Whipped: An Arthur Beauchamp Novel

Description

This installment of Deverell's acclaimed Arthur Beauchamp series gives readers both a tense, insider view of a courtroom drama along with political satire and tongue-in-cheek humour -- for dedicated Arthur fans or those meeting him for the first time

William Deverell was a journalist for seven years and a trial lawyer for 25, as defender or prosecutor in more than a thousand criminal cases, including 30 murder trials. The author of over 20 novels, Deverell has won the $50,000 Seal First Novel Prize and the Book of the Year Award, the Dashiell Hammett Award for literary excellence in crime writing in North America, as well as two Arthur Ellis Awards for best Canadian crime novel. His work has been translated into 14 languages and sold worldwide. He lives on Pender Island, B.C.

"Only those readers with some knowledge of recent Canadian politics will fully appreciate the author's nuanced view of the goings-on in Ottawa, but all will admire the way Deverall makes even minor characters complex and engaging." - Publishers Weekly "Bill Deverell's Whipped is a rollicking ride through politics, organized crime, and blackmail, with a flash of studded leather thrown in for good measure. Arthur Beauchamp is back in a wild thriller that strikes very close to home. I couldn't turn the pages fast enough." - Terry Fallis, two-time winner of the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour Whipped is a tonic for fans of William Deverell's Arthur Beauchamp and his struggles with the law, life, and his wife on mythical Garibaldi Island. As readers will expect, I root for Margaret, his wife and leader of Canada's Green Party, but I do not envy the political shenanigans she faces in Whipped. I'll never look at the Chief Government Whip the same way again!" - Elizabeth May, MP, leader of Canada's Green Party "Whipped is vintage Deverell: sardonic yet humane, with a cast of complicated characters, seemingly effortless storytelling, and more than a touch of the absurd. Over twenty novels to his credit, and somehow he just keeps getting better." - John MacLachlan Gray, award-winning author of The Fiend in Human and Billy Bishop Goes to War "William Deverell, in his new book Whipped, combines his unique rollicking, raucous, fast-paced writing style, with his jaundiced eye for Canadian politics, and his love for the work of a skilled trial lawyer, Arthur Beauchamp. As usual, he features the composite South Gulf Island, Garibaldi Island, and its quirky crew of idiosyncratic residents. Well worth a read." - Mike Harcourt, former Vancouver Mayor, B.C. Premier, fellow Garibaldi Island resident with Bill Deverell "Whipped is a heady blend of sex, politics and blackmail with New Age group-grope, Russian perfidy and Mafia machinations - a tale that's fresh, original and funny, a totally delightful romp." - Silver Donald Cameron, author of Warrior Lawyers and writer/narrator of the documentary film Green Rights: The Human Right to a Healthy World "Always a delight to spend time in the company of the urbane, classically minded, and wittily conflicted Arthur Beauchamp. As a fellow resident of the Gulf Islands, I revel in Mr Deverell's droll depiction of their weird and wonderful residents. As a political junkie, I love the skewering of those pompous politicians. Wrap it all up in terrific prose and a driving plot, you have the perfect antidote to a wet weekend." - C. C. Humphreys, Arthur Ellis Award-winning author of Plague "Once again, legendary lawyer Arthur Beauchamp is dragged from his idyllic retirement on Garibaldi Island, only this time to defend his garrulous wife, Margaret, the Green Party leader, from a rogue microphone and a multi-million dollar slander suit issued by an arrogant cabinet minister with a penchant for being ridden bareback by a whip wielding dominatrix - taking the reader for another wild ride as the great lawyer gradually unleashes his defense of his wife. It's a hoot - a story with a real snap." - Brian Brett, award-winning author of Trauma Farm and Tuco "If you like crime novels and courtroom drama, you are in luck here. If you are looking for really good Canadian writing, you came to the right place. Lovers of the Arthur Beauchamp series will avail themselves of a cup of tea or a glass of the good stuff and hunker down for another trip to lovably haywire Garibaldi Island. They will also follow the continuing misadventures of Arthur's wife, Green Party leader Margaret Blake, through the halls of that other peculiar island called Parliament. It's Deverell's twentieth book; thank goodness they didn't kill all the lawyers." - George Bowering, award-winning autho r