The best laid plans

This year's "One Book One Community" choice is The Best Laid Plans, a novel by Terry Fallis which is commonly billed as a satire of Canadian politics.

I'm not so sure I agree with the satire descriptor--aside from the main character, Angus McLintock, building a hovercraft in his spare time, and the fate that befalls Eric Cameron--but that could be because I already view Canadian politics with extreme cynicism, so nothing in The Best Laid Plans surprises me.

The book itself is good, though. It's a vast departure from last year's OBOC (The Book of Negroes), and I could see people complaining about The Best Laid Plans simply because it's not the heavy, dense, yet ultimately enjoyable read The Book of Negroes was--The Best Laid Plans comes off as trivial and minor in comparison.

That's not really a fair criticism, though. The goal of OBOC is to get people to read, especially people who don't normally pay much attention to books. For that to work, it can't be something as thick, dense, and frightening to new readers as Negroes is, at least not every year. Better to represent different genres--comedic fiction in this case--and having a book that can be polished off over a weekend is a nice boost as well.

(Besides, it's far from the worst "One Book One Community" we've had.)

As I said, The Best Laid Plans is an easy read, which works in its favour. You can put it down, come back to it a few days later and still know all the characters (because there are only about ten that show up more than once). You remember everyone's motivations. You get a sense that everybody really is trying to do the right thing (or at least the political right thing).

It's a fun little book that you don't need to be into books or politics to enjoy. Perfect summer reading.

--Ryan