In The Great Goat Bubble, Julian Gough showed he had a rare flair for creating great comedy out of the mad, mad, world of international finance and he repeats the trick in his new book, Crash, How I Lost a Hundred Billion and Found True Love.
The book, which is available as a Kindle Single, once again features Gough’s familiar protagonist Jude who finds himself caught up in the very maws of the European debt crisis. When the novella opens, Jude is living frugally in a dilapidated henhouse which he bought for ten million euros at the height of the property boom. But his peace is soon disturbed by a posse of financial bigwigs who arrive at his door to inform him that his mortgage is in imminent danger of defaulting which will precipitate a Europe-wide financial collapse. The cabal of economic experts immediately implement a hilarious rescue plan which entails Jude issuing a hundred billion euro bond to put a roof on his henhouse and reassure the financial markets concerning his debt stability. From there the story proceeds with mounting zaniness as first the Euro elite declare that the entire country has to have a roof built over it, and then decide to construct it out of solar panels plunging the country below into darkness.
There are plenty of laughs along the way in Gough’s tale but underneath the laughter there is also a sense of anger at the crushing burden of debt Ireland finds itself under, and its destructive social effects. There is equally, a sharp sense of scepticism concerning the fiscal remedies being proposed and implemented by our monetary overlords here and further afield. As he did in The Great Goat Bubble, Gough again shows his knack for explaining the complex world of international finance in clear terms while also managing to make it very funny.
The book has already topped the Kindle Singles hit parade and a mere £1.49 from Amazon makes the perfect recession-busting read.
