A Satire in the Style of Evelyn Waugh
Gerard Charles Wilson
Revised eBook Edition 2014 A$4.99
A NOVEL in the style of Evelyn Waugh’s early satires, satirising the way the media, lawyers and sundry activists deal with clerical sexual abuse. It is a tale of outrageous hypocrisy that will sometimes make you laugh, sometimes cringe, and sometimes leave you appalled, but will always be ‘glittering’ in its satire, as one reviewer put it.
Latest review HERE
SYNOPSIS
Paul Zomers arranges a welcome to the pristine hinterland above the coast for new neighbours Haydies and Persefony Sticks. After more drinks than is wise, Paul blurts out that he knows Fr Pleasance who at that moment is front-page in the media for the abuse of a minor. Partner Brad and the new neighbours will not let the mere mention pass. As Paul’s story advances so does the number of glasses of champagne until he makes a confession that unleashes an uncontrollable chain of events that draws in a hyperactive media team and a firm of equally hyperactive public liability lawyers. While Paul wrestles with events that bring him to the attention of the national media, he gets caught in a strange relationship with Persefony and her alternative life-style. Others watch the gradual swapping of roles with dismay. They have to do something about it.
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5 Star REVIEW
‘Could not put it down’. We often hear people say that about a book. Wilson’s book really is a book I could not put down, in fact I stayed up well into the next morning reading it. This is great satire. The names Wilson gives people says a lot about them and their professions and/or way of life. Built around the hysterical need to crush the Catholic Church in a blanket condemnation of everything Catholic, I mean everything Catholic, the big bug-a-boo is a perverted priest who has molested minor boys. Criminal and morally repugnant as such actions are, the author has his characters being seen as hypocrites of the first order in their own morally bankrupt lives. The ending seemed a bit abrupt but the tension the book had generated made it a rather welcome release to have it finally come to an end that was not too unrealistic but which continued the satire to it’s logical conclusion. A marvelous work of literature of the satire sort.
Fr Robert Wheelock, 5 Star Review Amazon