- Hardcover
- Publisher: HarperCollins Canada / Trade (Nov 27 2007)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0007263392
- ISBN-13: 978-0007263394
- Product Dimensions: 18 x 13 x 1.8 cm
- Shipping Weight: 181 g
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||
Product Details |
Product Description
Review
'A funny look at what happens of you push your children too hard.' Evening Standard 'Spikily satirical narrative poem with retro illustrations by the author.' Time Out Praise for 'Have I Got Views for You': 'Johnson is a good-humoured, entertaining commentator, with an agreeably optimistic bent.' Observer Praise for 'The Dream of Rome': 'I read it in two sittings, completely gripped. If Ruth Kelly has an ounce of sense, she will make this book compulsory reading for every 16-year old in the country.' Toby Young, New Statesman 'History comes alive only when written from the heart and Johnson's is full of swashbuckling japes, bloodthirsty yells and energetic sideswipes.' Craig Brown, Mail on Sunday 'Written with all the wit and zest that have helped to make him Britain's favourite celebrity MP.' Tom Holland, Daily Telegraph Praise for 'Friends, Voters, Countrymen': 'Johnson has cracked the art of making politics invigorating.' Daily Telegraph 'Such an entertaining read.' Daily Mail 'It is very funny and has, in short, all the idiosyncracies of its author.' Jeremy Paxman
Product Description
Written and illustrated by Boris Johnson The nicest kids you ever saw Were Jim and Molly Albacore! Alas for Molly and Jim, Their lives were not entirely cushy: Their parents were so very pushy. Mr and Mrs Albacore will do anything to get their offspring to the top of the pile. Father reads great literary works to them before they are even born, and puts them down for MENSA at five, Mother is not content unless her darlings are the star of every show. Molly and Jim, however, are happiest eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and watching telly. In this very funny book, Boris Johnson issues a verse warning to all pushy parents! if you push your children far enough they may push back, with dire consequences. Illustrated with delightful line drawings by the author.
Tag this product(What's this?)Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organize and find favorite items. |
Customer Reviews
|
There are no customer reviews yet on Amazon Canada
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
2.0 out of 5 stars (1 customer review)
2.0 out of 5 stars
The Perils of Boris Johnson., May 30 2008
By Robert P. Beveridge "xterminal" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Perils of the Pushy Parents (Hardcover)
Boris Johnson, The Perils of the Pushy Parents (Harper, 2007)
Boris Johnson, Conservative Party MP and (as of this writing) the CP's candidate for Mayor of London in the 2008 elections, coming up in just two weeks, is not only a lunkheaded politician. He also fancies himself a sort of Conservative Roald Dahl, at least within the purview of his eighth (as far as I can tell) book, The Perils of the Pushy Parents. Now, when I got a press release about this some months ago, I gathered somehow that this book was self- or vanity-published; when I got a friend from across the pond to score me a copy, imagine my surprise when I looked at the same and saw the HarperCollins imprint. Yes, folks, Boris Johnson is big news in the book publishing world. And how could he not be, with illustrations that look as if they were drawn by a not-particularly-gifted twelve-year-old suffering from the early stages of Parkinson's and such timeless poetry as:
"The People's Circus of Beijing
Is suddenly not quite the thing.
Paintballing? A football match?
No, none of these are up to scratch.
'We need', mused mum, 'a novel theme
For little Molly's birthday dream.'
She crooked an eyebrow as she spoke.
Was that a muffled childish croak
Beyond the door? She frowned. But now
Dad yelped and smote his bulging brow."
Okay, yes, I'll grudgingly admit that it shows a great deal more of a sense of rhythm than most amateur poets do, even if it does have that four-on-the-floor thud thing going on, and it is kind of clever now and again. But, oh, lord, is it heavy-handed. You can't really get that from this excerpt (which I chose by opening the book at random), but despite the fact that I'm thoroughly behind Johnson's premise here-- that parents who spend all their time planning their childrens' days to mold them into little version of the parents need to step back and get slapped around a bit-- I do wish he'd kept to the amusing, clever bit instead of wallowing off into "the moral of the story is..." ground at the end.
Mildly amusing, but if you're reading this in America, don't let yourself be goaded into asking a British friend to procure you a copy unless you're full of morbid curiosity about the writings of a member of parliament, and what he could possibly have to say in a kids' book. It's right up there with Ted Kennedy's My Senator and Me. **
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
