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rrrebeccajayne's review against another edition
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
1.5
nick_jenkins's review against another edition
4.0
I feel there are some interesting affinities here with another novel about British office life and the tedium thereof: Eley Williams's The Liar's Dictionary. Both are, in different ways, about revenge, and both employ bomb threats and explosives, although one has a very high body-count and the other does not. (Spoiler, I guess—once you read one, you'll know something about the other.)
The profoundly undermotivated Malry is a puzzling creature, and I feel like it would require teaching this novel or writing an article about it to unpack everything that is going on here. Certainly a novel with depths and wrinkles, something worth rereading.
The profoundly undermotivated Malry is a puzzling creature, and I feel like it would require teaching this novel or writing an article about it to unpack everything that is going on here. Certainly a novel with depths and wrinkles, something worth rereading.
missmelia's review against another edition
funny
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
schnauzermum's review against another edition
5.0
This is the first book by B S Johnson that I’ve read. Don’t be put off by his reputation for experimentalism. This is a darkly humorous and playful novel. Christie, a relatively lowly clerk, takes up a sort of double-entry book-keeping - every aggravation he suffers must be balanced by some means of recompense. This starts in a fairly minor way: returning empty reply-paid envelopes, writing to the local Council to ask them to investigate the claims of the local church to have ‘the answer to all problems, personal, political and international’ under the Trade Descriptions Act. Of course, things escalate. Recommended.
technomage's review against another edition
4.0
Strange and wonderful and it made me laugh at the end. Definitely recommend this and again thanks to backlisted.
egioia's review
4.0
This book was incredibly readable for "experimental" fiction. While I thought it was well-written and interesting, I wish it had been more developed. The end was a let down - too abrupt and contrived (though self-consciously that way).