A short read that's hard to put down
In this short novel, we meet Jane Charlotte, a woman who may or may not work for Panopticon’s “Department for the Final Disposition of Irredeemable Persons”, which may or may not exist. The department, nicknamed “Bad Monkeys”, secretly fights evil, not crime, and for the Bad Monkey soldiers, intentions make all the difference.
Criminals commit crimes as a means to an end — not necessarily an evil act, just a wrong one. An evil person — or bad monkey — enjoys the crime, commits it for it’s own sake, and the more psychological harm, the better. Just how do the Bad Monkeys judge who is evil and who is criminal? Actions are tracked throughout a lifetime.
Then again, all this may be a construct of Jane Charlotte’s imagination, a fantasy her mind has built to justify some extremely bad behaviour.
Drawing on story lines and characters from many a science fiction novel and movie, Ruff nevertheless continually surprises. With tight plot twists and an utterly engaging main character, familiar images of the doubting psychiatrist, the suited assassin and the reluctant hero take on new life and are sustained with overflowing energy.
Just when you think you’ve read this all before and are perhaps becoming mildly irritated by the Mix<$>-like fight scene between the good and bad Jane Charlotte (shades of Fighlub<$>?), Ruff snaps you in another direction. Ruff lays bare his influences, but walks the fine line of not letting Bad Meys <$>turn into something that has come before.
Bad keys <$>is a short read and if you have the time, it will be difficult to put down. Rarely is a book that flirts with both the nature of reality and theories of good and evil so absolutely entertaining in a “do-not-talk-to-me-until-I-am-done-reading” way.
