The Dogs of Avarice

Available now at https://rb.gy/ei4kk

This is a fast-paced crime caper that takes place across Scotland, Morecambe Bay and the seductive Calabria in Italy.

It is a tale of a failed witness protection scheme, theft, money laundering, people smuggling and the supply of drugs. A story where everybody is scared of the past, and craves the future.

But to fully understand this book it is probably a good starting place to understand what avarice is. The best way to do this is through two of the characters – Padre Conte and Christina de Luca.

‘There is an old Italian fable called Chi troppo voule nulla stringem (those who want too much end up with nothing). In the story, a dog is enjoying a bone at the side of the river. Whilst chewing the bone, he looks down at the water’s surface. He mistakes his reflection for another dog chewing what seems like a bigger bone. Eager to get a bigger bone, the dog opens his mouth, dropping his own bone and leaving him with nothing.’-Padre Conti.

 ‘You know that in Christian thinking, greed is said to be the one cardinal sin that God really hates. It plunges man into a mire; wealth becomes more important than God himself.’

‘I think it just becomes important in your life; you start to chase it, perhaps like a drug.’ -says Christi

‘You see, money talks, and when it does, every other voice is hushed.’ ‘I also think that it was greed that killed my brother.’- Says Christi

 ‘On that one, I think you are wrong. It wasn’t greed that killed him; it was avarice, which is even more dangerous.’ -says Padre Conti

‘What’s the difference?’-says Christi

 ‘In Italian, it is avarizia, historically the pre-eminent word for greed, but it has fallen out of favour these days. It is the extreme end of greed, probably the most sinful of all. It’s when a sense of entitlement collides with the need to be wealthy. Slowly, inch by inch, it permeates your world, destroys your perspective in the pursuit of your lifestyle. If you add narcissism into the mix, you enter despot territory. Perhaps the word avarice should make a reappearance, given the modern world that we live in.’

Greed is an emotion: Avarice is a behaviour.