One of the craziest thing’s we humans do, is politics! Politics at any level attracts the selfless – who are admirable; the autocrats who desire only to control the rest of us; the well-intentioned but incapable, and those who are just plain nuts. But it is nonetheless, our privilege to be able to vote.
'Vote Dimple Potts' is about small-town politics in New Zealand. I intended that it would be a parody and the antics of these characters do make me laugh, but ironically and as can often happen, fact can be stranger than fiction. Even as I was writing, I would pick up a newspaper and think, ‘Good grief, he, or she is even zanier than Dimple – or Corker!’ But no matter – it is a story and the advantage of a story is in being able to weave together, byzantine threads…
So, without giving too much away, this is what happens.
In a Nutshell
When the Mayor of the small New Zealand town of Brewster’s Neck is killed by an Auckland bus, his deputy, Dimple Potts must ‘step up to the plate.’ But it is with great indignation that Dimple realises he has not inherited a sinecure. A challenger arises – the radical Sarah Bumbulis – baker of Brewster’s Neck and opposed to a Council scheme to mine coal. Her political movement, titled the GLADS, goes head-to-head with the hard-nosed FOKKERS created by the town’s scheming ‘magnate,’ Corker Pritchard.
Meanwhile, the mysterious Homeless Hauptmann dies from a grievous throat wound inflicted by a Pawnee arrow; inventor Doug Hemopo is creating New Zealand’s largest robot; beekeeper Porterhouse Johnson makes an horrific discovery; and constable Herb Hikaka grapples with a crimewave, political intrigue and general mayhem that turn this rural heartland town upside down and cause the lights in Auckland to go out…
‘Vote Dimple Potts’ is for readers who have a taste for the absurd – but at a more serious level, the story is also a commentary about political motivations; the joy of invention; and what many consider to be the major issue of our time, which is climate change.