I recently re-read this book for the first time since buying it over 10 years ago. I enjoyed it then, but the first thing that struck me this time around—post-Brexit—is how anti the European Union (EU) this book is. In the book, it is referred to as the United States of Europe, or the US of E. There are numerous references to its excessive bureaucracy, manifested in the form of unnecessary, ridiculous or just plain daft regulations and laws. At times, the book reads like a typically xenophobic D

I recently re-read this book for the first time since buying it over 10 years ago. I enjoyed it then, but the first thing that struck me this time around—post-Brexit—is how anti the European Union (EU) this book is. In the book, it is referred to as the United States of Europe, or the US of E. There are numerous references to its excessive bureaucracy, manifested in the form of unnecessary, ridiculous or just plain daft regulations and laws. At times, the book reads like a typically xenophobic Daily Mail or Daily Express EU hatchet job (such as their reporting of the mythical bent banana regulations).



At the same time, there is a degree of affection for European countries (with the notable exception of Germany), and much of the story takes place in Italy, France and Austria. The main plot is driven by the USA's desire that the US of E doesn't become too powerful, and hints that the US of E needs to be sufficiently strong to stand up to US aggression. Consequently, the book's Brexit sympathies are not entirely one way. (I'm personally strongly in favour of the UK remaining a part of the EU; but, let's face it, the EU is far from perfect.)



One US of E law, that has come into force in the near future, provides the basic premise of the book: that employers are not allowed to discriminate between potential employees on the basis of their ability, and that incompetence is not grounds for dismissal. The result is a barely functioning and deteriorating future society.



While the theme of this book is often compared to Mike Judge's excellent movie, Idiocracy, released some three years after this book, they are actually quite different in their details. In Idiocracy, society has become dumber because stupid people have more kids than smart people, so genes for smartness are being diluted across society, resulting in an intellectually-challenged population of idiots. The smartest person on Earth is then an army librarian from our time, of average intelligence, who has awoken from a suspended animation experiment to find a society run by morons. In Incompetence, there are simply a lot of people doing jobs for which they are completely unqualified and unsuitable—but there are still a lot of intelligent people, including the book's protagonist and his quarry. Oddly, in both societies, law enforcement agencies are strangely and uncharacteristically competent.



The story is written in the first person, and concerns the variously-named Cardew Vascular, Harry Pepper, Harry Tequila, Harry Salt—which leads to the inevitable joke about Harry Lime, from the film The Third Man, a story from which this book borrows some plot elements. For the purpose of brevity, I'll refer to him as Salt, which is the name he seems to use most commonly.



Salt works for an unidentified, "deep" counter intelligence organization that ultimately appears to be a US of E agency. He is part of a cell and is in contact with only two other members, with whom he communicates via personal ads in newspapers. He has a number of fake, yet official, identities and has access to a number of seemingly limitless financial accounts. His cover allows him to masquerade as senior law enforcement officials. While his second contact is never identified and plays no part in the story, his first contact, known to him as Dick Klingferm, is central to the story.



Klingferm has requested a face-to-face meeting with Salt, for the first time in years. Salt arrives at their rendezvous to discover that Klingferm has been killed, along with a number of innocent bystanders, in an apparent elevator "accident".



Salt then sets out to discover who killed Klingferm, only to find that the killer is continually one step ahead of him and is taunting his every step. Ultimately, it transpires that Klingferm faked his own death, and is a double agent working for a clandestine group within the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).



Along the way, Salt encounters a variety of vivid characters, of greater or lesser intellect, many of whom exhibit extreme personality disorders.



In many ways, the plot (ironically) makes little sense: Klingferm is introduced as Salt's mentor, and yet Klingferm only has Salt as a contact within their organization. Klingferm then waits for many years before trying to unravel the other members of the organization by working his way through the chain of contacts, and he fails at the first step when Salt breaks protocol by failing to involve his other contact in his investigation. Perhaps Klingferm's actions were triggered by a recent proposal to allow Russia to become a member of the US of E, which the USA regards as unacceptable? If so, quite how unraveling Salt's organization would prevent this is unclear. Also, why would the USA fear such a failing political bloc? If Russia became dysfunction by joining the US of E and being bound by its laws, then surely the US would welcome, rather than oppose, their union?



Clearly, without any other mechanism for communication (such as a numbers station, which the book makes no mention of), the members of Salt's organization are easily isolated by the deaths of other members, and communication along the chain is slow at best.



That said, the plot doesn't really matter: the story is a fun romp that exploits its central theme—a general incompetence—for a variety of hilarious episodes. I laughed out loud at many of its gags and I enjoyed it immensely. However, at times, and the reason I knocked one star off my rating, is that the story also brings with it a tangible feeling of frustration that hiked my blood pressure.



The story has some curious loose ends: chief among them is that Klingferm is never confirmed as being dead, despite being shot in the head and losing a large part of his brain.