VLVL2 (2): Isaiah Two-Four (prelude to a better post)

[Paul Nightingale]

It seems to be a crazy idea Isaiah has come up with, and it isn't going
anywhere, if only because no one will fund it. But he talks a good case,
at least to Zoyd's ears. And he is in touch with the times. The project
allows the punter to play at violence; it's the fantasy element that
makes such games attractive. Participation in the kind of action usually
seen, by the participants, only on TV?

In Ch2, Isaiah tries to hustle Zoyd, which relates him, in the text, to
Hector. He might be fucking a family member, which relates him, in the
text, to Brock. And his 'game-plan', which involves manipulating, and
regulating the movements of, large numbers of people/punters/consumers,
also connects him to Brock. Isaiah insists that a "joint strange fate"
connects him to Zoyd, and the novel frequently juxtaposes male
characters in conflict. Zoyd here, in Ch2, with Isaiah, which both
prefigures and parodies his relationship with Brock; or Brock and Weed.
One might even anticipate conflict of some sort between Zoyd and Flash:
it fails to materialise, perhaps because of the setting.