Monday, November 13, 2006

Mma DELICIOUS ONTOASTE Scotsman: "She sits on a verandah in Botswana, drinking red bush tea, admiring the faultless blue skies and running the 'World's Best Detective Agency Ever! No 2'. Sound familiar? He is a hard-drinking, hard-bitten policeman who treads the dark shadows of Edinburgh's criminal underbelly solving dastardly murders. Recognise him? Mma Precious Ramotswe, the fictional creation of Scottish author Alexander McCall Smith, and Inspector John Rebus, writer Ian Rankin's dishevelled but dedicated cop? Not quite. They are Mma Delicious Ontoaste and Inspector Scott Rhombus, the satirical creations of author Toby Clements who has set out to poke fun at the work of some of the world's most famous crime fiction writers. He also takes a swipe at the sleuths created by Patricia Cornwell, the US's best-selling crime writer and the phenomenally successful Swedish author Henning Mankell." It wouldn't be difficult to parody Henning Mankell. He always begins each chapter with a time clause or indication of time. The solution eludes him until the end when the whole police crew heads home and Wallander goes after the criminal alone, against all rules, then at the final moment he is being shot at, but a fraction of a second before that he simply trips over something and is saved. Afterwards he is depressed like they can only be depressed in Sweden. And the name Mma Murakami of course refers to that other Japanese bestseller writer, Haruki Murakami. The No. 2 Global Detective. Clements also wrote a parody of The Da Vinci Code. 12:27:00 PM

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