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[[Category:New Reviews|Humour]]==Humour==__NOTOC__ {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Charles LambDean Koontz|title=Great Food: A Dissertation Upon Roast Pig and Other EssaysThe Bad Weather Friend|rating=4.5|genre=CookeryParanormal|summary=''A Dissertation Upon Roast Pig'' Benny is having a collection of food-related essays from the early 19th centuryterrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, with a humorous bentand his house gets trashed. They're but Oh, and someone has delivered a few pages each really weird, disturbing coffin- a light read sized object to bring a smile to your facehis home, then on to the next little foodie treat.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241951003</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=ClientsFromHell.net|title=Clients From Hell|rating=4|genre=Humour|summary=Everyone whoand it's worked as a freelancer has a story of a client from hell - that person who asked for something possible that whoever or whatever was impossible, wanted it done yesterday for a fraction of inside is the usual pricething that has trashed his house! The thing is, or Benny is just plain angry about the work producedvery last person to deserve all this bad luck. The website [http://www.clientsfromhell.net ClientsFromHell.net] has collated a number of such stories over the years, and has now published them as a book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0982473931</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Manu Joseph|title=Serious Men|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=Ayyan Mani He is a Dalit, an untouchable, stuck in a flat in Mumbai's slums but hoping, somehow, for a better future for his sonnice person. Working at the Insitute of Theory and Research he uses all his cunning and wiles to stay ahead of the game amongst the Brahmin scientistsA really nice person. Does he have So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the intelligence, and nerves, delivery to convince everyone that his son, against all odds, house is a genius?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848543085</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=John Saunders|title=The Vernham Chronicles|rating=4|genre=Humour|summary=Set amidst the rolling British countryside around Vernbury Vale is the little village of Vernham. Anyone who lives in new friend, a village will recognise it immediatelybad weather friend called Spike, with its cobbled streets and Tudor buildings. There was some damage during the war (which might, or might not have who has been down sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a lighthouse folly constructed by a local landowner on his lake) but the gaps have been filled with some beautiful, er, mock Tudor buildingsgood person. Almost unique and nearly beautiful as the village Spike isgoing to take care of Benny, it's not the star of The Vernham Chronicles. The stars are the people who live in Vernham.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907499598</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Martin Millar|title=The Good Fairies and will certainly take care of New York|rating=4|genre=Fantasy|summary=In this fairytale of New York, the Cornish fairy KingBenny's children are living in exileenemies, hiding in Central Park from a nasty industrial revolution back home. They have friends from Ireland with themif he, and all have the ability to startle the local squirrels. Elsewhere two innocent scallywag fairies fleeing Scotland have arrivedBenny, and adopted Harper (a human each. Heather has joined up with Dinnie, the citywaitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's worst busker, a fat, alcoholic and lonely fan of TV ads for phone sex, while Morag befriends Kerry, a dying kleptomaniac beauty, just as alone for different reasonswild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0749954205</amazonuk>1662500491

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Gervase Phinn1529153050|title=Twinkle, Twinkle, Little StarsBritain's Best Political Cartoons 2022|author=Tim Benson

|summary=Seeking some light relief from the current political turmoil which is coming to seem more and more like an adrenaline sport, I spent many of my teenage years reading James Herriotwas nudged towards ''Britain's books, and I found that this collection Best Political Cartoons of anecdotes and poems by Gervase Phinn had a real flavour of Herriot about it2022''. Perhaps it was just the setting, for Phinn was a school inspector in the Dales for many years, but I think he also has Sharp eyes will have noted that knack of capturing a situation, and a character, and bringing out we're not yet through the humour without making year: the person appear ridiculouscartoons run from 4 September 2021 to 31 August 2022. Here he collates stories from his other books, some Christmassy and others not, and he relates them with several of his own poems interspersed between.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141036435</amazonuk>Who can imagine what there will be to come in the 2023 edition?

 [[Category:History]]{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Simon Garfield1785633074|title=Just My Type: A Book About FontsStaggering Hubris|author=Josh Berry

|summary=A quality typeface is a bit Members of Parliament like a good referee at a football match in us to believe that you only really notice them if something has gone wrong. A referee the country is there to facilitate the players on the pitchrun by politicians, not to be headed by the star of Prime minister - the show ''primus inter pares'' (though watching Match that's for those of the Day these past few weeks you'd often beg to differwho are Eton and Oxbridge educated). So it but the reality is with typefacesthat the ''prime'' movers are the special advisers - the SPADS - who are the driving force behind the government. A good type helps We are in the privileged position of having access to the readermemoirs of Rafe Hubris, enhances the flow and makes man who was behind the skilful control of the Covid crisis which was completely contained by the viewing experience easy and simpleend of 2020. Well sort of You might not know the name now but he will certainly be the man to watch.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846683017</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Bob Servant and Neil Forsyth0571365884|title=Bob Servant: Hero My Mess is a Bit of Dundee|rating=3.5|genre=Humour|summary=After [[Delete This at Your PerilLife: One Man's Fearless Exchanges with the Internet Spammers by Bob Servant|bursting into public consciousness]] as the scourge of email spammers, Broughty Ferry's resident polymath Bob Servant has returned. This time, he expands upon the colourful life only hinted at Adventures in his previous oeuvre, Delete this at Your Peril. And what a life it has been. He steers us from his humble beginnings, his broken family and traumatic schooldays, through the rise and fall of his window cleaning empire, and his role in Dundee's brutal cheeseburger wars. Along the way, we witness his struggles with, respectively, women ('skirt'), his simpleton sidekick Frank, and the demon drink.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1841589209</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=P K Munroe|title=You Can Stick It|rating=3.5|genre=Humour|summary=Literary merit? Absolutely none! Plot, characterisation and all that other stuff you usually talk about? Nope – there's none of that, either. Ah, so it's non-fiction? Well, calling it ''fact'' would be stretching things a little too far... So, come on then. What ''is'' it?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007362188</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewAnxiety|author=Axel Scheffler|title=How to Keep a Pet SquirrelGeorgia Pritchett

|genre=HumourAutobiography|summary=SoGeorgia Pritchett has always been anxious, how do you keep even as a pet squirrel? child. Well, She would worry about whether the monsters under the bed were comfortable: it was the simple answer is that you don'tsort of life where if she had nothing to worry about she would become anxious but such occasions were few and far between. They're wild animals and not at all suitable for keeping in captivityOn a visit to a therapist, as an adult, but accepted thinking didn't always run that way. It when she was whilst he completely unable to speak about what was dipping into wrong with her it was suggested that she should write it down and ''The ChildrenMy Mess is a Bit of a Life: Adventures in Anxiety's Encyclopaedia'' of 1910 that Axel Scheffler came across a small but indispensible guide to obtaining and caring for your pet squirrel. His inventive mind came up with these beautiful illustrations to accompany is the text and if you're looking for an amusing gift for an animalresult -loving adult then this book could well be the answeror so we are given to believe.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571255981</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=PJ VanstonJohn Boyne|title=CrumpThe Echo Chamber|rating=35

|summary=It's Kevin Crump's first day Meet George Cleverley. He is self-defined as "one of the few television personalities over the age of fifty without a lecturer at Thames Metropolitan University - an ex-polytechniccriminal record". ItHe starts this book a bit worried when his mistress tells him she's carrying his child, but then his author wife is getting her kicks with the happiest day of his lifeUkrainian partner "Strictly Come Dancing" paired her with. They have three children, and he can't wait to see all that it holdswho are a sad-sack with absolutely no social skills whatsoever, and make a difference girl who hangs around with a virtue-signalling, keyboard warrior "wokester" who wants to all his students. And then it hits him: save the relentless pettiness world's homeless with out-of authority figures-date food, and a fit young lad doing the students who can't string gay hustle thing. Add in a few other characters – therapists, lawyers, random transgender types – that all have two sentences togethervery different connections to his life, and you have something that suggests an almost farcical approach to the modern world. What suggests the lowering of standards in search of higher test scoresfarcical approach even more, so more money from foreign studentshowever, and political correctness gone (as I believe is the saying goes) madfact this is bloody funny.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1848762852</amazonuk>0857526219

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=John LennonStephen Clarke|title=In His Own Write and A Spaniard in the Works|rating=3|genre=Humour|summary=During the height of Beatlemania, John Lennon used to doodle or write short poems or nonsense stories to pass the time (and there must have been a good deal of time to pass away on tour, if only waiting for screaming fans to leave them alone and go back home). Some of them were seen by Tom Maschler, literary editor at Jonathan Cape, who encouraged him to produce more. The results were published in two very successful short books in 1964 and 1965.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099530422</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=John Lindsay|title=Emails From An AssholeSpy Who Inspired Me

|genre=HumourGeneral Fiction|summary=Some classified ads are crying out for trollingThis is a spoof spy story, that isn't about James Bond. Or Ian Fleming. John Lindsay replies to them, spins them But it features a yarnman called Ian Lemming, who dresses well and 'likes the ladies' and strings them along who works for as long as possiblethe secret service, but in the planning side of things more than the active service. Sometimes Lemming finds himself put on a mission with a female spy called Margaux, and the advert is fairly innocuous pair end up stranded in Normandy, with Margaux on a desperate mission to unearth traitors in the resistance network, and he emails them anyway. These are emails from an asshole, after all.Lemming desperately trying to keep up with her!|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1402778279</amazonuk>2952163855

 {{newreview|author=L C Tyler|title=The Herring In The Library|rating=4.5|genre=Crime|summary=Tall, elegant Ethelred is a gentleman, and a third-rate author. Elsie, his literary agent, is short and dumpy, and not afraid to speak her mind. It is Elsie, in fact, who constantly assures her client he only occasionally aspires to the giddy heights of being second-rate. This could be the business partnership from hell, but not only do these two seem to get along, they even manage to solve crimes together. In this, the third outing for L C Tyler's eccentric sleuths, we are provided with a locked room mystery, a cast of possible villains of the most stereotypical type, and a fresh, funny tale which will make you laugh so much you'll get a stitch.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230714684</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=A J Jacobs|title=My Experimental Life|rating=3.5|genre=Humour|summary=A J Jacobs has a reputation for setting himself onerous tasks. His first book was about reading the entire Encyclopedia Britannica; his second detailed a year spent according to the Biblical precepts. In My Experimental Life, he recounts nine briefer episodes of living outside his comfort zone.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099547422</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Seth Grahame-Smith|title=Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter|rating=3.5|genre=Humour|summary='Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.' That quote, on the Statue of Liberty, was probably not designed with the inclusion of vampires in mind. But by some means or another North America is rife with the things – hiding in plain sight, as the older ones can bear sunlight, with the help of darkened glasses. It might just come down to one eager young man to rid his new country of such things, on his way to something he’s a bit more known for.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849014086</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jane Austen, Seth Grahame-Smith and Tony Lee|title=Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Graphic Novel|rating=3|genre=Graphic Novels|summary=It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie story of any renown will not remain simply a zombie story. Before you can say ''the risen undead'' it will become a series of books, inspiring others, and/or lead to the same story being published in many different guises. Here, then, on its way to Hollywood, is Jane Austen’s story of Lizzie Bennet, the feisty young woman trying to ignore Mr Darcy while fighting off the ''manky unmentionables'' – at least she is until the hidden truths open up to her, just as the soft soils of Hertfordshire do to yield their once-human remains. And this time it’s in graphic novel form.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848566948</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Carl McInerney|title=The Funniest Football Joke Book Ever|rating=3.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Who scored the most goals in the Greek Mythology League? The centaur forward. Badoom boom tshhhh. It's a football joke book, packed to the gills with all sorts of cheesiness and silliness. Funniest ever? Perhaps not, but it's not too bad.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849391114</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Paul Magrs|title=Hell's Belles|rating=3.5|genre=Humour|summary=The idea behind this series of novels is quite enchanting and amusing. Frankenstein's daughter is living and sleuthing in Whitby, ably aided and abetted by her sidekick, the enigmatic Effie, and a growing menagerie of younger accomplices, namely Michael and Penny. Whilst the original idea showed huge promise, I felt that the author has rather overdone it in terms of output, in his desire to capitalise on his original success. Book two in the series was quite disappointing, relying on sensationalism rather than adequate plot and character development. Book three was an improvement-and I'm delighted to report that this, the fourth book in the series, shows him returning to form with the promise we saw in the first of the series.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755346467</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Valerie Thomas Afonso Cruz and Korky PaulRahul Bery (translator)|title=WinnieKokoschka's JokesDoll

|genre=Confident ReadersLiterary Fiction|summary=Who turns off Well, this looked very much like a book I could love from the lights at Halloween? The lights witchget-go, which is why I picked my review copy up and flipped pages over several times before actually reading any of it. What does an Australian witch ride I found things to potentially delight me each time – a weird section in the middle on? A broomerangdarker stock paper, a chapter whose number was in the 20,000s, letters used as narrative form, and so on. It intrigued with the subterranean voice a man hears in wartorn Dresden that what little I knew of it mentioned, too. Yep But you've seen the star rating that comes with this review, and can tell that if love was on these pages, it's a joke bookwas not actually caused by them. So what happened?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0192729063</amazonuk>1529402697

{{newreview|author=Nick Wadley|title=Man + Dog|rating=4.5|genre=Humour|summary=Throughout my life IYou don've lived with dogs or deeply regretted the fact t get many better opening sentences than that I lacked a canine companion. , do you? Watching a dog – or better still, We first met His Excellency and The Ambassador's Wife in [[Sorting the Priorities: Ambassadress and Beagle Survive Diplomacy by Sandra Aragona|Sorting the interaction between dogs – is infinitely better than anything on television Priorities]] and we learned what itwas like to be moved around countries like accompanying baggage by the Italian Government but the time has come for HE to retires and for Sandra Aragona to become The Wife of Former Ambassador... They have left The Career and settled in Rome. Well 'settled's sheer joy to see how man rather overstates the situation and their dog interacts and how, so oftenBeagle, has no intention of slowing down any time soon, they hold a mirror up to each otherdespite being sixteen and deaf.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1564785521</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=B08GFSK2WZ|authortitle=The Harvard LampoonKarma Trap|titleauthor=Nightlight: A Parody of Twilight Lisette Boyd|rating=3.54|genre=HumourWomen's Fiction|summary=Most people will have heard George Jackson is thirty-three years old, absolutely gorgeous to look at - and single. She's not had sex for eight months and she's stuck in the karma trap: an awful lot of the worldwide phenomenon that bad luck is [[Twilight by Stephenie Meyer|Twilight]]being visited on her and she has a real talent for attracting drama. The books Her life's chaotic: she dealt with the leak from the shower by Stephenie Meyer and putting something down at the film have made a legend bottom of the romance between vampire Edward Mullen (Robert Pattinson plays stairs to absorb the water - then the movie role) shower fell through the roof whilst she was in it and teenage schoolgirl Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart)left her, stark naked, staring at the pervy postman. She only has to take her mother's dog out for a walk for her to end up with dog poo spattered across her face - and a photo being taken by someone who shares it around the office.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849013330</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Steven Lowe and Alan McArthur David C Mason|title=Is it Just Me or Has the Shit Hit the Fan?: Your Hilarious New Guide to Unremitting Global MiseryPandora's Gardener

|genre=HumourCrime|summary=''The banks fell over like fat Labradors running over John Cranston is a wet kitchen floor.'' Surely that is the wackiestgardener, most inappropriate simile for the credit crunch and all it has done for the world. You won't get any such namby-pamby animal likenesses from these authors, instead with quite although what he did before he became a potty mouth on them they will lambast the modern worldgardener, the entire banking systemhe claims, all those who failed to see it coming, and those millions is classified. That is just seemingly waiting for us all as well because he is about to revert to high-interest, high-risk, high-lending capitalismbe caught up in a criminal / spy / terrorist plot, so they where only he can get back on save the expenses train, and back up the rich listsday.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1847443656</amazonuk>0956180523

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Eoin ColferJester_Forever|title=And Another Thing ... Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the GalaxyForever After: Part Six of Three (Hitchhikers Guide 6) a dark comedy|author=David Jester|rating=3.54|genre=Science FictionHorror|summary=Of all Michael Holland is a cocky and brash young man who dies and gets made the big books announced for this yearoffer of his lifetime; immortality. We follow Michael, this one must have raised more eyebrows than many. Why try a grim reaper and write his friends, Chip (a new Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy book, when way before the end, its creator Douglas Adams was proving quite hopeless at such stoner tooth fairy) and Naff (a task? And why approach an Irishman, Eoin Colfer, when stoner in the originals - tempered with their humour which could only be described records department) as Monty Python doing a sci-fi Terry Pratchett, and they grapple with their cups of tea long lives and dressing gowns, could only be described as very English? Well the answer is most evident - Colfer is finding a world-beater when it comes clean surface to knocking up a story.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0718155149</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=The Vampire Miles Proctor|title=The New Vampire's Handbook|rating=3.5|genre=Humour|summary=I shall start with a prediction. I will not become a vampire, for this imminent Hallowe'en, any festive fancy dress parties, or indeed for life as the lifeless undead. I will not need tips sit on filing my fangs, or how to divert attention from the fact I cannot eat human food at dinner parties. Me and my reflection in mirrors will remain intact. But for those of you reading this at night, somewhere, flameproof cape at hand, with your distaste of garlic, publicity and presumably the anaemic, this is the sterling how-to lifestyle guidetheir flat.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224086464</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=David O'Doherty, Claudia O'Doherty and Mike Ahern1683691172|title=100 Facts William Shakespeare's Much Ado About Pandas|rating=3.5Mean Girls|genre=Humour|summary=Sometimes the title says it all - this is a book with 100 facts about pandas. Sometimes you need to note the author too - David O'Doherty won an Edinburgh Comedy Award, so this is a book of a 100 silly and untrue facts about pandas.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224086324</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Richard Horne |title=A is for ArmageddonIan Doescher

|summary=The world is definitely going to hell A long time ago, in a handcart. We're only just preventing lethal global warming by having a credit crunch that has prevented a lot of big buildinggalaxy far away, air travelall the Star Wars films were crunched up against Shakespeare, and consumerismthe marriage seemed a perfectly suitable one. The population is getting So much so – so obese there is no room for any more of us - easily did the plots and characters converse in Shakespearean dialogue, and add behave with Shakespearean stage directions – that to the exploding population statisticsproducers tried again, and itwith [[William Shakespeare's never going Get Thee Back to the Future! by Ian Doescher|Back to look betterthe Future]] no less. And donthat worked. But simultaneously they put a real test out. A film I can't get me started on where all even really remember seeing was transcribed into the bees have goneoriginal Elizabethan lingo...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224086197</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=James May|title=Car Fever: Dispatches From Behind The Wheel|rating=4|genre=Lifestyle|summary=Now, way back when A cult following I had never followed whatsoever was younger, and watched TV a lot, I am sure I remember Top Gear as being a consumer programme. How times change. These days I am sure they destroy more cars than they review, and given the three main people from the show are approaching superstar statusbrand new, with their amenable personalitiesyet oh so ancient, awkward wardrobe choices and trenchant laddish charmsdressing. They've sprung their media entities from out of Here was the studio, into other TV programmes, and the world of journalism, with chatty columns in the broadsheets allowing them free rein true challenge – would I manage to witter to their heart's desire. And hereenjoy this, in one grandiloquent volume, and in time based on little foreknowledge? Oh damn those shiny gold stars for Christmas, are many of James May's desires.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340994533</amazonuk>letting the game away…

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith 168369094X|title=Pride and Prejudice and ZombiesWilliam Shakespeare's Get Thee Back to the Future!|author=Ian Doescher

|summary=AhA long time ago, in a publishing house far away, [[:Category:Ian Doescher|someone]] thought it wonderfully wacky to rewrite the benefits to a good book story of Star Wars in Shakespearean pentameter, colliding two entirely different genres and styles in such a classic first line. 'Call me Ishmaelclever way they seemed perfectly suited.' 'It was a bright cold day then duly repeated for all the other films in Aprilthe main Star Wars cycle, and clearly someone's buffing their quills ready for Episode Nine, the title of which became public knowledge the clocks were striking thirteenday before I write.' Who can forget Iain Banks' 'It was In the hiatus, however, the effort has been made to see if the day my grandmother exploded'? same shtick works with other texts, and to riff on other seemingly unlikely source materials in iambs. Or those timeless words by Jane AustenAnd could we have anything more suitably unsuitable-seeming than Back to the Future, 'It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession with its tales of brains must be in want of more brains.'|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1594743347<time travel, bullying, and parent/amazonuk>child strife like no other?

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Harry Hill1473669065|title=Tim The Tiny Horse At LargeQueenie Malone's Paradise Hotel|author=Ruth Hogan|rating=45

|summary=ItTilda returns to Brighton, to tidy away the remains of her mother's been life after her death. Whilst there, she returns to the Paradise hotel, a while since Tim haven for eccentrics and Fly's [[Tim the Tiny Horse by Harry Hill|last adventures]]misfits. A place where people can be themselves, and changes are afoot in Tim's tiny world: Fly is getting married to his girlfriendlet go of thoughts that torment them elsewhere. Tim's a little worried because they've only known each other Little wonder that Tilda cannot forgive her mother for banishing her as a weekchild, from this place of wonder. The marriage goes aheadWith the help of Queenie Malone, caring, and Tim finds himself kicking his heelsgregarious, so he gets a pet. And so Tilda begins to pick apart the brief episodes in the life of a horse who lives in a matchbox continuetricky and uncertain relationship she had with her sometimes cruel and distant mother.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571244157</amazonuk>

 {{newreview|author=Spike Milligan|title=The Magical World of Milligan|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Some people you just have to love. It's the law. Spike Milligan was always fantastic, and he's much missed. He's got the perfect mix of nonsense, heart, and surreal humour. He speaks to people of all ages, and he's just plain lovely. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905264844</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sam Savage1683690346|title=The Cry of the Sloth|rating=3.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Meet Andrew Whittaker. In some untold time of recent American history, he is forced through a failed marriage and an artistic temperament at odds with so many other people, to let properties to tenants he does not like, for $120 a month. The lodgers might not like the state of the buildings - ceilings falling through and so on - but that's another matter. He would much prefer to be left alone in front of his little Olivetti typewriter and create art. He runs a literary journal, of a kind, called "Soap", which no-one likes, no-one reads (and often, with dodgy, cheap printing, no-one could physically read it anyway), and which makes him poorer in time, money and spirit.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0297856499</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewCon Artist|author=Christopher Moore|title=You SuckFred Van Lente

|summary=You know that old adage about books and covers? Well this is Comic-Cons are a case in point. The title isn't great, but the cover design for the paperback imprint is, like, duh!, the pits. It is so uncool…so unrep-resent-ative place of the book. This is not a cocktail thing. Not even a "Bloody Mary" thing.  Well, except wonder and sanctuary for the tiny bit that ismany people, but you'll discover that in due course.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1841498092</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Hugh Murr and Sid Nigtures |title=Cyber Sign Offs|rating=2|genre=Humour|summary=I admit I had the wrong end of the stick when it came to this Comic book, before I opened it artist Mike Mason arrives at least. I had assumed it was a collection of realSan Diego Comic-life on-line signatures - weCon, he've all seen thems looking for both that and sanctuary with other fans and creators, those straplines people have on all their forum posts. The obvious response would have been along plus the lines chance of 'fair enoughmaybe, just maybe reuniting with his ex. However, but why when his rival is this a book in this day and agefound dead, and not a website?'. But no. This Mike is a collection forced to navigate every dark corner of dialogues between two people - shall we call them Sue deNim the con in order to clear his name – from cosplay flash mobs and Allie Bye, who have a line or two to say intrusive fans to each other, zombie obstacle courses – Mike must prove his innocence and a made-up name (sorry, make that May Dupp-Name) with which to sign it off. Much jolly nonsense ensues.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904312497</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Tim Fitzhigham |title=All at Sea: One Man. One Bathtub. One Very Bad Idea: Conquering the Channel in a Piece of Plumbing|rating=4.5|genre=Travel|summary=Once more my life is made easy by saying this book does doing so, may just what it claims on the cover - takes unravel a narrator of zesty, wacky humour, throws him into an unlikely situation (dark secret behind a bath) and gets him to do something unusual (row it across the Channel - and then beyond). This despite the fact he was the world's worst sculler at Universitylegendary industry creator.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848090269</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Simon Brett1473669588|title=Blotto, Twinks and the Ex-King's DaughterFalling Short|author=Lex Coulton

|summary=There can be few people who have written eighty books without me even having picked up one of themLex Coulton's debut novel is a story about mistakes, failures, and relationships. At leastThe main protagonist, and at lastFrances Pilgrim, I have redressed that fault in the case of Simon Brettis a sixth form English teacher who has recently fallen out with her best friend Jackson, a work colleague and have come to is grappling with the conclusion there are 79 more that will be worth investigatingincreasingly eccentric behaviour of her mother. Here we meet for This relationship is complicated by the first time Blotto (posh idiotic son of a dowager duchess) and Twinks (posh brilliant genius sister to Blotto), their family, their surroundings, and the corpse inconveniently disturbing a dinner partyfact that Frances's father disappeared at sea when she was five years old.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845299353</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Karl Pilkington1683690133|title=KarlologyMy Lady's Choosing|author=Kitty Curran and Larissa Zageris

|summary=The Radio Five film critic Mark Kermode has You are a rule when reviewing comedieslass of twenty-eight. If he laughs more than five times then Plucky, penniless and in Regency-era London the film deserves its billing race is on to find a suitable suitor - or else doom yourself to life as an eternal spinster. Along your journey, you'll be accompanied by Lady Evangeline Youngblood - a comedyfiesty noble eager to save you from a life alone, and fired by a rogueish sense for adventure. If that rule was applied When it comes to Karl Pilkingtonsuitors though, you's new book Karlology then it would easily fit into ll have to make the ultimate decision between witty, pretty and wealthy Sir Benedict Granville, wholesome, rugged and caring Captain Angus MacTaggart, or the category for there are laugh aplenty in this strangemad, bad and terrifyingly sexy Lord Garraway Craven. With orphans, werewolves, amusing long lost lovers and charming little bookancient Egyptian artefacts along the way, it's clear this isn't going to be an easy decision...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140533746X</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Joe StretchStibbe_Xmas|title=WildlifeAn Almost Perfect Christmas|author=Nina Stibbe|rating=34.5

|summary=The word ''Twitter'' doesn't occur in Joe Stretch's vocabularyChristmas – the time of traditional trauma. You only have to think about the turkey for that – once upon a time it was leaving it sat on the downstairs loo to defrost overnight, but and if thatfailed the hair-dryer shoved inside it treatment was your next best bet. Nowadays it's what his book is about. Life in the blogosphere, massively exaggerated, where people donall having to make sure it't leave their desks s suitably free-range and organic – but nevertheless come together (but never literally) in satisfying their deepestnot too organic that you can go and visit it, darkest desiresand get too friendly with it to want to eat it. If I've made it sound even faintly excitingChristmas, believe methough, Joe Stretch is of course also a fantasist with realist tendenciestime of great boons. What he is after is laughter; what he produces is It's cash in hand for a virtual simulacrum. Sniggery-pokerylot of plump people who can hire red suits and beards, jiggery-jokery, he tinkers it was always a godsend for postmen with all the twilight zone of a futurethank-scenario where, for reasons beyond all understanding, some robotic and literal Dickhead (i.e. a man with a dick fixed you letters to his forehead – I kid aunties you not) decides to target a few selected humans for saw twice a make-over in his own image. Given decade that virtual worlds exist to pull in punters who don't like themselves your parents made you write out in long-hand as a child, and as for the real onemakers of Meltis Newberry Fruits – well, did they even try and their main purpose is to make money, one's only question must be: whysell them any other time of the year?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099532077</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Michael MarrDoescher_Will|title=Three Jumpers|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=When Bardolph Middle placed an ad in the paper proclaiming he was a writer, he thought he might get the odd request to write a speech or two. Maybe, if he was very lucky, a company might ask him to conceive an entire marketing plan and advertising campaign. What he never expected was this job offer…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906558485</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Rosy Barnes|title=Sadomasochism for Accountants|rating=3|genre=WomenWilliam Shakespeare's Fiction|summary=Humour's very personal, isn't it? If you dig films like ''Shaun of the Dead'' and ''Hot Fuzz'', I predict you'll love this chick lit parody. It's anarchic and very British comedy tradition. If you're into Force Doth Awaken: Star Wars Part the conventions of good writing, you may find it a little painful. Nevertheless, I enjoyed plenty of moments in Rosy Barnes' first novel.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0714531812</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewSeventh|author=Lady Annabel Goldsmith|title=Copper: A Dog's LifeIan Doescher|rating=4.5

|summary=Copper A long time ago, in a galaxy far away, there was one of a litter of dogs born man called William Shakespeare, who was able to create a stray bitch series of dramatic histories full of machinations most foul, rulers most evil and who was 'adopted' by Lady Annabel Goldsmith - rebellious heroes and heroines most sturdy. You may or might it be may not have noticed the other way round?. Here he tells cinematic version of his story in his own words as transcribed original stage play for him by his owner. He's got his own priorities – and obedience is not one of them – along with a roving spirit. It's perhaps fortunate that heThe Force Doth Awaken''s a dog as this allows you , but here at last we get the actual script, complete with annoying-in-different-ways-to call him 'cheeky' -before droids anew, returning heroes from elsewhere in his oeuvre, and 'charming'people keeping it in the family til it hurts. If he was a human being And if you need further encouragement, don'randy' and 'arrogant' would be two t forget his audience only demanded three parts of Henry VI – here the first words which came series is so popular we're on to mind.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0751538205</amazonuk>part seven – surely making this over twice as good…

{{newreview|author=Tim Moore|title=I Believe in Yesterday: My Adventures in Living History|rating=4|genre=Humour|summary=Common opinion has it that the television programme ''Time Team'' did a lot for the public image of archaeologists – bringing them out of their holes in the ground, and making them seem like exciting, interesting people with a good way of putting their knowledge across. However it was clearly a much harder task when it came Move on to those background artistes they have sometimes, walking up and down in Roman centurion gear, or living the historical lifestyle as a re-enactment.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224077813</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=L Vaughan Spencer|title=Don't Be Needy Be Succeedy|rating=4|genre=Humour|summary=Are you underperforming in your business and personal lives? Do you underestimate the importance of good hair and moisturised skin in achieving your life goals? Are you stumbling through life in a Fast-Moving Business Environment (FMBE) without a motivational mantra to guide you? Then you need this book. As ''The A to Zee of Motivitality'', this is a dictionary of achievement from a man who can teach you how to succeed like a toothless budgie.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846681634</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Mark Crick |title=Sartre's Sink: The Great Writers' Complete Book of DIY|rating=4|genre=Humour|summary=''Sartre's Sink'' comprises fourteen short story parodies of some of the world's best known writers – the twist being that the stories are all about undertaking some mundane DIY task such as tiling a bathroom (Dostoevsky) or reglazing a window (Milan Kundera). So far it sounds a bit like some pretentious Oxbridge student twaddle. You can just imagine how the idea came up over an over-ripe Brie and an underrated bottle of 1963 Taylor's port. It also rather smacks of that Radio 4 programme which I detest with an absolute passion - I can't even stand writing its name, ugh - ''Quote Unquote'', in which parodies do feature, read out by smug self-congratulatory writer darlings (you can tell I don't like it, can't you?). However, dear readers, this book is rather enjoyable and I speak as someone who is rather less versed in the writings of this famous lot than I care to admit.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847080472</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Eric Nakagawa|title=I Can Has Cheezburger |rating=4|genre=Pets|summary=''I Can Has Cheezburger'', is a clever and witty anthology of some of the best pictures and captions from the fantastic [http://icanhascheezburger.com/ lolcats website[Newest LGBT Fiction Reviews]] of the same name. The site has been growing in popularity in recent months, and so it was inevitable that a book would soon hit the shelves. Choosing which pics to include in the book could not have been an easy task, and some of the old favourites are there, alongside some less well known ones.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340977574</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Ian Crofton|title=History Without the Boring Bits|rating=5|genre=History|summary=I was never one for history, and in fact left the dregs of a history teacher in tatters when I scraped through with a D. Still, history is an odd thing – written by the winners of course, and annoyingly biased in my mind towards the plain. There's no real reason to remember the order of Henry VIII's six wives, but we can only relish the one credited with polydactylism, a third nipple and whatnot (the second one, in fact – whoever that was).|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847243746</amazonuk>}}