A Good Man in Africa

by William Boyd

De eerste secretaris van de Engelse ambassade in een Westafrikaanse staat raakt in moeilijkheden en zijn wanhopige pogingen om de schade te herstellen maken de toestand alleen maar erger..

Genres: Fiction, Africa, Humor, Historical Fiction, Novels, Literature, Book Club

299 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1981

About the author

Note: William^^Boyd

Of Scottish descent, Boyd was born in Accra, Ghana on 7th March, 1952 and spent much of his early life there and in Nigeria where his mother was a teacher and his father, a doctor. Boyd was in Nigeria during the Biafran War, the brutal secessionist conflict which ran from 1967 to 1970 and it had a profound effect on him.

At the age of nine years he attended Gordonstoun school, in Moray, Scotland and then Nice University (Diploma of French Studies) and Glasgow University (MA Hons in English and Philosophy), where he edited the Glasgow University Guardian. He then moved to Jesus College, Oxford in 1975 and completed a PhD thesis on Shelley. For a brief period he worked at the New Statesman magazine as a TV critic, then he returned to Oxford as an English lecturer teaching the contemporary novel at St Hilda's College (1980-83). It was while he was here that his first novel, A Good Man in Africa (1981), was published.

Boyd spent eight years in academia, during which time his first film, Good and Bad at Games, was made. When he was offered a college lecturership, which would mean spending more time teaching, he was forced to choose between teaching and writing.

Boyd was selected in 1983 as one of the 20 'Best of Young British Novelists' in a promotion run by Granta magazine and the Book Marketing Council. He also became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in the same year, and is also an Officier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. He has been presented with honorary doctorates in literature from the universities of St. Andrews, Stirling and Glasgow. He was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2005.

Boyd has been with his wife Susan since they met as students at Glasgow University and all his books are dedicated to her. His wife is editor-at-large of Harper's Bazaar magazine, and they currently spend about thirty to forty days a year in the US. He and his wife have a house in Chelsea, West London but spend most of the year at their chateau in Bergerac in south west France, where Boyd produces award-winning wines.

Reviews

[Seana · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book and was quite surprised to see so many one star reviews. I think fans of Evelyn Waugh and of Kingsley Amis's Lucky Jim will like it. It helps if you don't mind the protagonist being a reprehensible character.

[Amanda B · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very unlikable protagonist, but tbh most of the characters weren't that likeable! When I started this one, I wasn't sure it would grab me that much, but it sort of grew on me and I wanted some sort of redemption for Morgan Leafy. I didn't quite see the comedic value and it certainly didn't make me laugh out loud! I reckon my actual rating is 3.5🌟as my brain did wander off at times, but rounding up 😊

[Ensiform · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overweight, beleaguered Morgan Leafy, a minor official in the fictional African country of Kinjaja, muddles his way through a series of misadventures. He faces scandal, blackmail, and venereal disease, as well as a righteous Scottish doctor, whom he must attempt to bribe. A very funny novel, with solid, human characters and wonderfully bizarre situations that are nevertheless more believable than, say, Tom Sharpe’s. The plot unfolds compellingly, in three parts, with the middle part a flashback, and the third a continuation of the first. This is more than just a comic novel, it’s an almost poignant commentary on what it means to be human. Leafy is an ass, and he brings most (but not all) of his troubles on himself, yet he has the reader’s sympathy throughout. An extremely enjoyable book.

[Ian · Rating 5 out of 5]

Morgan Leafy is a great tragi-comic character. This is a good story with a lot of humour.

[Peter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Morgan Leafy is a hapless, misogynistic, overweight, oversexed First Secretary of the British High Commission in Nkongsamba, a rural city in the fictitious African country of Kinjanja. Leafy has spent three years in this corrupt, oil-rich country, the world's seventh-largest importer of champagne. It's the eve of elections taking place on Boxing Day, and the British through Leafy are meddling, crassly, the Duchess of Ripon, the queen's third cousin twice removed, is making an Independence Day visit to the city and there's a dead body on the High Commission grounds that no one dares to move.

By novel's end, sees Leafy, his singed hair resembling an atrocious candyfloss perm and a missing eyebrow covered in an oblong Elastoplast, the result of an unfortunate incident involving the problematic corpse, about to bed his boss's wife after failing with his daughter having recently recovered from a dose of gonorrhoea caught from his local mistress. Leafy's personal life is as complicated as Kinjanjan politics.

Boyd, who spent his childhood in Ghana and Nigeria, is unflinching in his critique of British attitudes during early post-Colonial years. In one scene, the Kinjanjan elite are invited to view a film about the British Royal family at play, to remind them "precisely just what it is they didn't possess and why, therefore, they just weren't quite such special people." Such observations place this book in the category of social satires that derided Western, but chiefly British, behaviour abroad.

Whilst I cannot say that I actually laughed out loud I did read this book with a smile on my face as Leafy bumbled his way to the madcap finale. And despite his imperious condescension of almost everybody around him I still found myself rooting for him. Overall I found this an enjoyable farce.

[Ellen · Rating 1 out of 5]

This was William Boyd's award winning first novel so I thought I would give it a try after having LOVED Restless. This is dated and terrible, not at all funny. Don't waste your time. I kept hoping it would get better and it didn't. If I had known I wouldn't have wasted my time.

[Ilana (illi69) · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Like Rome, Nkongsamba was built on seven hills, but there the similarity ended. Set in undulating tropical rain forest, from the air it resembled nothing so much as a giant pool of crapulous vomit on somebody's expansive unmown lawn. Every building was roofed with corrugated iron in various advanced stages of rusty erosion, and from the window of the Commission -- established nobly on a hill above town -- Morgan could see the roofs stretch before him, an ochrous tin checker-board, a bilious metallic sea, the paranoiac vision of a mad town planner."

Morgan Leafy is the protagonist of this comedy set in the fictitious town of Nkongsamba, state capital of the Mid-West region of Kinjanja, West Africa. As the second in command to the Deputy High Commissioner, he occupies what could be considered an important post in Her Majesty the Queen's diplomatic service, if only Nkongsamba could be considered a posting of any consequence. As the story begins, Leafy's many trials are just beginning, with the announcement that his new assistant, just recently arrived for the UK to give a helping hand, has gotten engaged to his boss's daughter, which he himself had had high hopes of marrying. This is only a minor setback though, because there are more pressing matters to attend to, mainly the business of bribing a high official, a task which he's been blackmailed into taking on, and also getting rid of the body of a local woman recently hit by lightning, which her compatriots absolutely defend anybody from touching for fear a local wrathful deity will take offence. Caught between a boss who uses him to take care of any and all unpleasant and humiliating tasks he can come up with and a megalomaniac local politician who threatens to reveal his most compromising secrets, not to mention the amorous attentions of the politician's wife, and a nice dose of ghonorrea passed on to him by his local girlfriend, Leafy's trials and tribulations truly make for a comical read as he tries to extricate himself from a mess that just keeps getting more complicated and unpleasant with every move he makes.

I'm not altogether sure what to make of A Good Man in Africa . It was certainly entertaining, and I guess I should take into consideration that it was William Boyd's first published effort (for which he won both a Whitbread and a Somerset Maugham award), and also that it was hardly a story I could expect to end with all loose ends perfectly tied up and neatly tucked in. While this book certainly works well as high comedy, I couldn't help but feel a slight discomfort about the way in which the locals are depicted as either unscrupulous power hungry manipulators or superstitious simpletons content to live in squalor and stinking decay, but in all fairness, all the characters in this biting satire receive evenhanded treatment as unlikeable individuals, all the better to reflect Leafy's own cynical view of humanity, which he may or may not be forced to reconsider by novel's end. 4.5 stars, which means I will most probably give it another reading or two sometime.

[Brooke · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book absolutely hilarious. I was literally in hysterics for an entire 20 page chapter - my husband was looking at me in awe as I have not laughed that long or hard in ages, and as he says, "I am a hard audience." That being said, it's not a riot throughout, but Boyd develops the characters so well that he can pull this off artfully. Having lived in Africa and England, I really appreciated Boyd's characters in all their Africanness and their Britishness. Morgan Leafy is an aspiring diplomat in a small West African nation, and despite the best of intentions, he makes a complete ass of himself. I'll leave it at that! I'd love to hear if others find it as amusing.

[Kim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Setting: 'Kinjanja', West Africa. In his debut novel, William Boyd tells the story of Morgan Leafy, secretary to the British High Commissioner in the town of Nkongsamba - a thoroughly-jaded and not particularly likeable character who has been in the country for several years and, although generally disliking it, has no particular ambition to do anything else. Through his often well-meaning actions, Morgan gets involved in blackmail, adultery, body-snatching, election-tampering and bribery - and the outcomes are rarely the intended ones....
I have read several of William Boyd's novels but liked this one the least of all of them - perhaps it was because it was a debut novel and he was just finding his feet as an author, perhaps it was the high expectations generated from cover blurb describing the novel as '...uproariously funny' (The Observer) - certainly if I was going to recommend a book about Africa that was uproariously funny it would be Indecent Exposure or Riotous Assembly, which are definitely that. This one, to me, was not - didn't especially like the central character so this was a bit of a 'miss' for me. Still won't put me off reading other books by him which I already have as I have enjoyed the four others of his I have read - 6/10.

[Al · Rating 2 out of 5]

The author's first novel. In this case, as is often true with first novels, the early Boyd gets the worm. This book is an over the top, scathing indictment of the English colonial presence in Africa. The protagonist, Morgan Leafy, is a minor colonial official in a fictional west African country. Attack fiction is fine, but the Leafy of the early pages is such a total waste (moral, human, intellectual, sexual, you name it) that I almost quit reading. Sure, his situations are ridiculous (not really "funny", because of Leafy's total lack of redeeming qualities), but Leafy's attitudes are so degrading they made me want to look away. I stuck it out, though (although not as often as Leafy did), and things improved a little by the end. Not enough to warrant reading the book, however, unless you happen to like the type (Graham Greene does it much better, so stop there if your time is limited).

[Phil Livingstone · Rating 5 out of 5]

My second book club book turned up trumps, thanks to my fellow member for recommending this to the group.

The folly of imperial Africa is laid bare. The personality of diplomatic relationships exposed. Power and lust collide. All told through the eyes of an imperfect Englishman struggling to make a name for himself.

At times funny, shocking, intriguing or all at once. A page turner with a good story that moves cleverly between time periods.

Will read more of Boyd now.

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

My actual rating for this book is a 3.5. I really enjoyed reading it, but I had to take periodic breaks because poor Morgan’s life was such a shitshow, it just got overwhelming. Half of the crap is from other people, like his boss Fanshawe. And half of the crap is of his own making, Like Hazel and Celia. But you do feel like he’s asked to put up with more than anyone can reasonably handle. Anyway, it was a good tragicomedy that was more fun than I expected.

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

Completely politically incorrect and savagely funny. An antidote to the neurotic political correctness of the modern day. By invoking a particular type of erudite British humour, William Boyd and his hero Morgan Leafy are following in the footsteps of Kingsley Amis and Jim Dixon. This novel is a delightful satire of the British pretensions to influence in Africa.

[D · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good slapstick comedy full of unlikable characters. See the description for details.

[Simon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading this flawed novel one recognises how changed the acceptable limits of taste have become since it publication.

The author via his principle character Morgan leafy pours forth invective upon the life and body of the little fictitious African land he has created in a way which at the time of publication 1981 was entirely a normal piece of observation.

Today however one cringes to read the early pages. These are imo the least effective of the novel. A sort of set pièce against everything African and I British and frankly it’s a bit tedious

However I think the action of the plot should hold even the most blasé modern reader. It’s a brilliant tortured
Description almost entirely credible of a30 something white guy .. shall we say .. without a fixed moral framework .. who is trying his level best to survive and have pleasure in Africa. The scrapes he has are brilliantly told. And credible

Once you are upon the momentum of the story I think it is a very good funny read. Jim Dixon from Lucky Jim comes to mind and I agree it is almost as good as that swipe at things from 20 years before.

[Trish · Rating 1 out of 5]

Boy this has been a struggle. It's dated, not particularly funny, too much gratuitous sex, there are very few characters I actually liked - especially the main character, who I ended up rooting for something bad to happen to - and the one decent person in the whole thing gets gratuitously killed. It doesn't even have a satisfying ending. I probably wouldn't have bothered finishing it if it hadn't been for a Book Club.

[George Henry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very British style of humour in a story full of interactions between entertaining characters. Funny enough at times to have me laugh out loud and my wife to wonder what was going on. My eye skipped over various overly descriptive passages but well worth the read.

[Scottnshana · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's funny, the prose is super, and the book is a fine examination of so many tripwires one can hit while representing his/her country abroad. The characters are richly drawn, and it's just as timely as it was when published in the early '80s.

[Debs Carey · Rating 2 out of 5]

I didn't realise until seeing other reviews that this was Boyd's first book. I was so glad to discover that for I was concerned he'd lost his touch. One of the things I really love about his books is how well he knows Africa. Of course, he's also a great storyteller.

In this one, all the component parts were present, but it was all done with a sledgehammer rather than his usual deft touch.

[Ken Ryu · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book. Boyd succeeds in so many phases. Before breaking down the successful elements of this impressive work, let's first get some housekeeping out of the way.

The story features British diplomat Morgan Leafy who is assigned to the British Embassy in the African republic of Kinjanja. Over the Christmas holiday and days prior to an important national election, Leafy become embroiled in a series of absurd and curious scenarios. He seems to be a lightening rod for bad luck and self-inflicted chaos. He drinks too much. He is overly lustful. He also has the worst possible luck.

Boyd sends Leafy on quixotic errands. Rather than finding solutions, Leafy seems to compound the problems with his valiant efforts. He is bright and resourceful. Despite all his best intentions and solutions, like a man struggling in quicksand, he only sink deeper into his troubled pit. Gonorrhea, ill-fated love affairs, political intrigue, lightening-induced death, revolutionary uprisings are some of the events that envelop poor Leafy.

Now to the accolades.

Character Development:
Leafy is a brilliant and convincing character. We get to know him intimately. We see all his flaws and virtues. He is someone we can cheer for despite his caddish behavior. We laugh at his exploits and worry as he faces setback after setback. Leafy's boss Fanshawe, Fanshawe's wife Chloe, Fanshawe's daughter Priscilla, the aspiring and corrupt professor-turned-politician Adekunle, Adekunle's Bristish-born wife Celia, and the incorruptible Dr. Murray are stars brilliantly developed in Boyd's extensive cast. There are no caricatures to be found. Boyd deals in deep, credible and complex personas. His characters are consistent throughout. Despite numerous scenes and crises, the character never break character or lose their originality.

Plot:
The plot is tight. Boyd starts near the end. He then rolls back a few months in order to show how Leafy and company arrive at their current predicaments. This technique is effective and executed brilliantly. The back stories are coherent and unexpected. We learn that Priscilla and Leafy had a short-lived romance. When we understand why the relationship fractured, the reason is shocking and delightfully conceived and described. Leafy's series of unfortunate events are spectacular. Boyd devises ingenious ways to explain how these events came to be. The action never seems forced or exaggerated. Boyd also never loses track of details that so often trips up lesser writers who dare to dream up a multitude of intertwining story lines.

Wit:
Leafy is quick on his feet and has a sharp wit, but that is not the primary source of the humor of "A Good Man". Leafy is constantly contending with stressful events. While doing his best to deal with these situations, he finds himself caught in embarrassing acts at the worst time again and again. On a romantic fishing outing with Priscilla, the mood is broken when they land a monster fish. Leafy has to subdue the wriggling monster and ultimately smash its head in with a rock. These fateful acts of odd luck are constantly following our hero Leafy.

History and Culture:
The world of the British diplomat is explained to the reader. We learn the p0litics, agenda, tactics, and career path of these ex-pats. The relationship between Leafy and Fanshawe is intriguing. Leafy must abide by the many whims of his boss, including some outside the box assignments. We learn of the politics and foreign influence in an oil-rich African nation, and how favored politicians leverage these connections. We learn about the corruption, the military foil to the political leadership, and the potential for riotous citizens in these African nations. Boyd spent time in Africa, and the scenes he describe seem to be taken from his life experience. We are the richer with his sharing his proprietary knowledge.

Style and Writing:
Boyd is a master of the language. His sentences are concise, his phrasing is impeccable, and his story is told without the words getting in the way. There are many great storytellers who lack the vocabulary, the restraint, and the skill, but can still deliver an exciting story. Boyd achieves the unique feat of great storytelling without flawed language.

Great Beginning, Profound and Well-Crafted Conclusion:
As the pages wind down, it seems that "A Good Man" is headed for a non-ending ending. There is too much happening and too few pages to close the book with a neat finale. Wrong! Boyd nails it. Only on the last few pages does the title become clear. Boyd waits, waits, waits to deliver his message. When he finally does, it is all the more powerful due to his patience. He does not pound the reader over the head, but he makes his point and it is clear and powerful.

A great book in so many ways. The sub 4 star rating is a complete shocker. After reading "A Good Man" and "Any Human Heart", Boyd has elevated to one of my favorite authors.

[Sue · Rating 4 out of 5]

It’s a long time since a book has made me laugh out loud as much as this one, but the drunken womanising antics of Morgan Leafy, young diplomat in Kinjanja, a newly independent African state, will also make you squirm. Not a book for people who prefer likeable lead characters, but I suspect the culturally ignorant behaviours shown by Leafy and his dreadful boss Fanshawe, weren’t completely untypical among Brits posted to the colonies, William Boyd draws heavily on his own experience of growing up in Africa in his first, award winning novel.

[Joe Conlan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not a likeable character in sight and had no desire to find out what happened in the end, but ploughed on nonetheless. A damn shame there isn’t a 3.5/5. I’ll give Boyd the benefit of the doubt.

[Käroliina Kask · Rating 4 out of 5]

See oli päris erinev ülejäänud raamatutest, mida ma (vähemalt viimasel ajal) lugenud olen. Selles mõttes värskendav. Ma näeks seda filmina päris hästi töötamas. Muidu meelelahutuslik ja võimusuhteid ironiseeriv teos. Ilmselt peaks sellelt autorilt veel midagi lugema, sest tal on päris äge stiil.

[alexander · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really found this adroitly executed and very fresh as a tale of expat life in West Africa, despite the book’s age.

Boyd’s exceptional storytelling shows him as a master of the genre with great style convincingly depicting the salacious and absurd happenings in Kinjanja, a fictional country somewhere next to Nigeria. (Lagos and Abuja are referred to in the text)

The whole thing is suffused with deadpan humour and devastating turns of irony for the grimy Morgan, repugnant, deluded as expats can be, and yet a constant victim of every indignity imaginable, along with the wry observations of bumbling British diplomats outsmarted at their own ill-conceived opportunistic games in a field they hardly understand. Was very impressed at the triple revelation of Adekunle, Murray and Celia’s natures, as a satisfying demonstration of the Seeming/Being lesson taught by Morgan’s imaginary rival. A lastingly great read, funny, humane and clairvoyant.

[Kusaimamekirai · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is an exchange about halfway through this story where the story’s only morally decent character tells our morally ambivalent “hero” to beware confusing “seeming” and “being”. This is in many respects the underlying theme of “A Good Man in Africa”. The story is set in a small town in Africa where the remnants of an old British colonial outpost try to maintain their influence with local politicians. On the surface, our “hero” Morgan is the frontman for these machinations and everything he does is through the lens of dealing with an uncivilised and backward people who are easy to exploit and manipulate.
This colonial thinking is wonderfully illustrated by Morgan’s superior who in seeking to curry favour with a village strongman offers him a first class flight to London and a weekend at a swanky hotel. When told of the offer the strongman responds in a vein that neatly expresses the post colonial order:

‘Thank you,’ Adekunle said finally. ‘Thank you for your offer. I will see if I can fit it into my itinerary.’
‘Itinerary?’ Morgan repeated, nonplussed. ‘Do you mean…?’
‘Yes, my dear Mr British Deputy High Commission man. You are a very late bird to catch this worm, as the saying goes. Once I’ve been to Washington, Paris, Bonn and Rome I’ll see if I can drop in on London. Thank you again, Mr Leafy,’ he said still smiling. ‘No wonder the Empire went. Yes?’

There’s something darkly humorous about this passage that brings us back to the seeming/being paradigm. The British think they can still offer trinkets to greedy warlords and they will come running. Who is exploiting who in this new world however becomes murky to say the least. Rather than the simple duality of a colonial/colonised world, the new reality is simply amoral. Blackmail, adultery, and corruption are the rules of the day and those with a moral compass don’t survive very long. It sounds grim, and it certainly is, but the absurdity of a world that was formerly governed by strict and hierarchical rules but is now every man(and woman) for themselves is also endlessly amusing. There are some laugh out loud sections of this story that one wouldn’t expect from something on this topic, particularly since so many characters are so despicable. Characters who go through their lives thinking things like:

“With a sudden flash of prophetic inspiration he felt he knew why there was so much evil in the world: the price you paid for being good was simply quite out of proportion, preposterously over-valued.”

My only criticism would be that as well as Boyd writes, he was at times a little heavy handed with his metaphors. A dead girl in the street named “Innocence” did make me roll my eyes a bit but for the most part, Boyd’s portrayal of greed, selfishness, and misguided and outdated colonial thinking was a great read.

[Laurie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Anyone with a name like Morgan Leafy is bound to have troubles. His career has wandered onto a jungle path and got lost. He's freckled, balding, going to fat. Within the Foreign Office, he's a second-stringer if ever there was one: not Oxbridge, not connected to the right people (or any people, for that matter) and stuck in a provincial backwater in west Africa as second-in-command to an about-to-retire has-been diplomat who spent his entire career in the Orient until, presumably because of his failing diplomatic powers or some unspoken slip-up, he's also shunted off to this provincial post. He and his awful wife can't fathom Africa, even a little. But then their daughter, disappointed in love, comes out. Maybe Leafy's prospects are looking up. If she isn't exactly a beauty and her head is as empty as they come, Priscilla may be the answer to Leafy's problems: she's got the connections and the social graces he so clearly lacks. BUT …

Morgan Leafy is one of those people everything happens to. Part of the charm of this novel is that all but the luckiest of us have been in a position where we've had to smile and metaphorically curtsy to people we can easily and cheerfully imagine being run down by a mad bull elephant or to whom we shout (in our imaginations only, of course) very rude words. If Morgan isn't the nicest bloke on the block, he's also no worse than many, but he's in that position between having responsibility he cannot shirk and not having any power to direct what he does (or for that matter, what anyone else does). Whatever problem he solves turns out to need a different solution from the one he's come up with. That's why disposing of Innocence (the dead servant) poses such an insoluble problem.

Although I'd say I'm not like that, I got a lot of vicarious enjoyment from Morgan's sotto voce expressions of bile and blind anger at the hand he's been dealt. The novel has a somewhat convoluted plot, but then isn't that like real life? And in the end, his enemy turns out to be the one person he admires and respects.

[Leslie · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5★

Morgan Leafy is a civil servant in the early 1970s Foreign Service posted to the small (mythical) country of Kinjanja in Africa. He simultaneously has inferiority and superiority issues -- he walks around with a huge chip on his shoulder but feels innately more important than any of the Africans. While this dicotomy is exaggerated in this satire, I suspect that it is not uncommon in people with Foreign Service postings in out-of-the-way places in Africa, Asia and elsewhere. However, Boyd's satire didn't entertain me the way Evelyn Waugh did in his African satires -- the humor is more caustic and felt more mean-spirited.

[James · Rating 1 out of 5]

The blurb on the back cover made this sound like a fun book to read. After reading the first 7 pages I was bored with the writing style - the author keeps mentioning things that have happened to the protagonist, but then doesn't fully expand on them. Unfortunately, we already know these titbits of information as they are on the back cover - they need to be expanded!! Flicking through the rest of the book I realised I hadn't seemed to miss much by heading to the end - all in all, a dissappointment as the cover blurb promised much more than was delivered.

[Dale · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow! I love William Boyd's versatility. The humor in the book is a side-splitting at some of his action novels are nail-biting. Poor Morgan Leafy, he has a lot on his plate as we are introduced to him, and the novel does a great job of ratcheting up that tension in the first section and then retracing the steps--almost entirely missteps--that led him to all his predicaments. It is that subtle British humor, though, that provides the glue to stick all these scenes together and keeps us turning one page after another asking, "How on earth will he get out of any of this?" A most enjoyable read!

[Peter · Rating 4 out of 5]

An entertaining book, well written, of course. The main character is a fairly repulsive sort who does at times do something right. I might have given another star, but the ending sort of fizzled out (or maybe I failed to understand it). Most other characters are venial, incompetent, or corrupt, but this is revealed slowly through the book. The background is vividly described, the heat, the chaos, and the poverty. An interesting, and at times entertaining, read.