This is a radical step when itĬomes to losing weight, but Harpie is if nothing else radical and Intestines removed in a gastric by-pass, all of which means she doesn’t We join author Harpie after having most of her stomach and Novels are always written in diary format, and this book doesn’t get Six-pack and a penis that twangs harder than a piano string. This isn’t one of those fashionably erotic books where the guy’s got a It’s well-written with a host of sub-plots and a cast of characters that are so true to the ex-pat community. I don’t want to throw any more spoilers in here, but I must say that if you only buy one book this year, make it this one.

Danny recalls better days for Gena when he spent time with her and her husband, Jack, bar-b-queuing, laughing and drinking. We have the beautiful Charlotte with the sumptuous breasts and perennial suntan, who once represented her country at martial arts in the Olympics, and the English prostitute, Gena, playing Russian roulette with her body. The characters just keep coming at you, and it’s a measure of Shearman’s genius and wit that they’re as divergent as it’s possible to be. And yet as the story progresses we soon get to realise that a) he fits in perfectly and despite the fact that he runs around debt-collecting in Zorro outfits, no one thinks him strange, and b) compared to everyone else he’s as sane as the Speaker in the House of Lords. In Shearman’s book we meet the protagonist, Danny, who to put it bluntly, just ain’t right. Their clothes are now the same, their histories are different and, like all ex-pats the world over, they’re a melting pot of offbeat coarse comedy. They all have their stories to tell, yet they never share the real one. And without exception they are all liars. They meet in the same bar and sit on the same stools they’ve been sitting on for years. The riff-raff and the hoi polio mix with ease.

They’re not so much real characters, just bizarre, offbeat people, yet surprisingly unnoteworthy. And Mark Shearman picks up on this theme with ease. I lived four years in the Algarve and it’s very true that you find yourself mixing with people you would never look twice at back home.įor my own part I recall The Munchkins (he went to jail for poisoning her), Timeshare Joe, Kevin the Murderer, and a whole host of the most unusual characters you could hope to meet. What a book! Mark Shearman has the ex-pat community in the Costa Blanca down to a T. If you only buy one book this year, make it this one

Expats in Spain by Mark Shearman