Reading Anne Maria Nicholson’s third novel Poker Protocol, I couldn’t get Lady Gaga’s best-selling single of 2009 “Poker Face” out of my head. I hadn’t thought of that song for a long time. Despite the 12-year gap between it and Nicholson’s book, the two were entwined for me.
Regardless of whether you’re a poker player (and I am not, and never will be) we all know what it means to have a poker face. In Nicholson’s book all the characters work hard to keep their poker faces glued on and not just at the poker table.
The book is set slap bang in the heart of Manly. It feels so familiar that I was guessing which café Leo was patronising and which medical centre Kristen worked in. I could see tax lawyer Max appearing in Manly Court for a refugee but struggled to imagine a corporate tax lawyer having a clue about what to actually say or do in that, or any, Court situation. Then there’s Greg, Kristen’s husband, who I struggled to see what kind Kristen saw in him. Tully is the former front line news reporter who is a complex character with plenty of issues and the elusive but likeable Eugenie is a maths genius.
The thing that connects these disparate characters is their love of playing their monthly poker game. The heart of Poker Protocol is Kristen. She’s got a big heart, a soul, a conscious and an unending ability to care for others.
The book has all the elements of a Shakespearian play or Puccini opera. There’s love, lust, hate, betrayal, greed, envy, hardship, deaths, regrets, gender fluidity and some very deep superficiality.
Nicholson’s strength is how she makes you care about these people. In the first 50 pages or so I was utterly disinterested in them. Using a perfectly paced slow reveal Nicholson keeps you questioning your initial views about this cast of characters and then keeps you guessing about what might happen and what you’d like to happen. It’s not just a story about the main five characters and the choices they make. It’s a comment on contemporary Australian life and the choices we make, or don’t even know we’re making.
Anne Maria Nicholson knows how to write. You’d expect no less from someone who was a journalist and current affairs journalist and presenter for 20 years with the ABC. Among the many pleasures in reading Poker Protocol is how it interweaves current affairs into the story; dealing with post-COVID-19 life, catastrophes in New Zealand, the ongoing nightmare of Australia’s treatment of refugees and an obsession with the price of real estate.
It’s this blend of current affairs, life in Manly, the big and small dramas of five people who would probably never have got to know each other were it not for poker and Nicholson’s skill at making you feel you’re the sixth person at the poker table that makes this book an absolute winner.
So, why is Gaga’s Poker Face swilling around in my head? It’s a catchy tune that’s hard to get out of your head once it’s implanted and it’s all about bluffing, no one can read my poker face, my p-p-p-p-poker face!
The best thing about Poker Protocol is that by the end of it those poker faces are gone.