A few years ago, purely for my own amusement, I decided to try and write a 'sequel' to Keith Waterhouse's classic novel Billy Liar. Clearly, it would have been an act of supreme hubris to have taken such a project seriously, but as a diversion it proved an interesting exercise.
Obviously, Waterhouse did, in time, provide us with a sequel in the form of Billy Liar on the Moon. The latter book, being set some years after the events of the original, and featuring none of the characters aside from Billy himself, did not answer the questions of exactly what happened to Billy Fisher following the events of the single Saturday in which the original novel takes place.
This was, of course, never intended for publication, and I don't personally condone fan fiction that appropriates characters from the likes of Star Wars or The X-Files. Almost all of it is trash, and mostly mildly pornographic. I was simply interested in whether I could satisfactorily unravel the unresolved plot threads of the novel in a way that would lead seamlessly into a second narrative. It ran to around seven pages before one of my own ideas demanded my attention, and in, true William Fisher style, it remained unfinished. I recently rediscovered the text and it's presented here as a curiosity. Obviously, if anyone objects, it will disappear again in short order.
All characters are copyright Keith Waterhouse
My text is © 2008 Martin Cater
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