OR
or: Monsieur Perroquet's descent from a high perch
ISBN: 979-8337669526
ENTER RICHARD CRAVEN’S BRISTOL ONCE MORE – A DARKLY COMIC URBAN MAZE WHERE WILDLY ABSURD MISADVENTURES COLLIDE WITH SHARP WIT, UNEXPECTED REVERSALS, AND A SPLASH OF THE MACABRE.
In this second volume of Richard Craven’s Bristolian Chronicles, meet dissipated parrot architect Hawksmoor Perroquet as he arrives in Bristol and promptly succumbs to a ketamine frenzy at the Anarchist Bookfair, during which he sells his wife, brainless budgerigar Arabella Melopsittica, and their egg to a passing ornithologist. Prompted by his remorse to eschew equine tranquilizers, in his newfound sobriety he commences his ascent of the greasy pole of human endeavour. His progress towards the dizzy heights of the Bristol Mayoralty is aided by the machinations of depressive provincial merchant banker Sir Hearty Luncheon, but then his wife and presumed daughter rematerialise, precipitating his usurpation by genial Scottish crow Ian Corby, and a headlong descent into drugs and disgrace.
Equally recalling the grandiosity of Greek tragedy and the squalor of low burlesque satire, Pretty Poli ploughs the Bristolian grand guignol furrow sown by the similarly lewd but literary Amoeba Dick.
| Object Name | Brief Description |
|---|---|
| A passing ornithologist | Proprietor of an institute of institute of mysterious provenance with tentacles in many countries |
| Alderman Oldphart | Emeritus council dignitary |
| Arabella Melopsittica | Scatter-brained budgerigar |
| Bar Wanque | Bar on Stokes Croft |
| Beggarswell Close | Lady Snatch's place of business. |
| Black Racist Centre | Arts & cultural centre |
| Boutique hotel | Rectory conversion by Mr Hawksmoor Perroquet |
| Bridewell sty | Central Police Station |
| Bristol Coroner’s Court | Flax Bourton |
| Caius & Tiberius Craquus | Pharmaceutical retailers |
| City Hall | The seat of government of Bristol City Council |
| Club Autonomie | Anarchist club & community centre |
| Constable Wifebeating-Cokehead | Policeman |
| Crapstore | Odds & Ends craft shop on the edge of St Werbuggers and Montypee |
| Crass Cheseham | Proprietor of the Fascist Dictatorship of Stokes Croft |
| Dogging Woods | Confirmed bachelors, poor throwers, and friends of Dorothy disport here |
| Don Quicksotte | CEO of Idiot Left Energy |
| Dr Mark Wankstain | Bristol Council's Poncemaker-in-Chief |
| Fascist Dictatorship of Stokes Croft | Some kind of arts & cultural centre, it is believed |
| Francis MacMahon’s lock-up | Lock-up at the top of Snandrews Road |
| Fruit & Nut Flake | Montpelier pub |
| Gilles de Pantalon Rouge | Manager of Quads & Pex Down Like Fuckin' Easton |
| Handjob Luncheon | Provincial merchant bank |
| Hawksmoor Perroquet | Ketamine-addicted parrot, architect, politician. |
| Hieronymous | Juggler, toper |
| Ian Corby | Crow, or possibly raven. Scottish, very personable. |
| Ianeass the Gimp | Sacred chess loon |
| Idiotic Left Energy | Don Quicksotte's ill-conceived green enterprise, peddling unsellable windmills to Sir Hearty Luncheon and the city's bemused financiers. |
| Infirmary Nurse | Purveyor of soup and ketamine to trotskers & hanarchits |
| Little Mogadishu | Area in St Pauls colonised by the Somali community |
| Lord Handjob | Dissipated provincial merchant banker |
| Lord Snatch | Trust-funded squattocrat |
| Magistrates Court | Magistrates Court |
| Medusa the gorgon | Dreadlocked, petrifyingly ugly proprietress of Club Autonomie |
| Messrs Justices Shallow & Silent | Magistrates & Aldermen |
| Minerva Ledwitch | Edwardian-seeming proponent of organo-fascism |
| Miss Isolde Acridotheres | Hybrid budgerigar/mynah |
| Montypee | A designated yobbery, the haunt of drug-addled failsons of Clifton's people who attend all the right fish suppers. |
| Mr Francis MacMahon | Drug dealer, pimp |
| Mr Jagtar Singh | Chauffeur to Sir Hearty Luncheon |
| Mr Vagus | Bankrupt who died in his workshop in the shadow of Horfield Gaol |
| Ms. Gamina Dročerpyatova | Executive assistant to Dr Mark Wankstain, prostituted by Mr Roger Buggery |
| Penistone House | Proposed location for an arts centre & colonic irrigation cafe |
| Perky Pets | Veterinary surgery |
| Siddhartha Yoga | Yoga studio |
| Sir Ezra Tertiary-Syphilis | Insolvency and corporate taxation practitioner |
| Sir Hearty Luncheon | Depressive provincial merchant banker |
| Slickrobbers | Retailers and fitters of car tires |
| Snandrews | Respectable suburb adjoining Montpelier |
| Snandrews Road | Montpelier road, linking the Old Disgrace with Francis MacMahon's lock-up |
| Solomon | Pub philosopher, i.e. toper |
| Squattocrat Towers | Home of Lord & Lady Snatch and their tiger St Just |
| St Just | Lord Snatch's gofer |
| St Werbuggers | Suburb in East-Central Bristol |
| Stokes Croft | A festering sink of anarchist utopianism, where reality bends under the weight of unwashed idealists and performance art. |
| Superintendent “Gloucester” Oldspot | Police chief |
| The Bearpit | Sunken pleasure gardens within a roundabout |
| The BRI | Hospital |
| The Craquepipe & Slappers | Pub in Cheltenham Road |
| The Ghastly Hipster Opposite Turbo Island | Hipster Bar in Stokes Croft |
| The Katze und Rad | Pub in Cheltenham Road |
| The Masonic Gite | Pub in Old Market |
| The Mayoral Residence | Southville warehouse conversion |
| The Mynah Arms | Pub in St Werbuggers |
| The Old Council House | Bristol Register Office |
| The Old Disgrace | Pub at the bottom of Snandrews Road |
| The Shouty Cunt | Pub, formerly a coaching in called The Berkeley Poker |
| The Spitting Chav | Pub in Patchway |
| Turbo Island |