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Reviewing Losing the Plot was hard because it breaks all the rules of published fiction (See Losing the Plot by Chuckwoww). Though flawed, it's a treat for Thailand-lovers and possibly deserves cult status. Now you can judge for yourself because the author has kindly allowed me to publish this extract.

With Bert stuck for an answer and Raffy across the road getting some beers this might be a good time to check on Arthur. He's not too far away as it happens. His wife Tui arrived in Bangkok as planned and together they'd done a bit of shopping.

Arthur got rid of his panty collection before she arrived. Just like that. One morning, in a fit of self-disgust he'd tipped the lot into a dumpster behind, appropriately enough, Robinson, where so many of them had been purchased. Did he miss them? Only when he thought about it, which he did, for a few moments, on the bus with Tui from Ekamai to Pattaya. But in a way he's glad they're gone. Now he's leaning back in his deckchair staring out across the Gulf of Thailand. Something he can do for hours.

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Ages ago, when he lived on Samui, he spent most of his days on Chaweng Beach... always on the same stool in the Coconut Bar... staring out to sea. But that was before Chaweng became a sort of tropical Skegness. He'd moved to Lamai, barely one jump ahead of the fish'n chips shops, and thence to Isaan, the undeveloped Thai hinterland which he had found much more to his taste. Isaan was slow, unhurried, with little in the way of tourist attractions. It was easy to slip into the rhythm of the place, wet season followed dry, hot got hotter, and days blurred into one another. One evening by the bug zapper, Tui, his wife of 7 years, had suggested a trip to Pattaya. Arthur had agreed. A change was as good as a rest... not that he really needed one, but why not, perhaps he could even sneak in a little side-trip to Bangkok. On his own. And he had always liked Pattaya. It was honest in its own seedy way; never pretending to be other than what it was... until quite recently anyway... when the local council started performing mental acrobatics trying to balance sin and safety.

In fact Arthur doesn't care much what the Thais do with their cities anymore. Neither does Tui, who, sensibly, is in another deckchair, to his left, tucking into a plate of deep-fried prawns she just bought from one of the vendors that swarm like sand flies among the pink and red foreign bodies. This is Tui's second visit to Pattaya and she loves it, doesn't find it tacky at all. Neither, after a beer or two, and a bit of a paddle, does Arthur. He is content to just lie back and relax. Try to anyway.

Chewing gum? No thanks. Newspaper? No. Not even the Bangkok Post, thrust uninvitingly in his face by yet another vendor, can hold his attention for very long. Hang on a sec... he buys one anyway... six British soldiers killed in Iraq... hmmm... a mess to be sure... but Arthur is more interested in watching the clouds. He isn't looking for omens or anything but he enjoys the constantly changing and evolving shapes. Above him immense billows are forming faces of Bush, Blair and Bin Laden... potent images that dominate his thoughts these days... more and more he is seeing pagan gods among the clouds... vengeful old Egyptian and Hebrew Gods... Osiris, Anubis, Set, and Yahweh, Zeus programming a handful of smartbolts, Mars in his war chariot, criss-crossed by parasailers... and of course old Priapus is up there too, ogling the banana-boat-load of ghostly topless waving bargirls.

It must all mean something thinks Arthur... these images from school history books surprisingly well etched into his memory, redolent of English summers, hours spent avoiding homework, lying on his back in the long grass listening to the sharp clack of willow bats meeting leather cricket balls. Then Sunday School and another kind of God... a stern but loving god who valued good table manners highly... who thought that children should be seen but not heard and whose first commandment was "thou shalt not pick thy nose or otherwise embarrass thy parents in front of the neighbours" and the second was "don't play with your winkle there's a good boy"...

American soldiers getting bumped off left and right, lot's of angry young Muslim men with time on their hands, non-existent WMD, Blair telling whoppers, and recently, according to the Bangkok Post, pipelines on fire, clerics getting blown up in An Najaf... it must all worry Bush surely... assuming he worries about anything ... it worries Arthur... a Muslim army soundly trounced, humiliated really but still they persist in their old ways... more Islamic than ever now probably... showing no respect for the loving Christian American god come to bring them all the wonders of a democratic consumer oriented society... do they need more fire and brimstone before they admit the error of their ways... more shock and awe? Do we have to send Billy Graham at the head of an army of evangelists before they see reason and embrace the joys and wonders of the modern age? Would that cause the stock markets to rally and the wounds of 911 to heal?

[Posted to Fiction by David]

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