Doggone Erik Ryman

An extract from the book: “The soldier on the front line will not, consistently, kill his family, friends, neighbours and associates without at some stage deciding that enough is enough. You see, the Leader is no fool, he realises that it is better to occupy the hands and dope the minds of the people with whatever means necessary than to fight them, for while they might not choose to remember the fact, they will always win.”

The Authortrek View: In Doggone, Erik Ryman presents a dystopian view of Britain’s future. The Government has sold the country to a supermarket for a nominal sum, and everything is going swimmingly well and rather too orderly until the supermarket makes a very British mistake, which allows the Civil Service to buy the country back. Democracy is then sacrificed under the benign direction of the Leader. Unfortunately, the Department struggles to live up to its promises, and the bread and circuses begin to get a bit stale and boring, forcing the Leader to resort to even more extremes to cover up the true state of the nation. And a solution presents itself when he treads in some corgi shit… At last, a culprit is found on whom to pin all the nation’s woes… Erik Ryman’s latest novel is very black, and still quite self-indulgent, although there is far more of a narrative than God’s Game. Doggone is also very funny and quite imaginative. The most enjoyable aspect of the novel is Doris’s dialogue with May-Belle, as he/she relates how the country has gone to the dogs. The author possibly breaks the rules here, as he does a lot of telling rather than showing, but the conversation is very entertaining. Erik Ryman himself makes a cameo appearance as a trigger-happy subordinate in the Department. And although the Leader is at pains not to offend his subjects, those of them that offend him do tend to come to rather bloody, sticky ends. The resolution of the novel perhaps veers too close to farce rather than satire, but overall, Doggone is a very enjoyable read.

You can read a resume of the book on our Amazon store below. To find out more about the author, please visit our Erik Ryman page.

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