Disgruntled Restaurant Employees Embrace Timothy’s Take-Out
While most people experience poor customer service from time to time, how many of them would be willing to trade places with the poor schmuck across the counter? Precious few, believes author Paul J. Barker.
(PRWEB) March 30, 2005 -- It is impossible to maintain one’s dignity while
serving customers in a fast food joint. To be successful in this line of work
requires, among other things, patience, humility, mental toughness, and the
ability to work like a pack animal. Carl Fellows – embittered narrator of
Barker’s stunning debut novel, “Timothy’s Take-Out” – has what it takes to
succeed, in theory. So why does he feel so completely out of his depth as
manager of a fast food restaurant?
The answer is simple: Carl Fellows is
not a people person. He loves animals, forests, ancient castles, and cold
November afternoons. At no point do human beings enter into the equation. He had
allowed himself to be seduced – by a charming resort town – into taking a job
that seems now on the verge of driving him insane.
Too stubborn to
concede defeat, young Fellows attempts to make the best of a bad situation. He
channels his rage into various get-rich-quick schemes, exhibiting plenty of
heart but not much ability. He falls hard for an angelic coworker five years his
junior. He looks forward to the sleepy off-seasons, when the tourists depart and
the town becomes “like a mythical place.”
Paul J. Barker, himself a
longtime restaurant worker, was quick to realize the comedic potential of a book
based on employee-customer confrontations and pathetically mismanaged fast food
joints. In no particular hurry to get the book done, he set about constructing
it with painstaking care, and the fruit of his labor is finally available (both
at his website http://www.dontlikemyjob.com and most major online
bookstores.)
Fans of "Timothy's Take-Out" will be pleased to learn that
Mr. Barker's second novel should be out sometime next year. Barker apologizes
for the delay, but assures his readers it will be well worth it!
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Source : http://www.prweb.com/releases/2005/3/prweb222515.htm