Book of the Week: Two Pumps for the Body Man

I picked up some nice items at the AAFSW book fair last week, and one of them was this quirky novel Two Pumps for the Body Man, which the author describes as a soft-boiled diplomatic noir.

See an interview with the author here, and visit his website here.

My novels take a playful approach to the problems that plague us. They’re serious literary fiction, but they respond best to readers who don’t take themselves seriously. They don’t shy from tragedy or horror, are irreverent towards the holy, stand in awe of the ordinary. I hope my readers enjoy a blend of comedy (deadly shredder machines), romance (foot-fetish blackmail), and tragedy (kindergarteners rehearsing the intruder drill).

The story is a series of Catch-22 situations in which an ambitious CG battles with her RSO at the “second worst facility in the entire Foreign Service.” That description of the facility is decidedly not fictional. The post is unnamed, but it’s the Consulate in Saudi Arabia that’s across the street from a big hospital. Maybe you know the one. It’s still a dump.

The story ends with a terrorist attack on the unnamed Consulate, something which is also not at all fictional. See this essay by the author in the Foreign Service Journal. The novel is well worth reading for that part alone.

I give it two thumbs up (or something, since I don't have a ratings scale). This novel might make me start a book review feature.