Guns 'n' Rose

 

 

 

Robert G. Barrett was raised in Bondi where he has worked mainly as a butcher. After thirty years he moved to Terrigal on the Central Coast of New South Wales. Robert has appeared in a number of films and TV commercials but prefers to concentrate on a career as a writer.

Also by Robert G. Barrett in Pan

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EVLIN AND THE
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ITTLE
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OMETHING
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This is a work of fiction and all characters in this book are a creation of the author's imagination.

First published 1996 in Pan by Pan Macmillan
Australia Pty Limited
1 Market Street, Sydney

Reprinted 1997, 2002, 2005, 2008

Copyright © Psycho Possum Productions 1996

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, scanning or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

National Library of Australia cataloguing-in-publication data:

Barrett, Robert G.

Guns 'n' rose.

ISBN 9780330358514

I. Title.

A823.3

Typeset in ll/13.5pt Times by Post Typesetters, Brisbane Printed in Australia by McPherson's Printing Group

This book is dedicated to the Australian Olympic rowing team at Atlanta 1996. The eights. Psycho Possum Productions had the pleasure of helping to sponsor them. They didn't win gold, but we're more than proud of them. And we'd do it again anytime
.

 

Firstly, I have to thank everyone for buying the books and making them the success they are. You've been more than kind. And the possum lady thanks you for buying the T-shirts too; she can now afford to feed her two kids and she's bought herself some teeth as well. Also, thanks for all the letters. I'm getting heaps of them and they're all great; some are even better than others. I'm doing my best to answer all of them, but at the moment I've been flat out, so if a reply is a bit late in coming, I'm sorry, but you should get one eventually.

Secondly, people are always asking what's going on with Les Norton on the screen. Well, I've done it. I have finally sold my soul to the devil. The devil in this case being a company in Sydney called Radio Superhighway owned by a person called John Singleton. Radio Super-highway has bought the rights off me to make a Les Norton TV series. When I say ‘bought', obtained a hire-purchase would be a better description. I don't get a zac until when, and if, the series goes to air. So don't stop buying the books and T-shirts in the meantime. I have to eat and the possum lady has to feed her kids and she still needs more teeth. I also have to stress that, along with selling my soul to the devil, I also had to sell him a thing called creative control, which means they can virtually do what they like with my books. So if you turn on the TV and Carlotta comes
out playing Les Norton and Joh Bjelke-Petersen shows up playing Price Galese: don't blame me. However, I'm sure John Singleton and Radio Superhighway want this to be a success just as much as I and my readers do, so I don't think they'll murder it too much. Anyway, they've only obtained the TV rights from me. I can still make a Les Norton movie — which I will do one day and I can assure you it will be done properly. So that's what's going on.

Finally, the possum lady said that along with the
TEAM NORTON
caps in either black or green with gold lettering, there's another two T-shirts available —
GUNS 'N' ROSE AND DAVO'S LITTLE SOMETHING
. Still only $32 for a T-shirt and $28 for a cap. Just send a cheque, along with your size (M, L, XL), choice of T-shirt or cap and address it to Psycho Possum Productions, PO Box 3348, Tamarama, Sydney NSW, 2026. The possum lady also said if people come up and ask you where you got your T-shirt or cap, don't tell them. Talk to them if you want to, but don't tell them anything. Okay? As for me, I'll see you in the next book. Thanks again.

 

Robert G. Barrett Terrigal, 1996

 

 

 

Despite all his ill-gotten gains and everything he had going for him, Les Norton was by no means the happiest man in the world at the moment. By no means. Certainly he wasn't short of a dollar and he owned his house at Bondi with stuff planted all over the place that he could sell if he wanted to and he had a fairly steady job amongst friends that paid him a substantial income for what little work he did a few nights a week, not counting the fringe benefits. Not a bad start in life. Yet on the other hand, Les couldn't seem to take a trick and sometimes wondered just where life was leading him.

After the Bondi Baths caper, Norton split from Side Valve Susie's unit, and so did Susie; along with the good-looking lawyer who handled all the business in Melbourne. Which effectively ended any ideas he had for a bit of steady porking with an old friend he fancied just round the corner. Goodbye, Les, and thanks for your help. And since then Norton's love life had been more or less batting zero. Around this time he loaned a bloke he knew and trusted a thousand dollars. The bloke was all right, except he had a heart attack and
died at forty-one; and in the surf at Coogee of all places. So he got buried along with Norton's thousand bucks. Then Les' car was stolen. The old, white Ford ute he never washed. Some young hoons nicked it up the Cross one night and used it in a ram-raid on an appliance store in Kensington, getting away all right and leaving what was left of Norton's old ute down a back alley in Alexandria.