Editors --- "Bits" [2000] AltLawJl 21; (2000) 25(1) Alternative Law Journal 49

• BITS
• The Dragon Man
• Academics' Paid Outside Work
• Personal Injuries

BITS

The Dragon Man

by Garry Disher; Allen & Unwin 1999; 239 pp; $14.95 softcover.

It's pre-Christmas on the Momington Peninsula, and a long dry summer is looming. A pyromaniac is setting fire to mailboxes while out on the highway a serial killer is cruising. His target is young women (isn't it always?). We know the killer is male because the novel begins with his perspective:

Sometimes it felt as if he were prowling the roof of heaven, riding high through the night, the stars close above him ...

The high literary style lasts until the end of the Prologue and the first victim, and then it's back to earthy prose with Disher's solid protagonist not exactly hot on the trail:

Detective Inspector Hal Challis showered with a bucket at his feet. He kept it economical, but still the bucket over- flowed. Couple more showers and he'd have enough water for a load of washing.

The domestic chores of DIs rarely feature in crime fiction, even when they haven't got a faithful spouse or house­ keeper looking after them, so this makes a nice change. Otherwise Challis is pretty much your standard loner crime-fighter, liked by his colleagues but not considered a career-threat, married to the job but with a blighted past (a wife in jail for attempted murder-his), and an off-beat hobby (restoring an old Dragon Rapide aeroplane­

hence the title).

Disher couldn't write a boring sentence if he tried and he's particularly good on characterisation. This is just as well because there's an exceptionally long list of characters: 15 or more are introduced in the first four chapters and they're all integral to the story. It's a measure of Disher's skill that he man­ ages to individualise them all while keeping a tight rein on the plot.

The story races along at a pace considerably quicker than life in the sleepy Peninsular towns, and there's the continual pleasure of Disher's sharp observations on landscape, characters, and popular culture. There's high interest, too, in following the progress of the local police as they attempt to link disparate leads and cope with various family problems.

Serial killers are always good for upping the narrative tension - who, when, where, why?-but I predict that many readers will, like me, correctly identify the killer very early in the story. For me, this was The Dragon Mans only weakness, but it's a big one.

RUTH STARKE

Ruth Starke is a postgraduate student at Flinders University.

Academics' Paid Outside Work

NSW Auditor-General, February 2000.

The NSW Auditor-General (AG) has released a Performance Audit Report titled 'Academics' Paid Outside Work' (POW). It focuses on situations where academics are engaged in their own private work for outside bodies, and not via university created and controlled arrangements.

The audit arose as a result of a disclosure under the Protected Disclosures Act 1994 about one university, and the AG decided to examine all NSW universities. The Deputy AG concluded:

'The Audit Office is of the opinion that, whilst all universities have developed policies to manage POW and to protect IP rights, many of those policies are out­ dated and require urgent review. Many of them do not adequately protect the universities or provide adequate compensation for the use of their resources or their name. There also seems to be a lack of clarity for accountability to monitor and enforce the policy' (p.3).

Under NSW law, universities are created as bodies corporate. Therefore all those common law obligations on corporate directors and officers fall on university management. My question is: if university resources have been depleted by the failure of university management to carry out its duties, can the universities sue to recover the amounts?

PETER WILMSHURST

Peter Wilmshurst is a NSW lawyer.

Personal Injuries

by Scoff Turow; Penguin, 1999; 403 pp; $24.95 softcover.

Personal Injuries is a lawyer's story about one of his clients who is involved in an intricate web of bribery, lies and extortion. George Mason's client, Robbie Feaver, is about to be indicted for tax evasion and bribing federal judges. Instead, he is offered and accepts a deal with the United States Attorney to expose the corrupt judges.

Feaver is a middle-aged lawyer who has a legal practice with his best friend, specialising in personal injuries cases. Evon Miller is the FBI undercover agent assigned to shadow Robbie to make sure he isn't lying or cheating the government. Robbie and Evon develop a strong relationship that has to survive many challenges inflicted both by the nature of the work and by Robbie's lies and behaviour. For example, Robbie is a flamboyant ladies man who also shows tremendous concern for his sick wife and mother. At the same time agent Miller is more comfortable in her undercover life than her normal one. She feels like an outcast who will never belong to others or herself. Her work with Robbie, and his flamboyance and charm, help her to discover who she is, was and will be. No longer does she need undercover assignments to keep her from her real self.

Personal Injuries makes the reader think, and new challenges emerge in one paragraph after another. Mason's narration of the story leads to many questions in the reader's mind, many of which remain unanswered until the final chapter. Scott Turow has _an extraordinary ability to tell a story and explain the events without giving too much information away. This is certainly not light reading but it is most enjoyable to lose yourself in for hours of your holiday.

BRIANNA REGAN

Brianna Regan is a High School student in Adelaide.

BITS is compiled by Liz Mumford and Francis Regan.