A FIRST REVIEW OF HIGH IMPACT INSENSITIVITY By Jenny Nichols at Waiheke Weekender

High Impact Insensitivity

By Jonathan McQuillan

($30, from Paper Plus and highimpactinsensitivity.com)

A hilarious, laddish, sweary trip of a novel with a thumping heart of gold, set on Waiheke. Who knew the island’s media landscape could be this exciting? Mark Goodenough, that’s who, the novel’s unlikely hero, sacked from his job in big-time commercial radio after the most humiliating on-air blunder imaginable.

Mark knows he can make a go of his new job as programme director at Waiheke Radio – until he meets his delinquent band of broadcasters, who have never seen a rule they didn’t want to snort, burn or trash. The station is in big trouble, and it will take a miracle to save it from forces with lofty connections, deep pockets and greed to match.

The author’s musicality and love for radio is one of the joys of the book – he has a lot of fun with his fictional radio station and its motley cast of miscreants. The text sings, pumps and shreds with musical references from great to dire. It is also a pleasure seeing so many local references in print, from the Gulf News to the Waiheke Dirt Track. If you are easily offended, this is definitely not the book for you, although just what is offensive is one of the themes of a yarn which never takes itself too seriously.

I will also always respect a sympathetic, insiders’ view of the media however rough-hewn – but that’s just me.