Morgan Leafy has problems. The First Secretary of the British Deputy Commission in the West African country of Kinjanja, he is being blackmailed by a local politician. His plans to rig the country´s elections have somehow gone awry and a coup is slowly brewing. To make matters worse, his black mistress, Hazel, is cheating on him. The luscious Priscilla Fanshawe, daughter of his boss and object of his ambitious lusts, has just announced her engagement to his hated rival. And her father is threatening to dismiss him - unless Morgan can promptly dispose of a smelly corpse, which, according to local beliefs, must be left to rot under the hot African sun. With his first book, ´´A Good Man in Africa,´´ William Boyd has made a fine and very funny contribution to that now familiar genre of the English comic novel. The plot is quick; the prose - for the most part - smooth; the humor, relentlessly black. Indeed ´´Good Man´´ frequently recalls the manner and tone perfected by such masters as Evelyn Waugh and Kingsley Amis - it is as though Lucky Jim had been suddenly transported to the mythical kingdom of Azania in ´´Black Mischief.´´
Description:
Morgan Leafy has problems. The First Secretary of the British Deputy Commission in the West African country of Kinjanja, he is being blackmailed by a local politician. His plans to rig the country´s elections have somehow gone awry and a coup is slowly brewing. To make matters worse, his black mistress, Hazel, is cheating on him. The luscious Priscilla Fanshawe, daughter of his boss and object of his ambitious lusts, has just announced her engagement to his hated rival. And her father is threatening to dismiss him - unless Morgan can promptly dispose of a smelly corpse, which, according to local beliefs, must be left to rot under the hot African sun. With his first book, ´´A Good Man in Africa,´´ William Boyd has made a fine and very funny contribution to that now familiar genre of the English comic novel. The plot is quick; the prose - for the most part - smooth; the humor, relentlessly black. Indeed ´´Good Man´´ frequently recalls the manner and tone perfected by such masters as Evelyn Waugh and Kingsley Amis - it is as though Lucky Jim had been suddenly transported to the mythical kingdom of Azania in ´´Black Mischief.´´