Small Fortune

Some people have commented via social media that I can't be a real lawyer because I never blog about my work*. That supposition is what we lawyers call a non sequitur. Let me demonstrate. Some of my clients also accuse me, when a case is lost, that I'm not a real lawyer. I counter with the correction that incompetence is every bit as real as competence. What they mean is qualified. It is perfectly possible to be incompetent and qualified at the same time. I'm not saying I'm incompetent, not at all, but that quality is all around for us to see. I choose to write about other people's incompetence and not my own, not from a position of superiority, but because we can derive amusement, and even comfort, from the trials of others.

Of course, people will also ask, "Is Robert Fanshaw a real writer?" or, "Is his wife really the finance director of Monsaint Medical Instruments?" Or, as somebody remarked yesterday, "If Caroline didn't realise that gambling is dangerously addictive then she's pretty stupid."

I to leapt to her defence at this criticism. There's a lot you could say about Caroline, but she's no more stupid than you or I. She's very good with numbers and can calculate odds quicker than I can. So stupidity does not explain her sudden fascination with different forms of gambling. She started with a little light roulette, moved onto blackjack, learnt to play high-stakes poker, and then she texted me from the Kranji racecourse, the HQ of the Singapore Turf Club. She gave me a tip she had received from a Chinese acquaintance, a certain Mr Nim, for a guaranteed winner in the last race. Mr Nim was so certain that Caroline placed a small fortune on it.


The horse's name, in case you follow racing, is Oceans Flow. Look out for it. Really, it's a good horse. I hope it wins you some money. If you want to find out how it ran on that fateful evening in Singapore, you can look up the racing results, or wait until June for the full story, when Shameless Corruption storms up the straight of the Amazon ebook charts.

I've been drafting up some 'blurbs' for the publisher. Here's part of one...

Caroline’s marriage is already in trouble when she infiltrates a gambling syndicate that is planning to fix the result of the World Cup. Introduced to the suave Mr Nim, she learns to gamble with the high rollers, but when beginner's luck runs out, loses far more than just her money...

*The reason I don't write about commercial law is that if it bores me, it would bore you even more.