the bog and Pete goes back inside and unhooks the last two carcasses from the rack. Lays them out side by side on the cutting table. One for him and one for Sam.
‘Right,’ Pete thinks and prepares to make the first draw with his saw. Then he stops suddenly, instantly, in mid stroke. He takes a step back, looks at the headless, footless, open body in front of him, and, as stupid as it sounds, he recognises her. It’s Phyllis. He doesn’t know how; he just knows. The saw drops to his side and he can’t do it, not this one. So he swaps places with Sam, and Phyllis goes to cheery Sam who continues to sing along to the Seventies as he butchers Phyllis, cuts her into pieces. Pete just keeps his head down andworks on his nameless carcass until it’s done and they’re done. It’s time to clean the tools of their trade for another day, and for Singer Sam to leave Pete with a cheery goodbye. Pete trails behind his exit, sidling past and trying not to look at Sam’s handiwork; bits of Phyllis neatly prepared for consumption. He’s never been so relieved to close the door on his work in his life.
Outside in the car park Pete sits behind the wheel of his van, lights up a cigarette that trembles in his fingers. Christ, what the fuck’s the matter with him? She was a pig. That’s all. A fucking pig. And if that’s all it is then why is his head in his hands? Why is he squeezing his eyes shut?
This is what middle-aged matronly Marlene from accounts sees as she’s walking to her car; Pete huddled over his steering wheel. She thinks, ‘Is something wrong with him?’ Her concern echoes Mr Long’s ethos of ‘We’re more than workmates here; we’re all one big happy family. All for one and one for all.’ Marlene, an ardent subscriber to that sentiment, steps over to Pete’s van, taps on the window and gently opens the passenger door. She puts her head inside.
‘You OK, Pete?’
‘What? Oh yeah.’
Pete looks over at the intrusion, wipes his hand across his eyes, adds a muttered ‘Fine’ that doesn’t sound fine. Marlene, a soft soul who rescues birds and won’t tread on a spider, feels instant compassion for this grown man with tears on his cheeks. She lets herself into the van, slides across to Pete, puts an arm around his shoulder, draws him like a child to her ample bosom, tells him, ‘There. There.’ and that everything will be all right. Pete settles into the most comfortable of positions.
Marlene, enjoying this spontaneous closeness, thinks that it’s a long time since she had a man’s head between her breasts. Pete’s enjoying the same thing, thinks that it’s a long time since he had his head between a woman’s breasts. And neither of them seem in any hurry to curtail the situation.’