Book Review: Mister Roberts by Alexei Sayle

Anyone who knows the British comedian and author of this book, Alexei Sayle, will know that he has a reputation for the bizarre and here he provides a short novel with one of the most unusual stories that readers are likely to come across. Set in an expat community in Spain a boy with an irresponsible mother discovers an incredible machine which originates from another planet that gives him the ability to masquerade as a powerful, but mute, adult: Mister Roberts.

This is a short novel with a simple plot but one which is so boldly preposterous that it is instantly fascinating and makes the reader turn the page in a desire to know where this unusual premise can be leading. The story is also punctuated with amusing asides and similes, but gradually it reveals a more serious underlying message about how to behave responsibly when in possession of power.

Book Review: Mr Dixon Disappears by Ian Sansom

In Mr Dixon Disappears author Ian Sansom gives his second outing to his character, Israel Armstrong; mobile librarian to a small Irish town and, once again, a reluctant and incapable detective. Having settled successfully the previous Case of the Missing Books and been reluctantly  accepted as part of the scenery in his adopted home in County Antrim, Israel embarks on a new project, a display of the history of the town's oldest store, only to find himself as the chief suspect in the disappearance of Mr Dixon, the owner of the store.

This light-hearted story begins with an interesting and entertaining premise, with a style that is easy to read and relaxing, introducing many of the characters from the previous installment. However, after a promising start the author seems to have gone into auto-pilot and most of the characters in this tale end up having no purpose other than as a nod to fans of the previous story, almost as if they were a catch-phrase to be acknowledged in a mid 1980s sitcom.

Book Review: Slam by Nick Hornby

"Slam" is an amusing insight into the life of a teenager who is cruising through life, happy with his lot, until a small mistake changes his life forever. Nick Hornby is well-known for his books in which he writes about the feelings and emotions of the characters dealing with the type of situations that effect every day people and in Slam he does an incredible job of writing in the narrative of a teenager obsessed with skate-boarding.

This story is about how the main character, Sam, has to deal with the consequences of his actions as he is dealt with the problems of a man while still a teenager - the increasingly familiar issue of teenage pregnancy. What is interesting in this book is how Sam's perception of living with the consequences of his actions contrast with an alternative version of what could happen and how Sam, in the absence of a father figure, turns for life advice to the unlikely guru-like figure of the skater Tony Hawk.

Book Review: Whatever Loves Means by David Baddiel

Author, David Baddiel, sets his novel, "Whatever Love Means", during the hysteria surrounding the death of Princess Diana, in 1997, where a difference of opinion on how this historical event affects people's everyday lives drives the initial wedge between a married couple that begins a process in which, ultimately, several close relationships are utterly destroyed.

Played out to the backdrop of a national event in which many people try their best to turn into their own personal tragedy, a real rupture occurs in the life of Joe and his family as his wife dies in mysterious circumstances leaving him with their small child to look after. Not prepared to accept the official account of the circumstances of his wife's death Joe delves further into the tragedy only to find that he has been terribly let down by all of those who were closest to him.

Book Review: The World According to Bertie by Alexander McCall Smith

The "44 Scotland Street" novels are one of the series of books that Alexander McCall Smith is known for and this is the fourth installment. Set in Edinburgh the reader follows a snapshot of the lives of the inhabitants of Scotland Street, with the young Bertie as a central character, a boy who is unfortunate enough to have an over-protective and over-ambitious mother pushing him into music classes and yoga lessons when all he wants to do is be a normal little boy.

The strength of this book lies in the characters. Seldom have I read a book with so many interesting and unusual characters that quickly make the reader want to know more about them and find out where their story is going to end up; the art dealer and his new girlfriend the teacher, the Jacobites, the woman whose father "buys" her a husband and little Bertie himself. Unfortunately, this leads to the major weakness of this book; the reader never gets very deep into any of the characters lives, they are spread rather thinly through the book and not one of them has their narrative concluded. In other words there is no plot at all.

Book Review: You're A Bad Man Mr Gum by Andy Stanton

You're a Bad Man Mr Gum is the first outing for Andy Stanton's disgusting character that children will love to hate. Mr Gum is a filthy loner who picks his nose and lives in a horrible house - loathed and feared by children. In this story Mr Gum is forced to keep his garden spotless by a fairy and the plot revolves around his poisoning of a lovely dog, Jake, to prevent him from spoiling his garden. However, Polly comes to the rescue with some magic chocolate and some wonderful friends.

Young children who are discovering their reading skills will enjoy this book as it is full of baddies and goodies that they will get totally involved with. Some parents may deem this book too disgusting for young children, but in reality this is just the sort of naughty fun that kids love and parents should revel at being able to join in when reading this book with their youngsters.

Book Review: The Seven Gifts by John Mellor

The Seven Gifts, by John Mellor, is small volume that contains a set of seven delightfully bizarre, short allegorical tales linked together by the story of a boy who is in the process of being tutored by an angel for the purpose of delivering seven gifts that have been bestowed upon earth.

This highly unusual book delivers seven thought-provoking stories, laced with a large collection of some of the most strange and memorable characters that have ever appeared together in a book. Each tale can be read and enjoyed in isolation from the others, however, the linking narrative of the boy and angel make this far more than just a collection of short stories and provides a clearer picture as to the meaning of each tale. So original and full of potential are these stories that readers are sure to examine, at least some of them, several times even though they are easy to read.

Book Review: Mercury Falls by Robert Kroese

Mercury Falls, by Rob Kroese, is a comic novel about the approach of the Apocalypse and how preparations for it by the managements of heaven and hell become compromised by over-complicated bureaucracy and underhand deals.

This amusing story tells how a reporter, an indolent angel and a nerd end up having pivotal roles in the approaching Apocalypse, a world-ending deal that has been forged by heaven and hell after many thousands of years of legal wrangling. The writing here is extremely imaginative, with angels and demons resembling employees of large corporations and heaven and hell appearing like competing companies. Whilst the author creates humour from turning the divine into the banal and poking fun alternately at creationism and modern science, at times the humour is rather esoteric and this may prevent this novel from appealing to a wide range of readers.

Book Review: French Revolutions by Tim Moore

French Revolutions is the true and humorous tale of Tim Moore's attempt to cycle around France following the route of the 2000 Tour De France. Whilst this attempt is largely successful, the author does resort to cheating on a number of occasions, something he justifies by outlining the history (tradition?) of cheating in the real Tour. This interesting take on the race is interspersed with a wide variety of factual anecdotes about the Tour De France which gives the book another dimension and making it more than just a jokey travelogue.

This is a well-written and interesting story which takes the reader through the French countryside and the superhuman effort it takes to complete the Tour even at a slow pace, imparting something of the author's emotional journey as he becomes a more accomplished cyclist.

Book Review: The Case of The Missing Books by Ian Sansom

The Case of the Missing Library Books is the first in Ian Sansom's series of comedic novels featuring the librarian Israel Armstrong who, in this first outing, becomes an unlikely detective. Israel arrives, from London, in small and obscure Irish town where outsiders are made to feel less than welcome. He quickly finds that he has been downgraded to mobile librarian and that he must locate all 14000 missing books.

This is an interesting yarn which draws heavily on Israel's discomfort and inability to fit in with the locals for sources of humour but there is a lot of situational amusement to be derived from this book too. Cultural stereotypes are used a lot in this story but they are not over-relied upon and largely occur because of Israel's lack of social skills and preconceived ideas.

Book Review: The Guv'nor by Lenny Mclean & Peter Gerrard

The Guv'nor is the nickname and biography of Lenny McLean and this book catalogues his violent progress in the east end of London from abused child to petty thief, hard man, minder, bare-knuckle boxer to bit-part actor; a truly astonishing and, at times, disturbing tale.

Although this is a biography it has the feel of an autobiography due to its first person narrative and use of colloquial English, giving it a really authentic feel and making it as if The Guv'nor is telling his story directly to the reader and makes for unusual and interesting reading. Indeed the litany of misdeeds and violence which are described in Lenny McLean's life would sound ridiculous if told in any other way and are only believable when hearing it from a first person perspective. This is the story of one of London's old-fashioned monsters but told in a way that reveals the good qualities of his character.

Book Review: Birdwatchingwatching by Alex Horne

Birdwatchingwatching documents the year-long foray into birdwatching by Alex Horne, an investigation into a hobby that his father has long had and that Alex has never understood. In an attempt to understand his father's passion Alex challenges him to a "Big Year", a year in which the person who sees the most species is declared the winner with the level of competition bringing father and son closer together.

Over the course of a year Alex's growing enthusiasm for birds is obvious and the way in which he delves into all the mysterious aspects of birdwatching is very amusing indeed. The style of this book is one of a naive newby to the hobby of birdwatching, almost birdwatching through the eyes of a child, making great reading for anyone who loves birds, from those with just a casual interest to the hard core "twitcher".

Book Review: My Booky Wook by Russell Brand

My Booky Wook is Russell Brand's autobiography, although, as with all autobiographies by young people, it is only the story so far and readers can expect further editions from this outrageous characters. Written in Brand's characteristic Dickensian style of speech, this book focuses heavily on his teenage years and early twenties; times of personal self-destruction through drug use and "sex-addiction".

In My Booky Wook the author relies largely upon the telling of quite outrageously bawdy anecdotes, outlining Russell Brand's litany of careless and thoughtless escapades as he pursued a course of self-destruction. If these anecdotes were not told in such a bizarre and self-deprecating style they would be offensive, indeed to many they will remain so, but I found many of them made me laugh out loud although at least some of them were quite shocking.

Book Review: Iznogoud; The Caliph's Vacation by Goscinny & Tabary

Iznogoud; The Caliph's Vacation is a collection of short, animated stories which follow the attempts of the evil Grand Vizier, Iznogoud, to depose the Caliph of Baghdad by taking him on a series of ridiculous and potentially fatal vacations and days out, all of which fail hopelessly.

The stories and dialogue are written by Goscinny, who is most famous for the Asterix series, and the illustrations are excellent, provided by Tabary. Each of the stories revolves around the evil Grand Vizier trying to kill the Caliph in various, typically comic-strip style, vacation strategies each of which goes totally wrong and end up leaving Iznogoud in various states of disarray including being turned into a louse, turned into a shell and stranded in a desert.

Book Review: Salmon Fishing in the Yemen by Paul Torday

Salmon fishing in the Yemen, by Paul Torday, is an original story of the attempt to introduce fly fishing for salmon into the wadis of southern Yemen, which has catastrophic consequences. This story revolves around a British fisheries scientist and his efforts to find a way of succeeding with the visionary project of a Yemeni Sheikh, and also on how members of the British government hijack the scheme for a vote-winning photo opportunity.

This book is written in a very unusual style, being a collection of documents; diaries, police reports, memoirs, letters and e-mails which at first feel rather awkward, but as the book progresses, the reader becomes comfortable with what is a rather original style which makes a fairly average book into something that stands out from others. This construction of the novel means that many of the documents are very personal to the characters, and this means that the characters become quite developed, although the ending perhaps leaves one wanting a little more from some of the main protagonists.

Book Review: Overtaken by Alexei Sayle

Overtaken, by Alexei Sayle, is a tale of the events that happen to Kelvin immediately before, during and after a road accident that kills his entire group of friends. Fighting with emptiness and depression he decides to create a "memorial" to them in the most unusual fashion - a story that contains a strange twist at the end which although it was not completely unexpected, was only anticipated, by this reader, in the final few pages preceding the ending.

With a few moments of humour, this is not the comedy novel one might expect from an author who is a well-known comedian but instead an unusually calculating story of revenge which does not work out quite in the way the reader or the main character expects or hopes for, and a few things about Kelvin's personality and ways of thinking are fairly thought-provoking.

Book Review: Borat - Touristic Guidings to Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan by Sacha Baron Cohen

This is in fact two books in one, with the second part being entitled: Touristic Guidings to Minor Nation of U.S and A. Both are spoof travel guides, by British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, introduced by the comedy character, Kazakhstani reporter Borat Sagdiyev. For those that know this character the book holds few surprises, playing on the cultural preconceptions of westerners towards Eastern Europe and the perceived cultural naivete of Borat.

Those who are fans of Borat will find a lot of amusement in this book which contains visual and verbal humour, although they may be disappointed to find a number of jokes being recycled. However, those who are easily offended by racial, religious or sexual jokes will despise this publication; one thing that most will probably agree upon is that in this book Baron Cohen has taken this character just about as far as he can.

Book Review: The Book of Dave by Will Self

The book of Dave is based around the premise that the written ramblings of a London taxi driver have been misinterpreted by a future, antediluvian English society, creating a culture of racism, sexism and of split families. This parody of religious beliefs interested me immensely but I found upon reading it, that this novel did not live up to my expectations.

Written with two parallel storylines, following both the London cabbie (Dave) and the future society, I found that it took a very long time for them to come anywhere near together. Perhaps this writer was too clever for me but I found that having to wait until very close to the end to understand every triviality was annoying.

Much of the storyline following the characters in the future (characters that I found indistinuishable from one another) is written in an irritating dialect which is in fact a form of cockney written phonetically and this just smacked of unoriginality - just a copy of Anthony Burgess's jargon in "A Clockwork Orange" although it was much easier to understand than that.

The Book of Dave is not all bad though, at its best it satirises the blind faith of religious groups and the breakdown of the family unit in many parts of the UK, but for me it took too long to make any of these points.

This book is certainly not for a mass audience and the more subversive reader will appreciate it more than others, although I feel it fails to live up to its full potential.

Score: 6/10

Book Review: Saving Fish From Drowning by Amy Tan

A novel based upon a story received from the spirits by a medium is an unusual book indeed, but Amy Tan has done an excellent job in turning this into an enjoyable, amusing and thought-provoking story. In Saving Fish From Drowning the reader follows a group of 12 American tourists on their cultural tour of China and Burma, a tour which is doomed to disaster before it has even begun.

The story is narrated by the group's recently deceased tour organiser, who watches over the tour as a spirit and along the way makes amusing observations, gossipy asides and irritated remarks about her friends' constant ability to say the wrong thing, make impetuous decisions and generally approach the foreign cultures they encounter with an ignorant and patronising attitude.

What makes this book so enjoyable is that there are so many aspects to it - the author herself describes her work as a mixture of genres: murder mystery, romance, picaresque, comic novel, magical realsim, fable, myth, police detective and political farce. It is perhaps the ironic, comic and farcical aspects of the book that I most enjoyed and the way that the media and the Burmmese government react to and manipulate events was particularly amusing.

Some may say that this book takes a simplistic and ill-informed view of Asian cultures, but that would be missing the point that this was the effect the author was attempting to create. However, one criticism that I would make is that there are too many characters, some of which were quite indistinguishable from each other - on the other hand some of the characters were very enjoyable and with a little more time devoted to them, they could have been even more memorable.

This is an enjoyable, amusing and engrossing story which satirises tourism, cultural expectations and the regime in Burma - an easy and frivolous read. Those expecting deep insight into the situation in Burma will be highly disappointed but those looking for a well-written novel with an interesting story will be delighted.

Score: 8.5/10

Book Review: Five Hundred Mile Walkies

Five Hundred Mile Walkies is the true and highly humourous Tale of a man and a borrowed dog walking the south west peninsula path through Devon and Cornwall in order to impress a girl that the author met at a party. Such a mundane premise may sound like it has little to offer, but Wallington has a real knack of finding the farcical side of every situation and developing it into an hilarious aside. Added to that, the author combines a rather literary style with the common touch and the result is a very readable story but not one that is dumbed down.

Wallington himself compares his tale to that of Jerome K. Jerome in "Three men and a Boat", and his style is highly reminiscent of this famous book. More importantly, it compares very favourably to "Three Men and a Boat", but, similarly to that and many other humourous books, much of the fun and laughter occurs in the early part of the tale and towards the end it appears as if the author gets rather tired of writing.

The addition of the dog, Boogie, is one that may divide readers, however. Boogie's flatulence provides a running joke throughout the book and for some this may be a constant source of amusement, although for others such a cheap and repetative joke becomes a little stale.

These downfalls aside Five Hundred Mile Walkies is a very funny book and for some reason I was particularly amused by the excursion through Westward Ho! - the only place in Britain that has an exclaimation mark in its name.

I recommend this story to lovers of humour and travel literature, and it serves well as a light read between more challenging material whilst maintaining a semi-literary style.

Score: 8.5/10