The Fandom of the Operator by Robert Rankin

The Fandom of the Operator is the latest enjoyable tale from the pen of Robert Rankin. The 'anti-hero' is Gary Cheese. A 22 year old who has a dead-end job in a telecoms company. He is employed to sit and wait to switch off a light whenever it comes on. His hobbies and main interests are death and P.P.Penrose's Lazlo Woodbine detective novels, but not his science fiction novels. In fact, he is such a fan that as a teenager he gate-crashed P.P.Penrose's wake and attempted to reanimate him with voodoo. When, he discovers that his 'work' with light bulbs is connected to the FLATLINE project - as in CHATLINE, but to the dead, he naturally wants to speak to P.P.Penrose. This is another surreal tale from Robert Rankin, described by himself as a 'techno-gothic masterpiece'. Mind you, it also claims that Rankin dictated this posthumously to the Brentford medium Madame Loretta Rune. Those who enjoy his work will probably enjoy this. Although it has to be said that this is blacker and possibly more off-the-wall than 'normal'. I would suggest that someone new to Rankin try one of his other more positive, less black comedies.

Publisher: Corgi Date: 2001 Pages: 367 Price: £5.99 Format: Paperback ISBN: 0 552 148970 Reviewed by: Rod Cameron Review Date: April 2002