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For the British edition: http://www.amazon.co.uk With an election coming up the last thing that political minder Murray Whelan needs is for trouble between his ministerial boss and the transport unions. But trouble is what they have and when it escalates to murder then Murray is a natural suspect having been seen threatening the dead man. As is often the case in Maloney's books centre stage belongs to politics, and with Minister Agnelli down in the polls Murray is asked to stand as a sort of dummy contender for preselection. This political sub-plot not only takes a high proportion of the book, but the manoeuvring between the contenders also provides most of the fun. Fun that can hopefully be related to the political goings on anywhere in the world, but is still uniquely Australian in this book. The Big Ask is the fourth book to feature Murray Whelan, and it continues Maloney's tradition of poking some well aimed-fun at Australian politics while still developing some very warm and human characters. Murray is the first person voice of The Big Ask, a Labour man who has been involved in politics for most of his working life and has the cynicism to prove it. Divorced and unlucky in love Murray has a son, Red, and a highlight of this series has been the wonderful and very Australian father and son relationship. I was delighted to see much more of Red after he was off stage for most of the previous book, he's a completely believable teenage boy with the usual teen preoccupations, and the perfect foil for his often frustrated father. Maloney also excels with his settings, particularly the Australian flavour that appears in many scenes. The best example in The Big Ask is the fruit and veg market that plays a prominent role in the mystery. Sure every city has one of these, but not quite the same as the multicultural melting pot blended with Australian attitude that makes this Melbourne market stand out. It certainly brought back some memories for me of hanging around the local market in the early dawn hours and coffee and cholesterol for breakfast in the market cafe. I feel the urge for a Saturday morning visit. The Big Ask is quite a fast read, but I still felt that Maloney's pacing let him down a little. As with the previous book in the series the mystery part of the plot took over 100 pages to really get started. He tried to fix it in this book by using a chunk of text as a prologue that belonged much later in the book. It's a device that I find quite annoying and it didn't work. Fortunately the saving graces of characters and settings helped in making that first part readable, and The Big Ask still finished up being my favourite Maloney to date. If you fancy some Australiana without having to pay exorbitant airfares to get here, then you could do worse than to try reading a Shane Maloney. As one of the few Australian mystery authors to make it on the international market he must be doing something right. Recommended, but be prepared to read a genuinely Australian book, not a transplanted American or British book. The extra work in interpreting the idioms should be well worthwhile. Review based on the Australian edition published in 2000.
Reviewed by Paul Richmond, August 2003
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