More from Shane Maloney
With the possibility of an ugly strike looming large at the newspaper where I work, what better time to reach once more for that lighthearted political minder, Murray Whelan? In The Big Ask, Whelan got caught up in the struggle for control of a truckers' union. In Something Fishy, he's been elected to his state's parliament as a member of the Australian Labour Party, which "exists only in the imagination of its members."This novel, the fifth in the Whelan series, is off to a more somber start than The Big Ask. But its third chapter contains a delicious description of the sort of meeting that is the lot of an opposition backbencher's life: "Proceedings drifted like the continents, the room was overheated and my attention wandered out the window."
More later.
Did I say somber? The scene where Whelan falls on the Swedish woman at the beach had me laughing out loud.
© Peter Rozovsky 2006
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Shane Maloney
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humorous crime fiction
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Labels: Australia, Humor, Murray Whelan, Shane Maloney
posted by Peter Rozovsky at 8:48 PM
2 Comments:
Maloney is very sharp, very funny. Bring on the day when he tackles something bigger than Melbourne. I'd like to see Murray Whelan at the United Nations or sent to Washington as a political advisor to the Australian ambassador.
Horst: That's a wonderful thought. Have you read Something Fishy? Can you imagine Murray Whelan tumbling onto the Swedish ambassador instead of just onto a Swedish woman at the beach?
Such a setting might present Maloney with a challenge when it comes to those funny disclaimers he likes to use. I can well imagine him writing "There is no such thing as the United Nations." Many people probably believe that is the case now, and considerable evidence exists to support such an opinion. But it would be harder than usual for him to claim that "the Australian Labour Party exists only the imagination of its members" if it has the power to appoint U.N. ambassadors. And I don't want Whelan to change parties.
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