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3.8 AVERAGE
3.8 AVERAGE
funny
lighthearted
medium-paced
Although, I had heard of Adrian Mole, I didn't get round to reading any of the books until a couple of years ago when I read the first in the series. I seem to have managed to skip the books in between and have dived back in with this one, so a lot has happened, although it stood quite well on its own all things considered. The diary format makes it very easy and quick to read and I soon raced through it. The whole situation with Marigold had me shouting at him, how on earth could he not just make the break. Also the debt thing wound me up a bit too, although I guess he's not in a minority, you hear of people in this situation all the time. The thing that amused me the most was his letters complaining about the swan in the river which somehow ended up with a reply back to him regarding Mr Swan!
I think this is my favourite Adrian Mole book. I love the politics and the insistence of Blair being in the right, I love Marigold and the ridiculous never-ending charades. Mostly I love the ongoing feud with the swans. A swan can break a man's arm, you know.
A really good book once again from Townsend. Everything seems to go wrong for Adrian, and especially at the end of the novel I feel strongly for him.
Humour, pathos and satire the book keeps you glued and smiling
Still thinking the world revolved around him, Adrian keeps to his diary and pours out his secrets. This book finds him older, with his younger son back in Nigeria with his (the son's) mother, and his older son in the British army. This book is an anti Iraq war polemic; Adrian trusts Tony Blair when he tells the country about the WMDs, and Adrian encourages his son that the war will be over soon, with devastating results.
I'm not sure what it is with the Adrian Mole series. In print I'd likely not give the book a second glance, nor if I did buy it, even enjoy it. But the excellent narration of the audio book (courtesy of BBC Radio 4) has had me gripped throughout.
In a strange way, I'm really quite looking forward to the next release.
In a strange way, I'm really quite looking forward to the next release.
funny
lighthearted
relaxing
Adrian Mole is 34 and on blundering his way into middle-age-dom. Divorced, and an absent parent to his two children who are as far-flung as Nigeria and Kuwait (where his teenage son Glenn is on military duty), he deals anew with the responsibilities of owning a new loft apartment he can't afford, and his daily troubles involve battling a group of swans from the canal his apartment faces, led by the most aggressive of the pack, whom he christens Gielgud. Sounds like Adrian's teenage dilemmas and insecurities when he was 13¾ are way way way behind him, right?
He is still smitten with his childhood sweetheart, the unattainable Pandora, who is now a politician and Labour MP. He flirts with Marigold Flowers, a customer at the small independent bookshop he is working at, and soon finds her to be a clingy and manipulative hypochondriac and tries unsuccessfully to ditch her, while falling for her older sister, the enigmatic Daisy. Meanwhile, he writes letters to celebrities like tabloid queen Jordan (in 2003 where this novel is situated) and David Beckham, in an attempt to secure interviews with them (at his convenience, no less) for his book, working title "Celebrities and Madness".
Against this frivolity that forms Adrian Mole's year-and-a-half in this installment, he has to deal with grittier issues like suddenly homeless parents who decide to live out on the fields of pig stys in (where else) the Piggeries in a hasty investment venture, real fear for his son Glenn, who gets caught up in the Iraq war, while Mole declares his undying support for Tony Blair's government, and quite vocally in a series of embarrassing letters. He also tries to keep his flagging bookclub alive while compounding his debt by signing up for more and more bank credit.
Those who have followed the Adrian Mole through his pimply youth would also recognise his BFF Nigel. In this book, Nigel becomes clinically blind, and feels like a sobering reference to Townsend's own blindness, diagnosed round the time of writing of this novel. It is commendable that she does not colour the account of Nigel's blindness with tragic overtones, but blends it into Adrian's story with darkly comic strokes.
Though raucously funny, I felt a tinge of sadness when I was reading Adrian's diary entries, not just at Townsend's recent passing, but because Adrian Mole is all grown-up agewise, but yet so beguilingly and identifiably inadequate as an adult. You worry that Adrian will never ever get his act together, and realise that even though he's a fictional charactor, you identify with him because he is the sum of all your worst fears about your adult self. At least you get to laugh about it, so maybe it won't be so bad.
He is still smitten with his childhood sweetheart, the unattainable Pandora, who is now a politician and Labour MP. He flirts with Marigold Flowers, a customer at the small independent bookshop he is working at, and soon finds her to be a clingy and manipulative hypochondriac and tries unsuccessfully to ditch her, while falling for her older sister, the enigmatic Daisy. Meanwhile, he writes letters to celebrities like tabloid queen Jordan (in 2003 where this novel is situated) and David Beckham, in an attempt to secure interviews with them (at his convenience, no less) for his book, working title "Celebrities and Madness".
Against this frivolity that forms Adrian Mole's year-and-a-half in this installment, he has to deal with grittier issues like suddenly homeless parents who decide to live out on the fields of pig stys in (where else) the Piggeries in a hasty investment venture, real fear for his son Glenn, who gets caught up in the Iraq war, while Mole declares his undying support for Tony Blair's government, and quite vocally in a series of embarrassing letters. He also tries to keep his flagging bookclub alive while compounding his debt by signing up for more and more bank credit.
Those who have followed the Adrian Mole through his pimply youth would also recognise his BFF Nigel. In this book, Nigel becomes clinically blind, and feels like a sobering reference to Townsend's own blindness, diagnosed round the time of writing of this novel. It is commendable that she does not colour the account of Nigel's blindness with tragic overtones, but blends it into Adrian's story with darkly comic strokes.
Though raucously funny, I felt a tinge of sadness when I was reading Adrian's diary entries, not just at Townsend's recent passing, but because Adrian Mole is all grown-up agewise, but yet so beguilingly and identifiably inadequate as an adult. You worry that Adrian will never ever get his act together, and realise that even though he's a fictional charactor, you identify with him because he is the sum of all your worst fears about your adult self. At least you get to laugh about it, so maybe it won't be so bad.
emotional
funny
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Moderate: War
Minor: Death