The Afrikaans
by Nick Pirog
I’m a big fan of Nick Pirog’s writing, and as I progressed through his sarcastic and witty Thomas Prescott series, I read the latest installment The Afrikaans. It wasn’t my favorite of his works, but I didn’t consider it the end of the world. It was just a little too violent for my taste; others might like the excitement.
Picking up where the last book left off, our sarcastic and hilarious hero has survived (spoiler alert) the wolves and serial killers only to take a well-deserved cruise with his sister and her narcoleptic pug. However, there are evil forces at work and the elite cruise ship finds itself hijacked and taken hostage by African pirates who demand beaucoup bucks delivered to their AIDS-ravaged continent. As usual, there is a host of incredibly colorful characters, made even more vivid by the first-person narrator’s descriptions of them.
What wasn’t usual was the variety of writing style. Instead of the entire book being written from Prescott’s perspective, the chapters alternate between government bigwigs, a doctor, pirates, military personnel, etc. Interestingly enough, Prescott’s sister, a staple in the series, wasn’t given her own chapter. While the switch didn’t make me fear for the hero’s safety, it did give the book a distinctively darker tone, since only a slice of the pages contained the author’s usual sarcasm and off-color jokes. Also, there was a lot of violence and a couple of attempted rape scenes. It might seem strange that I found this book too gruesome, since in the previous book, the killer pinned his victim’s eyeballs to the wall; but somehow, I wasn’t able to take this book as lightly.
I’m looking forward to the conclusion of the series, and I definitely won’t hold The Afrikaans against him. Art is subjective, and I still very much enjoy reading his work.
Picking up where the last book left off, our sarcastic and hilarious hero has survived (spoiler alert) the wolves and serial killers only to take a well-deserved cruise with his sister and her narcoleptic pug. However, there are evil forces at work and the elite cruise ship finds itself hijacked and taken hostage by African pirates who demand beaucoup bucks delivered to their AIDS-ravaged continent. As usual, there is a host of incredibly colorful characters, made even more vivid by the first-person narrator’s descriptions of them.
What wasn’t usual was the variety of writing style. Instead of the entire book being written from Prescott’s perspective, the chapters alternate between government bigwigs, a doctor, pirates, military personnel, etc. Interestingly enough, Prescott’s sister, a staple in the series, wasn’t given her own chapter. While the switch didn’t make me fear for the hero’s safety, it did give the book a distinctively darker tone, since only a slice of the pages contained the author’s usual sarcasm and off-color jokes. Also, there was a lot of violence and a couple of attempted rape scenes. It might seem strange that I found this book too gruesome, since in the previous book, the killer pinned his victim’s eyeballs to the wall; but somehow, I wasn’t able to take this book as lightly.
I’m looking forward to the conclusion of the series, and I definitely won’t hold The Afrikaans against him. Art is subjective, and I still very much enjoy reading his work.