Number 23 - Look Who's Back - Timur Vermes

 

Again, a brand new writer for me. I picked this book entirely because of that cover.

Fish out of water stories are ten a penny. Take a character from one environment, put them somewhere they wouldn't normally be and sit back and watch. Time travel variants aren't particularly new - Mark Twain's Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court being a perfect example from over 100 years ago.

This has to be the single most audacious take on the theme that I've ever seen. As you may have worked out from that cover, the fish out of water in this book is none other than the Fuhrer himself, Adolf Hitler.

He wakes up in 2010 in Berlin for no reason that is ever explained (not that a reason is needed, this is one of those 'just go with it' stories) and has to learn to navigate Germany and general existence in the age of the internetworks...

Everyone assumes he is an extremely dedicated impersonator who never breaks character. He manages land a guest spot on a satirical TV show, giving his opinions on modern life as he sees it.

As satires go, this is next level stuff. If you'd ever told me that a book written in first person from the point of view of Hitler would be this funny, I wouldn't have believed you. It's true that the laughs become more and more uncomfortable as the book goes on, but it's still laugh out loud funny even the times when you wonder exactly why this is funny. It's pretty disturbing towards the end too, despite the basic impossibility, the story feels horribly plausible.

Throughout the book we see conversations taken entirely the wrong way by both parties. These range from hysterically funny to an internal pleading that someone will recognise the fact that he's not joking (sometimes both at the same time). It's very cleverly written indeed. 

I'm sure I missed a few political sideswipes since I'm not an expert on 2010 German politics, but there's more than enough here to entertain, provoke and disturb regardless. It is jaw-droppingly good - in a literal sense.  My jaw genuinely dropped several times in the course of reading this.

I started by saying this was audacious and that's still the best single word I can think of to describe this book. I highly recommend this to anyone who likes potentially challenging fiction. I loved it unreservedly.

Number 63 - Squeeze Me - Carl Hiaasen

 The first time I read a Carl Hiaasen novel, I thought I was reading a sequel since the characters had such well developed backstories that were insinuated throughout the book.  It turned out it wasn't a sequel, it's just that Hiaasen can flesh out his characters to an insane degree, giving them entire life stories without ever slowing the pace of the story.

This one is no exception.

His political leanings have always been obvious in his books and he's an expert at not letting the environmental message get in the way of the story, and yet keeping it strong and obvious.

He's never featured the actual president of the USA as a character before though. He gets more openly political than anywhere outside of his newspaper columns in this riotous new offering. It's set in a fictitious timespan in between the end of the pandemic and the re-election campagn of the POTUS.

This opens, like so many of his other books, with the violent death of a random character.  In this case, it's Kiki Pew Fitzsimmons, 72 years old, "twice widowed and wealthy beyond a need for calculation". She vanishes from a fundraiser for the IBS Wellness foundation and is next seen as a large lump in the stomach of an 18 foot long Burmese Python.

 Kiki is (was) a member of the Potussies (short for POTUS Pussies), a group of dowager ladies who idolise the president and everything he stands for.

When the manager of venue hosting the fundraiser decides that the news of a giant snake eating the clientel might be bad for business, he decides to hide the truth. This kicks of a typically Hiaasen domino effect that gets wilder and funnier as it moves on.

Angela Armstrong is a wild animal removal expert. She was once a ranger but once dealt with a poacher in a somewhat overzealous manner. She is dragged into the procedings when she's asked to remove the snake - this is before the manager knows the location of the sweet(?) little old millionaire. It turns out she's every bit the typical Hiaasen protagonist, tough, princiipled and with an imaginiative take on natural justice.

Throw in a president (who's never named directly) who seems all too familiar, his wife and an amorous secret service agent, lost pearls, a pair of small time hoods, a falsely accused illegal immigrant and a psycho stalker, and you have a recipe for chaos. The multiple plot lines weave in and out of each other leading to a hilarious conclusion.

This is one of his most unpredicatble books in years, typically fast paced and funny and laced with a hefty dose of satire.  I can imagine this book will make a lot of people very angry, depending on their views about 45.  That's a good thing.  They deserve it. Those with a sensible view of the current incumbent will be laughing as loud as I was.

 Easy 8/10