The Joining of Dingo Radish

Matt Hartman is a freelance editor and cataloguer, running Hartman Cataloguing, Editing and Indexing Services.

When his mother and father are killed at a railroad crossing outside the
fictional town of Bennington Falls, Saskatchewan, the formidable task of
caring for Pitch (his mentally challenged brother) and Marty (his newly
pregnant sister) falls to Dingo Radish (named Dingonaslav Marion
Radashonovich by his dysfunctional parents). The 31-year-old Dingo,
lacking other resources, decides to turn to thievery as a way to raise
enough money to allow the family to escape the town he has come to
despise. After several small thefts from agricultural supply shops in
the area, Dingo decides to pull one last job—stealing a cargo load of
Guardian, an expensive pesticide with the ability to change its makeup
to destroy any weed with which it comes into contact. “What made it so
popular among western producers,” Harasymchuk writes, “was its
adaptability. Weather wasn’t a factor in how the stuff worked … It
could be sprayed on vegetables, cereal grains, pulse crops and even
fruit trees.”

Guardian’s manufacturer is Steigman Biotechnologies, a collection of
fortress-like buildings outside Saskatoon. Dingo’s plan to hijack a
tractor-trailer full of Guardian from the plant is blindsided by a group
of radical bioethicists who choose the same night to blow up the whole
factory, fearing the destructive powers of the chemical. From that point
on, the novel careens across the dusty landscape of Saskatchewan, as
Dingo and his accomplices (Emily, the pretty leader of the bioethicists,
Dr. Ryerson, one of Guardian’s inventors, and Marty) try to rescue
Pitch, held captive by the Steigman gang, and avoid some gruesome
consequences.

Harasymchuk clearly delights in creating scenes of mayhem and
destruction, yet he maintains the ability to keep his odd characters in
line and true to themselves. We’ll see more from this promising
writer.