This collection of monthly magazine columns by Sue Townsend, author of the Adrian Mole books, is (she claims) as close to a memoir as we are going to have from her. Each piece is light as foam, and not meant to last a great deal longer, and yet her accounts of her travels, her frustrations with 29 drafts of various screenplays, her travails as a smoker in a nonsmoking world, her struggle through a snowstorm to meet a newborn grandchild are tart, lighthearted, and charming, and there are worse things in a wicked world. Carolyn Oldershaw reads with exactly the right wry feel for the ridiculous. B.G. © AudioFile 2003, Portland, Maine--
Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine
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Review
While not an autobiography, this collection of irresistible pieces by Adrian Mole's creator makes for funny, touching and perceptive reading. The vision of Britain that comes across in these pages is sardonic and joyful, celebrating the eccentricities of the English while maintaining a clear-eyed distance. Sue Townsend takes us into a world of sun-worshippers, writers who don't want to write, garden centre lovers and other peculiarly English characters. Her monthly column for Sainsbury's Magazine covers everything from hosepipe bans and Spanish restaurants to writer's block, and although (inevitably) not all pieces maintain the same level of inspiration, they are never less than diverting.
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by Sue Townsend
