Description
Early in the twentyfirst century the
Honourable Wiremu Waka, Minister of
Financial Development in the new
Green Government of New Zealand, is
in Edinburgh seeking an eight billion
dollar loan for tourist development of
the Taupo Volcanic Zone. His aim is to
change New Zealand’s image from
clean, green and boring to hot, red and
exciting. The main part of his pitch is a
state-of-the-art holovideo recreation of
Maori volcano myth. On the night of
his presentation to the Scotch Table he
dies violently in a Scottish sauna.
His reluctant companion Neil Munro
returns to New Zealand pursued by the
killer he is determined to unmask. He
scarcely recognises the country he grew
up in. Maori radicals and fascist Pakeha
youth clash at the Minister’s bicultural
state funeral and secret state video
surveillance manipulates a country that
on the surface appears to be leading the
world once more in innovative
legislation.
Munro is an unheroic man in his early
forties, balding, paunchy, too short for
his own self esteem, suffering from PFD
– Post-Fame Depression – following the
collapse of his television career and his
marriage. Gourmet tastes on a budget
deficit require him to take the only job
going, a Fire Tour Video through the
Taupo volcanic region from Taranaki to
White Island in company with a
dyspeptic scientist who loathes the late
Minister and the Minister’s father, who
blames Munro for his son’s death.
This satirical eco-thriller goes beyond
tomorrow’s’ headlines into Taranaki oil
production sabotage, Ruapehu ski resort
bombing, ‘the firing of the
world-famous Rotorua Pink and White
Terraces theme park, a terrorist threat
to reprise the Tarawera hydrothermal
eruption of 1886. Maori fire myth,
scientific research and high-tech
developments are necessary elements of
a future shock fable about the extremes
of politically correct Maori and Pakeha
positions, the possibilities for electronic
manipulation of public opinion and the
coming tourist exploitation of our
mightiest unspoiled mountain reaches.
David McGill has written 18 social
histories of New Zealand and one
children’s fantasy. This is his first novel.
264 pages
Hardcover
Pages have yellowed and library marks are evident on the end pages. A well used preloved book for someone wanting a good read and a good price.