Chance graduated from university as an engineer with too much ambition to wait for his company to promote him. He took risks, until he realised that to progress into management the higher ups had to trust and appreciate his work. As they learned to depend on him, his role expanded. Then he had the misfortune to begin a relationship with Georgina and married her.

She was an administration manager with ambitions of her own and opposed everything he wanted. Frustrated, he changed career path to a PhD at the university, in psychology, where he had more freedom. She moved out and they divorced.

He met Megan a fellow PhD student at the university. She was an elite pole vaulter and he wanted her to use a technique he was studying, phenomenology, to hone her skills. She coached herself using a digital vaulting model they developed. She adopted Heidegger’s phenomenological technique to focus on improvement. Chance helped her to articulate her vaulting experience and identify potential she could exploit. Under his tutelage, she performed in flow at the zenith of her ability, where time dilation was possible.

 The novel tells the story of Megan who strives as a schoolgirl in local competitions and then after several years becomes an elite athlete touring international championships with her boyfriend Chance. Their individuality is tested when organisers seek to monetize pole vaulting by restricting her training techniques to result in closer competition and more earnings from this and similar events.

Would she succeed? Her training methods were opposed by rivals and also by less able athletes who couldn’t compete with her. Would the nanny state overreach into trying to limit her performances? Would their training methods be acceptable to the athletics authority at the Olympic Games? How would their work be affected by an outbreak of pandemic flu at the Olympics?

Megan’s training could be restricted by an outbreak of pandemic flu at the Olympics. They resist, because they are individualists and take part in a non-violent protest march through the city centre, which wins acceptance of individualism. It is a win for their campaign of individualism, like Australian scrub turkeys who live solitary lives, over bees who live in highly socialised groups.

There is strong pressure on Megan and Chance to conform and compromise their performances but competition is everything to them. Megan has reached a record height by arduous training without social goals.

Turkeys Not Bees is available on Amazon at https://tinyurl.com/hwn74md2

Extracts and reviews are on the blog martinknox.com