Incompetence (Gollancz S.F.) [Paperback]

The book is based on Europe in the not distant enough future, Europe is now known as the United States of Europe and incompetence is a way of life. Political correctness has gone mad and discrimination is not allowed no matter what a persons sex, age, race or incompetence. In fact the worse you do the quicker you will climb the ever so slippery ladder of sucess. This is a bit of a problem for Harry Salt, you see he is actually good at his job - too good! Harry Salt (just one of his many identities but the one he goes by mostly in the book) is an agent working for an establishment mearly known as The Agency. He's abit like a private detective but with a bigger expense account, more authority and the ability to dispose of anyone in his way - okay so not very much like a private detective but he does solve crimes, and a hell of a lot better than the police.

The plot is predictable and the solution even more so, but it is not that that makes the book a worthwile read. It is the journey there and the characters Harry meets along the way that will have you in stitches within minutes.

I don't normally write reviews, but I was moved to do so in this case after reading some of the earlier comments. In short, there's nothing at all wrong with this book except that it isn't Red Dwarf. But, you know, we have to accept the fact that nothing else will ever be RD, and move on. A suitable period of mourning has elapsed, I think.

Although Incompetence has a plot, of sorts, it isn't really that important. And maybe the characters are a bit like cardboard cutouts, but that isn't important either. Incompetence is really a vehicle for the author to make jokes about situations that piss him off. Now, if you can identify with these situations, you'll find the book funny. If you can't, you won't. No particular life experience was necessary to be able to appreciate RD. You may, or may not, have enjoyed its particular brand of lavatory humour and insults; but if you didn't, it probably wasn't because you don't have sufficient life skills. But Incomptence only makes sense, I think, if you have a particular mind-set, and have seen a bit of the world. For example, if you don't understand why the idea of a caterer being compelled to employ a waiter with Tourette's syndrome is funny, it won't help if someone explains it to you. Either you get it or you don't.

For my part, I started laughing from the first paragraph, and carried on laughing until the last page. In places I laughed so hard I thought I'd swallow my own eyeballs. At the same time, I can imagine a bunch of RD fans scratching their heads, and complaining that there's only one fart joke in the whole book.

In summary, the humour in this book is more like that in Dilbert than in Red Dwarf. Like Dilbert, the plot and the characters are sketchy. Also, like Dilbert, if you don't understand it, it's because it's about you. :)

The story line is thin, but that doesn’t matter in the slightest, because it’s the ideas and descriptions that make this the funniest book I have read for quite some time. Hopefully someone will turn it into a film…