The relaunch of Tatters

Charles Woolley

THIS grand occasion is not so much the launch of a book … but a relaunch of Michael Tatlow …
After spending two decades on a fruitless fight against the Big End of Town … you can’t fight city hall … and what is more Tammany Hall than this state … Tatters was denied justice as my wiser counsel always told him he would be.

But he fought anyway.

The Irish pig is in him as it is in Blarney Pike, the hero of this book.

A lifetime wasted I told him … and indeed he never got his day in court. In the end denied his day by Mr Justice Blow …

… a Dickensian figure at law … and it’s no slander to call a man Dickensian … though if I ever appear before Mr Blow I shall ask him to discharge himself from my case … because I once called him Dickensian. Blow is certainly a Dickensian name — make of that what you will.

Michael didn;t weaste his time. Within hours of defeat he started his novel. Within months he published it. I know journos who still haven’t written “that” book. I’ve done a travel book myself but my great Australian novel is still unfinished. Curse you Tatlow.

At the same time as he becomes a published author Tatters also re-enters political society. He’s already rattled some old ALP skeletons here in this very suburb (Battery Point). I admire a lot of Labor values — but not running the local ratepayers association like a 1960s ALP stacked branch.

Tats and I went to vote in the local hall and were amazed at the prospect the machine members — the political undead, 80 if they were a day; to re-work Yeats, slouching towards Bethlehem to vote.

An ancient turned us away from the meeting. Naive and defeated we retreated. Our only consolation was that by comparison our youth was intact. Tatlow now blooming and freed of his hopeless litigation wrote splendidly to the local paper and smote the Amalekites hip and thigh.

Tatters is back and in him we have one of the sharpest political minds in Tasmania. If I were to long for election and prepared to take the paycut, Tatlow is the man I would engage to get me there. He is Graham Richardson without the Swiss bank account, but with the moral compass.

So to the book Pike’s Pyramid. A vicious murder in old Europe. A man cruelly done in. And it’s Indochine cuisine, his cock and his balls stuffed Viet Cong style into his mouth. But this is no cock and ball story. It’s a fast-paced international thriller in which the worst thugs in Sydney create murder and mayhem in the lovely old Tasmanian town of Stanley … hello Michael that happens every summer. It’s called tourism.

Ethical though he is Tatters’ book is full of product placement which I feel compelled to reveal. Quote: Pike’s support group were staying at Battery Point’s Shipwright’s Arms Hotel … an historic showcase of maritime memorabilia — clean, wonderful food, cheap rooms and 10 minutes walk from the court.

But wait a minute. Back in Stanley the CIA chief operative arrives. This is a global story bigger than the Nut. And what do you think his name is … I quote again: The CIA’s Gordon Latimer does not waste words. He is a stout man with a short beard.

But if Tats looks after his mates he settles a few scores too. In Pike’s trumped up court prosecution the DPP os a florid-faced fat fellow looking on the edge of a heart attack. But his name is Jim Flynn and so is no-one we know.

You must all buy a copy because in one disguise or another you are all in there. So are many of Tatlow’s wives and much of his colourful life.

The book is Pike’s Pyramid. It’s on sale at brave bookshops everywhere.

It is my pleasure to launch it and I can’t wait for the sequel!

Pike’s Pyramid can be purchased online at thisTasmania bookstore: Here

At Hobart bookshops and www.knocklofty.com
and from mike@mywordproducts.com

RRP $29.95.

Notes of a speech to launch Pike’s Pyramid, Battery Point, Wednesday, November 1.