This is the first book in a new series from Caimh McDonnell, famous for his increasingly inaccurately named Dublin Trilogy.
At the time of writing, there are four books in this series:
All are excellent but it’s the first one that really stole my heart because it introduces the spectacularly awful Vincent Banecroft – the very shabby, shoddy, shady editor of The Stranger Times, who keeps a shotgun in his office.
(None of my bosses have ever kept a shotgun in their office and I now consider this to be a serious defect in an employer. But I digress.)
Then there’s Stella – no one knows who or what she is – even Stella herself – and Grace, the religiously devout office manager, struggling daily with the Boss From Hell, Ox with his gambling issues, and Reggie who possesses some surprising and as yet undefined skills. Not forgetting the naked Rastafarian living in the basement. And why wouldn’t he?
This is the point at which Hannah Willis applies for and gets the job of editor at The Stranger Times. She’s grateful at the time – one hour into her new job she’s not quite so sure.
The Stranger Times publishes stories other supposedly more respectable periodicals wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot speculum. My mother-in-law is a lettuce and living in the fridge. That sort of story. In other words – interesting stories and not just boring accounts of everything the government has screwed up in the last twenty-four hours, or how many MPs have been caught fiddling their expenses, or who’s at war with whom, or a profile of this week’s most influential influencer. You know – all the boring stuff.
And to those who maintain mothers-in-law don’t live in fridges and The Stranger Times is making it all up, Vincent Banecroft will reply that he’s not reporting a leafy mother-in-law currently residing in the fridge – he’s actually reporting that someone believes his mother-in-law is a slightly wilting Webb’s Wonderful and living in the salad drawer.
The characters are interesting, the premise unusual, and the story is fast, funny and riddled with Mr McDonnell’s trademark acerbic wit.
Slacken your grip on reality and enjoy …
I've read all 4 of these, and they're brilliant! I'm hoping there will be lots more to come in the series, although I shouldn't think he'll be as prolific at producing new books as Jodi! Does she ever sleep? 😁