SOJALS rating:

Good (3/5)

I first read this on the 3rd April 2002.

In a company's research labs somewhere in America, two scientists are working, under quite adverse conditions, to further human knowledge.

Sandra Foster is studying fads. She's trying to find out how they start and how they can spread spread so quickly through a population.

Bennett O'Reilly is researching information diffusion in social groups.

However Bennett's research position is threatened, Sandra, in a flash of infatuated inspiration, suggests combining their research and furthermore recommends using a flock of sheep as a substitute for Bennett's more conventional, but currently unobtainable, macaques.

Their research combines as a search for the bellweather of the flock, the sheep that by default, unwittingly and almost invisibly, leads the others.

Simmering away in the background are sensitivity exercises, Gina's astonishingly convincing management potential and Management's clear vision of the business improvement achievable by the introduction of increasingly obscure procedures and am increasing volume of paperwork.

A hilarious and delightful novel with superb writing and such excellent characters - the chaotic and appalling Flip, Bennett and his atrocious dress sense. Bittany's birthday party and Sandra herself with her scientific brilliance buffeted and buoyed by her whatever's currently happening n her personal life.