GARRY
McDOUGALL
I'm Another Title
When Bicentennial official Cliff Badger goes missing in an outback town, no-one is interested in finding him. Could be because he’s alienated everyone, because there’s been a death-in-custody that's started a Royal Commission, because the Riot Squad has replaced the local police, because the place is crawling with the media, and the politician’s call for Law and Order cause community division and enmity. Or perhaps, it’s because his ex-wife is keen to see him forgotten. Whatever it is, only mild-mannered koori, Kev, is committed to finding him, but at what cost?
Kev’s first suspects are the fiery Aboriginal leader, Billy, the passionate Mara, and the manipulative counciilor Sheila. All Kev wants is peace and civility, and safety for his wayward son Danny, working for local petty criminal, Paddy Bourke and the Hard Boys. But the Riot Squad is convinced that a black uprising is planned for the Bicentenary, and most see no limits to their powers.
It's a murder mystery, written by Kev's son Danny, stuck in a prison cell. Who's body has been found on Australia Day? Who is the killer? 1988? Why is everyone after Cliff Badger’s Commodore? And why is Danny in prison, wriyting writing this story? And what happens when all trust is destroyed, and when all that’s forgotten is again remembered?
Forgetting and Remembering/ Bicentennial Trust
This opening chapter to Part Four always moves me, despite having written it myself. I have entered other people's world, and the results shocked me.
Bicentennial Trust (or Remember and Forgetting) is fiction, and any resemblance to real people is entirely co-incidental. Still, the 'Breewarinna riots' of 1987, and the 1988 Australian Bicentennial celebrations, are my inspiration, and its comtemporanious background. Although there are necessary similarities to Breewarinna in the novel's unnamed town, its geography, town layout, and facilities are fictional and imaginary.
The fictional Indigenous Cultural Centre has a curious parallel. In the 1980s, I had involvement in an official Bicentennial Project. At one point, I was asked for an idea for an Indigenous Bicentennial Project, quickly suggesting Breewarinna's Aboriginal Fish Traps, a fascination piece of the past. Find out more about them at
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fish_trap
www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uYKg1M6PRk
"Creating the figure of Cliff Badger was most satisfying." said the author. "He is a bully, and yes, this is my chance to reveal him to himself. While other characters change and evolve, Badger is determinedly fixed in his ways and in his self-image. The bully can only survive with his/her self-image is in tact. The moment it is questioned, undermined or destroyed, nothing remains the same.
I'm Another Title