Difference between revisions of "Newest Humour Reviews"

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[[Category:Humour|*]]
 
[[Category:Humour|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|Humour]]
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[[Category:New Reviews|Humour]]__NOTOC__
==Humour==
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{{Frontpage
__NOTOC__
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|author=Dean Koontz
{{newreview
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|title=The Bad Weather Friend
|author=Alain Mabanckou
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|rating=4.5
|title=Memoirs of a Porcupine
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|genre=Paranormal
|rating=4
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|summary=Benny is having a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and his house gets trashed. Oh, and someone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to his home, and it's possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that has trashed his house!  The thing is, Benny is the very last person to deserve all this bad luck. He is a nice personA really nice personSo fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to his house is a new friend, a bad weather friend called Spike, who has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good personSpike is going to take care of Benny, and will certainly take care of Benny's enemies, if he, Benny, and Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are.
|genre=Literary Fiction
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|isbn=1662500491
|summary=The protagonist of this novel is an ordinary Congolese porcupine until Papa Kibandi performs an ancient ritual involving a hallucinogenic cocktail called ''mayamvumbi'', and transforms him into his son's harmful double. The insecure younger Kibandi becomes more and more embittered as his life goes on, and sends his porcupine to 'eat' anybody he feels the least bit threatened by, a process whereby that person's life essence is sucked out, killing them instantly. Over one hundred victims later and following his master's death at the hands of a vengeful baby, our narrator retires to the hollow of a baobab tree where he writes this confessional.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846687675</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Tom Holt
 
|title=Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Sausages
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Fantasy
 
|summary=Imagine a world where pigs can do quantum mechanics, and where female solicitors turn into chickens. Add a dry cleaner that moves (literally, from the roof tiles to the basement) from town to town every forty-eight hours, a couple of medieval knights who've fought every day for centuries, and a magical ring (or pencil sharpener, depending on the mood it's in). Stir in a bit of property developing, a thaumaturgical detective and an old man who lives in a cloud. Result? You haven't even begun to probe the depths of this crazy, absurd, complex and hilarious book.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1841495077</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Steve Hely
 
|title=How I Became a Famous Novelist
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=With an uncompromising title like 'How I Became a Famous Novelist', this clearly isn't intended to be a subtle book. So I can hardly complain when a cynical look at the writing industry swings raw punches in every direction. It just isn't my sort of humour, but equally, if you rave about 'The Office' you will likely enjoy this book far more than I have done.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849015724</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Charles Lamb
 
|title=Great Food: A Dissertation Upon Roast Pig and Other Essays
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Cookery
 
|summary=''A Dissertation Upon Roast Pig'' is a collection of food-related essays from the early 19th century, with a humorous bent. They're but a few pages each - a light read to bring a smile to your face, 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 who's worked as a freelancer has a story of a client from hell - that person who asked for something that was impossible, wanted it done yesterday for a fraction of the usual price, or is just plain angry about the work produced. 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 is a Dalit, an untouchable, stuck in a flat in Mumbai's slums but hoping, somehow, for a better future for his sonWorking at the Insitute of Theory and Research he uses all his cunning and wiles to stay ahead of the game amongst the Brahmin scientistsDoes he have the intelligence, and nerves, to convince everyone that his son, against all odds, 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 a village will recognise it immediately, with its cobbled streets and Tudor buildings.  There was some damage during the war (which might, or might not have been down to a lighthouse folly constructed by a local landowner on his lake) but the gaps have been filled with some beautiful, er, mock Tudor buildingsAlmost unique and nearly beautiful as the village is, 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 of New York
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Fantasy
 
|summary=In this fairytale of New York, the Cornish fairy King's children are living in exile, hiding in Central Park from a nasty industrial revolution back home.  They have friends from Ireland with them, and all have the ability to startle the local squirrels.  Elsewhere two innocent scallywag fairies fleeing Scotland have arrived, and adopted a human each.  Heather has joined up with Dinnie, the city'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 reasons.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0749954205</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1529153050
|author=Gervase Phinn
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|title=Britain's Best Political Cartoons 2022
|title=Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Stars
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|author=Tim Benson
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Humour
 
|genre=Humour
|summary=I spent many of my teenage years reading James Herriot's books, and I found that this collection of anecdotes and poems by Gervase Phinn had a real flavour of Herriot about itPerhaps it was just the setting, for Phinn was a school inspector in the Dales for many years, but I think he also has that knack of capturing a situation, and a character, and bringing out the humour without making the person appear ridiculousHere he collates stories from his other books, some Christmassy and others not, and he relates them with several of his own poems interspersed between.
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|summary=Seeking some light relief from the current political turmoil which is coming to seem more and more like an adrenaline sport, I was nudged towards ''Britain's Best Political Cartoons of 2022''Sharp eyes will have noted that we're not yet through the year: the cartoons run from 4 September 2021 to 31 August 2022Who can imagine what there will be to come in the 2023 edition?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141036435</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
[[Category:History]]
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|isbn=1785633074
{{newreview
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|title=Staggering Hubris
|author=Simon Garfield
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|author=Josh Berry
|title=Just My Type: A Book About Fonts
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Humour
 
|genre=Humour
|summary=A quality typeface is a bit like a good referee at a football match in that you only really notice them if something has gone wrong. A referee is there to facilitate the players on the pitch, not to be the star of the show (though watching Match of the Day these past few weeks you'd often beg to differ). So it is with typefaces. A good type helps the reader, enhances the flow and makes the viewing experience easy and simple. Well sort of.
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|summary=Members of Parliament like us to believe that the country is run by politicians, headed by the Prime minister - the ''primus inter pares'' (that's for those of you who are Eton and Oxbridge educated) but the reality is that the ''prime'' movers are the special advisers - the SPADS - who are the driving force behind the government. We are in the privileged position of having access to the memoirs of Rafe Hubris, the man who was behind the skilful control of the Covid crisis which was completely contained by the end of 2020You might not know the name now but he will certainly be the man to watch.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846683017</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Bob Servant and Neil Forsyth
 
|title=Bob Servant: Hero of Dundee
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Humour
 
|summary=After [[Delete This at Your Peril: 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 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>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=0571365884
|author=Axel Scheffler
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|title=My Mess is a Bit of Life: Adventures in Anxiety
|title=How to Keep a Pet Squirrel
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|author=Georgia Pritchett
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Humour
+
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=So, how do you keep a pet squirrel? Well, the simple answer is that you don'tThey're wild animals and not at all suitable for keeping in captivity, but accepted thinking didn't always run that way. It was whilst he was dipping into ''The Children'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 the text and if you're looking for an amusing gift for an animal-loving adult then this book could well be the answer.
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|summary=Georgia Pritchett has always been anxious, even as a child. She would worry about whether the monsters under the bed were comfortable: it was the sort of life where if she had nothing to worry about she would become anxious but such occasions were few and far betweenOn a visit to a therapist, as an adultwhen she was completely unable to speak about what was wrong with her it was suggested that she should write it down and ''My Mess is a Bit of a Life: Adventures in Anxiety'' is the result - or so we are given to believe.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571255981</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=John Boyne
|author=PJ Vanston
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|title=The Echo Chamber
|title=Crump
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|rating=5
|rating=3
 
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=It's Kevin Crump's first day as a lecturer at Thames Metropolitan University - an ex-polytechnic. It's the happiest day of his life, and he can't wait to see all that it holds, and make a difference to all his students. And then it hits him: the relentless pettiness of authority figures, the students who can't string two sentences together, the lowering of standards in search of higher test scores, so more money from foreign students, and political correctness gone (as I believe the saying goes) mad.
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|summary=Meet George Cleverley. He is self-defined as "one of the few television personalities over the age of fifty without a criminal record". He 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 Ukrainian partner "Strictly Come Dancing" paired her with. They have three children, who are a sad-sack with absolutely no social skills whatsoever, a girl who hangs around with a virtue-signalling, keyboard warrior "wokester" who wants to save the world's homeless with out-of-date food, and a fit young lad doing the gay hustle thing. Add in a few other characters – therapists, lawyers, random transgender types – that all have two very different connections to his life, and you have something that suggests an almost farcical approach to the modern world. What suggests the farcical approach even more, however, is the fact this is bloody funny.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848762852</amazonuk>
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|isbn=0857526219
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=John Lennon
 
|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>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Stephen Clarke
|author=John Lindsay
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|title=The Spy Who Inspired Me
|title=Emails From An Asshole
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Humour
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|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Some classified ads are crying out for trolling. John Lindsay replies to them, spins them a yarn, and strings them along for as long as possible. Sometimes the advert is fairly innocuous and he emails them anyway. These are emails from an asshole, after all.
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|summary=This is a spoof spy story, that isn't about James Bond. Or Ian Fleming. But it features a man called Ian Lemming, who dresses well and 'likes the ladies' and who works for the secret service, but in the planning side of things more than the active serviceLemming finds himself put on a mission with a female spy called Margaux, and the pair end up stranded in Normandy, with Margaux on a desperate mission to unearth traitors in the resistance network, and Lemming desperately trying to keep up with her!
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1402778279</amazonuk>
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|isbn=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 glassesIt 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>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Afonso Cruz and Rahul Bery (translator)
|author=Carl McInerney
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|title=Kokoschka's Doll
|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>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Valerie Thomas and Korky Paul
 
|title=Winnie's Jokes
 
 
|rating=2.5
 
|rating=2.5
|genre=Confident Readers
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|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Who turns off the lights at Halloween? The lights witch. What does an Australian witch ride on? A broomerang. Yep, it's a joke book.
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|summary=Well, this looked very much like a book I could love from the get-go, which is why I picked my review copy up and flipped pages over several times before actually reading any of it. I found things to potentially delight me each time – a weird section in the middle on darker 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. But you've seen the star rating that comes with this review, and can tell that if love was on these pages, it was not actually caused by them. So what happened?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0192729063</amazonuk>
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|isbn=1529402697
 
}}
 
}}
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{{Frontpage
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|isbn=B08KKQ85FN
 +
|title=But Never For Lunch
 +
|author=Sandra Aragona
 +
|rating=4
 +
|genre=Short Stories
 +
|summary=''If a woman approaching the menopause can be likened to a Rottweiler in lipstick, an Ambassador nearing retirement resembles a pampered peacock about to be released into the company of carrion crows or, more to the point, about to discover the real world of bus timetables and paying his own gas bills.''
  
{{newreview
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You don't get many better opening sentences than that, do you? We first met His Excellency and The Ambassador's Wife in [[Sorting the Priorities: Ambassadress and Beagle Survive Diplomacy by Sandra Aragona|Sorting the Priorities]] and we learned what it was 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' rather overstates the situation and their dog, Beagle, has no intention of slowing down any time soon, despite being sixteen and deaf.
|author=Nick Wadley
 
|title=Man + Dog
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Humour
 
|summary=Throughout my life I've lived with dogs or deeply regretted the fact that I lacked a canine companion. Watching a dog – or better still, the interaction between dogs – is infinitely better than anything on television and it's sheer joy to see how man and dog interacts and how, so often, they hold a mirror up to each other.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1564785521</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=B08GFSK2WZ
|author=The Harvard Lampoon
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|title=The Karma Trap
|title=Nightlight: A Parody of Twilight
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|author=Lisette Boyd
|rating=3.5
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|rating=4
|genre=Humour
+
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=Most people will have heard of the worldwide phenomenon that is [[Twilight by Stephenie Meyer|Twilight]]. The books by Stephenie Meyer and the film have made a legend of the romance between vampire Edward Mullen (Robert Pattinson plays the movie role) and teenage schoolgirl Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart).
+
|summary=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 bad luck is being visited on her and she has a real talent for attracting drama. Her life's chaotic: she dealt with the leak from the shower by putting something down at the bottom of the stairs to absorb the water - then the shower fell through the roof whilst she was in it and 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>
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}}  
}}
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{{Frontpage
 
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|author=David C Mason
{{newreview
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|title=Pandora's Gardener
|author=Steven Lowe and Alan McArthur
 
|title=Is it Just Me or Has the Shit Hit the Fan?: Your Hilarious New Guide to Unremitting Global Misery
 
 
|rating=3
 
|rating=3
|genre=Humour
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|genre=Crime
|summary=''The banks fell over like fat Labradors running over a wet kitchen floor.''  Surely that is the wackiest, 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 a potty mouth on them they will lambast the modern world, the entire banking system, all those who failed to see it coming, and those millions just seemingly waiting for us all to revert to high-interest, high-risk, high-lending capitalism, so they can get back on the expenses train, and back up the rich lists.
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|summary= John Cranston is a gardener, although what he did before he became a gardener, he claims, is classified.  That is just as well because he is about to be caught up in a criminal / spy / terrorist plot, where only he can save the day.  
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847443656</amazonuk>
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|isbn=0956180523
 
}}
 
}}
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=Jester_Forever
|author=Eoin Colfer
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|title=Forever After: a dark comedy
|title=And Another Thing ... Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Part Six of Three (Hitchhikers Guide 6)
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|author=David Jester
|rating=3.5
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|rating=4
|genre=Science Fiction
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|genre=Horror
|summary=Of all the big books announced for this year, this one must have raised more eyebrows than many.  Why try and write a new Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy book, when way before the end, its creator Douglas Adams was proving quite hopeless at such a task?  And why approach an Irishman, Eoin Colfer, when the originals - tempered with their humour which could only be described as Monty Python doing a sci-fi Terry Pratchett, and with their cups of tea and dressing gowns, could only be described as very English?  Well the answer is most evident - Colfer is a world-beater when it comes to knocking up a story.
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|summary=Michael Holland is a cocky and brash young man who dies and gets made the offer of his lifetime; immortality. We follow Michael, a grim reaper and his friends, Chip (a stoner tooth fairy) and Naff (a stoner in the records department) as they grapple with their long lives and finding a clean surface to sit on in their flat.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0718155149</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1683691172
|author=The Vampire Miles Proctor
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|title=William Shakespeare's Much Ado About Mean Girls
|title=The New Vampire's Handbook
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|author=Ian Doescher
|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 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 guide.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224086464</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=David O'Doherty, Claudia O'Doherty and Mike Ahern
 
|title=100 Facts About Pandas
 
|rating=3.5
 
|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 Armageddon
 
 
|rating=2.5
 
|rating=2.5
 
|genre=Humour
 
|genre=Humour
|summary=The world is definitely going to hell in a handcart.  We're only just preventing lethal global warming by having a credit crunch that has prevented a lot of big building, air travel, and consumerism. The population is getting so obese there is no room for any more of us - and add that to the exploding population statistics, and it's never going to look better. And don't get me started on where all the bees have gone...
+
|summary=A long time ago, in a galaxy far away, all the Star Wars films were crunched up against Shakespeare, and the marriage seemed a perfectly suitable one. So much so – so easily did the plots and characters converse in Shakespearean dialogue, and behave with Shakespearean stage directions – that the producers tried again, with [[William Shakespeare's Get Thee Back to the Future! by Ian Doescher|Back to the Future]] no less. And that worked. But simultaneously they put a real test out. A film I can't even really remember seeing was transcribed into the original Elizabethan lingo. A cult following I had never followed whatsoever was given the brand new, yet oh so ancient, dressing. Here was the true challenge – would I manage to enjoy this, based on little foreknowledge? Oh damn those shiny gold stars for letting the game away…
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224086197</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=168369094X
|author=James May
+
|title=William Shakespeare's Get Thee Back to the Future!
|title=Car Fever: Dispatches From Behind The Wheel
+
|author=Ian Doescher
|rating=4
 
|genre=Lifestyle
 
|summary=Now, way back when I 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 the three main people from the show are approaching superstar status, with their amenable personalities, awkward wardrobe choices and trenchant laddish charms.  They've sprung their media entities from out of the studio, into other TV programmes, and the world of journalism, with chatty columns in the broadsheets allowing them free rein to witter to their heart's desire.  And here, in one grandiloquent volume, and in time for Christmas, are many of James May's desires.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340994533</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith
 
|title=Pride and Prejudice and Zombies
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Humour
 
|genre=Humour
|summary=Ah, the benefits to a good book of a classic first line.  'Call me Ishmael.' 'It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.' Who can forget Iain Banks' 'It was the day my grandmother exploded'? Or those timeless words by Jane Austen, 'It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains.'
+
|summary=A long time ago, in a publishing house far away, [[:Category:Ian Doescher|someone]] thought it wonderfully wacky to rewrite the story of Star Wars in Shakespearean pentameter, colliding two entirely different genres and styles in such a clever way they seemed perfectly suited.  It was then duly repeated for all the other films in the main Star Wars cycle, and clearly someone's buffing their quills ready for Episode Nine, the title of which became public knowledge the day before I writeIn the hiatus, however, the effort has been made to see if the same shtick works with other texts, and to riff on other seemingly unlikely source materials in iambs. And could we have anything more suitably unsuitable-seeming than Back to the Future, with its tales of time travel, bullying, and parent/child strife like no other?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1594743347</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=1473669065
|author=Harry Hill
+
|title=Queenie Malone's Paradise Hotel
|title=Tim The Tiny Horse At Large
+
|author=Ruth Hogan
|rating=4
+
|rating=5
|genre=Humour
 
|summary=It's been a while since Tim and Fly's [[Tim the Tiny Horse by Harry Hill|last adventures]], and changes are afoot in Tim's tiny world: Fly is getting married to his girlfriend. Tim's a little worried because they've only known each other for a week. The marriage goes ahead, and Tim finds himself kicking his heels, so he gets a pet. And so the brief episodes in the life of a horse who lives in a matchbox continue.
 
|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>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Sam Savage
 
|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>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Christopher Moore
 
|title=You Suck
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Humour
 
|summary=You know that old adage about books and covers?  Well this is 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 of the book.  This is not a cocktail thing.  Not even a "Bloody Mary" thing.
 
 
 
Well, except for the tiny bit that is, 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 book, before I opened it at least.  I had assumed it was a collection of real-life on-line signatures - we've all seen them, those straplines people have on all their forum posts.  The obvious response would have been along the lines of 'fair enough, but why is this a book in this day and age, and not a website?'.  But no.  This is a collection of dialogues between two people - shall we call them Sue deNim and Allie Bye, who have a line or two to say to each other, 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 just what it claims on the cover - takes a narrator of zesty, wacky humour, throws him into an unlikely situation (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 University.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848090269</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Simon Brett
 
|title=Blotto, Twinks and the Ex-King's Daughter
 
|rating=4
 
 
|genre=Humour
 
|genre=Humour
|summary=There can be few people who have written eighty books without me even having picked up one of them. At least, and at last, I have redressed that fault in the case of Simon Brett, and have come to the conclusion there are 79 more that will be worth investigating. Here we meet for 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 party.
+
|summary=Tilda returns to Brighton, to tidy away the remains of her mother's life after her death. Whilst there, she returns to the Paradise hotel, a haven for eccentrics and misfits. A place where people can be themselves, and let go of thoughts that torment them elsewhere. Little wonder that Tilda cannot forgive her mother for banishing her as a child, from this place of wonder. With the help of Queenie Malone, caring, and gregarious, Tilda begins to pick apart the tricky and uncertain relationship she had with her sometimes cruel and distant mother.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845299353</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=1683690346
|author=Karl Pilkington
+
|title=The Con Artist
|title=Karlology
+
|author=Fred Van Lente
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Humour
 
|genre=Humour
|summary=The Radio Five film critic Mark Kermode has a rule when reviewing comedies. If he laughs more than five times then the film deserves its billing as a comedy. If that rule was applied to Karl Pilkington's new book Karlology then it would easily fit into the category for there are laugh aplenty in this strange, amusing and charming little book.
+
|summary=Comic-Cons are a place of wonder and sanctuary for many people, and when Comic book artist Mike Mason arrives at San Diego Comic-Con, he's looking for both that and sanctuary with other fans and creators, plus the chance of maybe, just maybe reuniting with his ex. However, when his rival is found dead, Mike is forced to navigate every dark corner of the con in order to clear his name from cosplay flash mobs and intrusive fans to zombie obstacle courses – Mike must prove his innocence and, in doing so, may just unravel a dark secret behind a legendary industry creator.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140533746X</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Joe Stretch
 
|title=Wildlife
 
|rating=3
 
|genre=Humour
 
|summary=The word ''Twitter'' doesn't occur in Joe Stretch's vocabulary, but that's what his book is about. Life in the blogosphere, massively exaggerated, where people don't leave their desks but nevertheless come together (but never literally) in satisfying their deepest, darkest desires. If I've made it sound even faintly exciting, believe me, Joe Stretch is a fantasist with realist tendencies. What he is after is laughter; what he produces is a virtual simulacrum. Sniggery-pokery, jiggery-jokery, he tinkers with the twilight zone of a future-scenario where, for reasons beyond all understanding, some robotic and literal Dickhead (i.e. a man with a dick fixed to his forehead I kid you not) decides to target a few selected humans for a make-over in his own image. Given that virtual worlds exist to pull in punters who don't like themselves in the real one, and their main purpose is to make money, one's only question must be: why?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099532077</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Michael Marr
 
|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>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=1473669588
|author=Rosy Barnes
+
|title=Falling Short
|title=Sadomasochism for Accountants
+
|author=Lex Coulton
|rating=3
 
|genre=Women'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 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>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Lady Annabel Goldsmith
 
|title=Copper: A Dog's Life
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Humour
 
|genre=Humour
|summary=Copper was one of a litter of dogs born to a stray bitch and who was 'adopted' by Lady Annabel Goldsmith - or might it be the other way round?.  Here he tells his story in his own words as transcribed for him by his owner.  He's got his own priorities – and obedience is not one of them – along with a roving spiritIt's perhaps fortunate that he's a dog as this allows you to call him 'cheeky' and 'charming'.  If he was a human being 'randy' and 'arrogant' would be two of the first words which came to mind.
+
|summary=Lex Coulton's debut novel is a story about mistakes, failures, and relationships. The main protagonist, Frances Pilgrim, is a sixth form English teacher who has recently fallen out with her best friend Jackson, a work colleague and is grappling with the increasingly eccentric behaviour of her motherThis relationship is complicated by the fact that Frances's father disappeared at sea when she was five years old.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0751538205</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=1683690133
|author=Tim Moore
+
|title=My Lady's Choosing
|title=I Believe in Yesterday: My Adventures in Living History
+
|author=Kitty Curran and Larissa Zageris
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Humour
 
|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 to those background artistes they have sometimes, walking up and down in Roman centurion gear, or living the historical lifestyle as a re-enactment.
+
|summary=You are a lass of twenty-eight. Plucky, penniless and in Regency-era London the 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 fiesty noble eager to save you from a life alone, and fired by a rogueish sense for adventure. When it comes to suitors though, you'll have to make the ultimate decision between witty, pretty and wealthy Sir Benedict Granville, wholesome, rugged and caring Captain Angus MacTaggart, or the mad, bad and terrifyingly sexy Lord Garraway Craven. With orphans, werewolves, long lost lovers and ancient Egyptian artefacts along the way, it's clear this isn't going to be an easy decision...
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224077813</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=Stibbe_Xmas
|author=L Vaughan Spencer
+
|title=An Almost Perfect Christmas
|title=Don't Be Needy Be Succeedy
+
|author=Nina Stibbe
|rating=4
+
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Humour
 
|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.
+
|summary=Christmas – 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, and if that failed the hair-dryer shoved inside it treatment was your next best bet. Nowadays it's all having to make sure it's suitably free-range and organic – but not too organic that you can go and visit it, and get too friendly with it to want to eat it. Christmas, though, is of course also a time of great boons. It's cash in hand for a lot of plump people who can hire red suits and beards, it was always a godsend for postmen with all the thank-you letters to aunties you saw twice a decade that your parents made you write out in long-hand as a child, and as for the makers of Meltis Newberry Fruits – well, did they even try and sell them any other time of the year?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846681634</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=Doescher_Will
|author=Mark Crick
+
|title=William Shakespeare's the Force Doth Awaken: Star Wars Part the Seventh
|title=Sartre's Sink: The Great Writers' Complete Book of DIY
+
|author=Ian Doescher
|rating=4
+
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Humour
 
|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.
+
|summary=A long time ago, in a galaxy far away, there was a man called William Shakespeare, who was able to create a series of dramatic histories full of machinations most foul, rulers most evil and rebellious heroes and heroines most sturdy. You may or may not have noticed the cinematic version of his original stage play for ''The Force Doth Awaken'', but here at last we get the actual script, complete with annoying-in-different-ways-to-before droids anew, returning heroes from elsewhere in his oeuvre, and people keeping it in the family til it hurts.  And if you need further encouragement, don't forget his audience only demanded three parts of Henry VI – here the series is so popular we're on to part seven – surely making this over twice as good…
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847080472</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
  
{{newreview
+
Move on to [[Newest LGBT Fiction Reviews]]
|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] 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>
 
}}
 

Latest revision as of 13:11, 2 January 2024

1662500491.jpg

Review of

The Bad Weather Friend by Dean Koontz

4.5star.jpg Paranormal

Benny is having a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and his house gets trashed. Oh, and someone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to his home, and it's possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that has trashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the very last person to deserve all this bad luck. He is a nice person. A really nice person. So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to his house is a new friend, a bad weather friend called Spike, who has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. Spike is going to take care of Benny, and will certainly take care of Benny's enemies, if he, Benny, and Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are. Full Review

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Review of

Britain's Best Political Cartoons 2022 by Tim Benson

4star.jpg Humour

Seeking some light relief from the current political turmoil which is coming to seem more and more like an adrenaline sport, I was nudged towards Britain's Best Political Cartoons of 2022. Sharp eyes will have noted that we're not yet through the year: the cartoons run from 4 September 2021 to 31 August 2022. Who can imagine what there will be to come in the 2023 edition? Full Review

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Review of

Staggering Hubris by Josh Berry

4.5star.jpg Humour

Members of Parliament like us to believe that the country is run by politicians, headed by the Prime minister - the primus inter pares (that's for those of you who are Eton and Oxbridge educated) but the reality is that the prime movers are the special advisers - the SPADS - who are the driving force behind the government. We are in the privileged position of having access to the memoirs of Rafe Hubris, the man who was behind the skilful control of the Covid crisis which was completely contained by the end of 2020. You might not know the name now but he will certainly be the man to watch. Full Review

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Review of

My Mess is a Bit of Life: Adventures in Anxiety by Georgia Pritchett

4star.jpg Autobiography

Georgia Pritchett has always been anxious, even as a child. She would worry about whether the monsters under the bed were comfortable: it was the sort of life where if she had nothing to worry about she would become anxious but such occasions were few and far between. On a visit to a therapist, as an adult, when she was completely unable to speak about what was wrong with her it was suggested that she should write it down and My Mess is a Bit of a Life: Adventures in Anxiety is the result - or so we are given to believe. Full Review

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Review of

The Echo Chamber by John Boyne

5star.jpg General Fiction

Meet George Cleverley. He is self-defined as "one of the few television personalities over the age of fifty without a criminal record". He 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 Ukrainian partner "Strictly Come Dancing" paired her with. They have three children, who are a sad-sack with absolutely no social skills whatsoever, a girl who hangs around with a virtue-signalling, keyboard warrior "wokester" who wants to save the world's homeless with out-of-date food, and a fit young lad doing the gay hustle thing. Add in a few other characters – therapists, lawyers, random transgender types – that all have two very different connections to his life, and you have something that suggests an almost farcical approach to the modern world. What suggests the farcical approach even more, however, is the fact this is bloody funny. Full Review

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Review of

The Spy Who Inspired Me by Stephen Clarke

4star.jpg General Fiction

This is a spoof spy story, that isn't about James Bond. Or Ian Fleming. But it features a man called Ian Lemming, who dresses well and 'likes the ladies' and who works for the secret service, but in the planning side of things more than the active service. Lemming finds himself put on a mission with a female spy called Margaux, and the pair end up stranded in Normandy, with Margaux on a desperate mission to unearth traitors in the resistance network, and Lemming desperately trying to keep up with her! Full Review

1529402697.jpg

Review of

Kokoschka's Doll by Afonso Cruz and Rahul Bery (translator)

2.5star.jpg Literary Fiction

Well, this looked very much like a book I could love from the get-go, which is why I picked my review copy up and flipped pages over several times before actually reading any of it. I found things to potentially delight me each time – a weird section in the middle on darker 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. But you've seen the star rating that comes with this review, and can tell that if love was on these pages, it was not actually caused by them. So what happened? Full Review

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Review of

But Never For Lunch by Sandra Aragona

4star.jpg Short Stories

If a woman approaching the menopause can be likened to a Rottweiler in lipstick, an Ambassador nearing retirement resembles a pampered peacock about to be released into the company of carrion crows or, more to the point, about to discover the real world of bus timetables and paying his own gas bills.

You don't get many better opening sentences than that, do you? We first met His Excellency and The Ambassador's Wife in Sorting the Priorities and we learned what it was 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' rather overstates the situation and their dog, Beagle, has no intention of slowing down any time soon, despite being sixteen and deaf. Full Review

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Review of

The Karma Trap by Lisette Boyd

4star.jpg Women's Fiction

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 bad luck is being visited on her and she has a real talent for attracting drama. Her life's chaotic: she dealt with the leak from the shower by putting something down at the bottom of the stairs to absorb the water - then the shower fell through the roof whilst she was in it and 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. Full Review

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Review of

Pandora's Gardener by David C Mason

3star.jpg Crime

John Cranston is a gardener, although what he did before he became a gardener, he claims, is classified. That is just as well because he is about to be caught up in a criminal / spy / terrorist plot, where only he can save the day. Full Review

Jester Forever.jpg

Review of

Forever After: a dark comedy by David Jester

4star.jpg Horror

Michael Holland is a cocky and brash young man who dies and gets made the offer of his lifetime; immortality. We follow Michael, a grim reaper and his friends, Chip (a stoner tooth fairy) and Naff (a stoner in the records department) as they grapple with their long lives and finding a clean surface to sit on in their flat. Full Review

1683691172.jpg

Review of

William Shakespeare's Much Ado About Mean Girls by Ian Doescher

2.5star.jpg Humour

A long time ago, in a galaxy far away, all the Star Wars films were crunched up against Shakespeare, and the marriage seemed a perfectly suitable one. So much so – so easily did the plots and characters converse in Shakespearean dialogue, and behave with Shakespearean stage directions – that the producers tried again, with Back to the Future no less. And that worked. But simultaneously they put a real test out. A film I can't even really remember seeing was transcribed into the original Elizabethan lingo. A cult following I had never followed whatsoever was given the brand new, yet oh so ancient, dressing. Here was the true challenge – would I manage to enjoy this, based on little foreknowledge? Oh damn those shiny gold stars for letting the game away… Full Review

168369094X.jpg

Review of

William Shakespeare's Get Thee Back to the Future! by Ian Doescher

4.5star.jpg Humour

A long time ago, in a publishing house far away, someone thought it wonderfully wacky to rewrite the story of Star Wars in Shakespearean pentameter, colliding two entirely different genres and styles in such a clever way they seemed perfectly suited. It was then duly repeated for all the other films in the main Star Wars cycle, and clearly someone's buffing their quills ready for Episode Nine, the title of which became public knowledge the day before I write. In the hiatus, however, the effort has been made to see if the same shtick works with other texts, and to riff on other seemingly unlikely source materials in iambs. And could we have anything more suitably unsuitable-seeming than Back to the Future, with its tales of time travel, bullying, and parent/child strife like no other? Full Review

1473669065.jpg

Review of

Queenie Malone's Paradise Hotel by Ruth Hogan

5star.jpg Humour

Tilda returns to Brighton, to tidy away the remains of her mother's life after her death. Whilst there, she returns to the Paradise hotel, a haven for eccentrics and misfits. A place where people can be themselves, and let go of thoughts that torment them elsewhere. Little wonder that Tilda cannot forgive her mother for banishing her as a child, from this place of wonder. With the help of Queenie Malone, caring, and gregarious, Tilda begins to pick apart the tricky and uncertain relationship she had with her sometimes cruel and distant mother. Full Review

1683690346.jpg

Review of

The Con Artist by Fred Van Lente

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Comic-Cons are a place of wonder and sanctuary for many people, and when Comic book artist Mike Mason arrives at San Diego Comic-Con, he's looking for both that and sanctuary with other fans and creators, plus the chance of maybe, just maybe reuniting with his ex. However, when his rival is found dead, Mike is forced to navigate every dark corner of the con in order to clear his name – from cosplay flash mobs and intrusive fans to zombie obstacle courses – Mike must prove his innocence and, in doing so, may just unravel a dark secret behind a legendary industry creator. Full Review

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Review of

Falling Short by Lex Coulton

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Lex Coulton's debut novel is a story about mistakes, failures, and relationships. The main protagonist, Frances Pilgrim, is a sixth form English teacher who has recently fallen out with her best friend Jackson, a work colleague and is grappling with the increasingly eccentric behaviour of her mother. This relationship is complicated by the fact that Frances's father disappeared at sea when she was five years old. Full Review

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Review of

My Lady's Choosing by Kitty Curran and Larissa Zageris

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You are a lass of twenty-eight. Plucky, penniless and in Regency-era London the 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 fiesty noble eager to save you from a life alone, and fired by a rogueish sense for adventure. When it comes to suitors though, you'll have to make the ultimate decision between witty, pretty and wealthy Sir Benedict Granville, wholesome, rugged and caring Captain Angus MacTaggart, or the mad, bad and terrifyingly sexy Lord Garraway Craven. With orphans, werewolves, long lost lovers and ancient Egyptian artefacts along the way, it's clear this isn't going to be an easy decision... Full Review

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Review of

An Almost Perfect Christmas by Nina Stibbe

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Christmas – 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, and if that failed the hair-dryer shoved inside it treatment was your next best bet. Nowadays it's all having to make sure it's suitably free-range and organic – but not too organic that you can go and visit it, and get too friendly with it to want to eat it. Christmas, though, is of course also a time of great boons. It's cash in hand for a lot of plump people who can hire red suits and beards, it was always a godsend for postmen with all the thank-you letters to aunties you saw twice a decade that your parents made you write out in long-hand as a child, and as for the makers of Meltis Newberry Fruits – well, did they even try and sell them any other time of the year? Full Review

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Review of

William Shakespeare's the Force Doth Awaken: Star Wars Part the Seventh by Ian Doescher

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A long time ago, in a galaxy far away, there was a man called William Shakespeare, who was able to create a series of dramatic histories full of machinations most foul, rulers most evil and rebellious heroes and heroines most sturdy. You may or may not have noticed the cinematic version of his original stage play for The Force Doth Awaken, but here at last we get the actual script, complete with annoying-in-different-ways-to-before droids anew, returning heroes from elsewhere in his oeuvre, and people keeping it in the family til it hurts. And if you need further encouragement, don't forget his audience only demanded three parts of Henry VI – here the series is so popular we're on to part seven – surely making this over twice as good… Full Review

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