Be Specific About Containing Books The Rotters' Club (Rotters' Club #1)
Title | : | The Rotters' Club (Rotters' Club #1) |
Author | : | Jonathan Coe |
Book Format | : | Paperback |
Book Edition | : | Anniversary Edition |
Pages | : | Pages: 415 pages |
Published | : | February 4th 2003 by Vintage (first published February 22nd 2001) |
Categories | : | Fiction. Historical. Historical Fiction. Contemporary. European Literature. British Literature |
Jonathan Coe
Paperback | Pages: 415 pages Rating: 3.96 | 10386 Users | 601 Reviews
Chronicle During Books The Rotters' Club (Rotters' Club #1)
Birmingham, England, c. 1973: industrial strikes, bad pop music, corrosive class warfare, adolescent angst, IRA bombings. Four friends: a class clown who stoops very low for a laugh; a confused artist enthralled by guitar rock; an earnest radical with socialist leanings; and a quiet dreamer obsessed with poetry, God, and the prettiest girl in school. As the world appears to self-destruct around them, they hold together to navigate the choppy waters of a decidedly ambiguous decade.Declare Books Supposing The Rotters' Club (Rotters' Club #1)
Original Title: | The Rotters' Club |
ISBN: | 0375713123 (ISBN13: 9780375713125) |
Edition Language: | English |
Series: | Rotters' Club #1 |
Setting: | Midlands, England Birmingham, England |
Literary Awards: | Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction (2001) |
Rating Containing Books The Rotters' Club (Rotters' Club #1)
Ratings: 3.96 From 10386 Users | 601 ReviewsWeigh Up Containing Books The Rotters' Club (Rotters' Club #1)
Telling his controversially romantic story Jonathan Coe is at the same time most ironic and nostalgic.When we grow up it seems to us that we live in the best of times. But reality may be quite different And the middle of the seventies was the time of stagnation. They sat and drank their pints. The tables in which their faces were dimly reflected were dark brown, the darkest brown, the colour of Bournville chocolate. The walls were a lighter brown, the colour of Dairy Milk. The carpet was brown,A wonderful tale of growing up in 1970s Britain, with its strikes, powerful unions, IRA bombings; and the joys and hardships of the Trotter family. Near the end of the book are the reminiscences of Benjamin Trotter: a real "tour de force" of author Jonathan Coe, for it runs for 37 pages without a single full stop... And it is still very readable!
Jonathan Coe's a jolly nice chap, and his articles on various topics are interesting, above all his long campaign championing B.S.Johnson, which I remember him launching in The Spectator in 1991, culminating in the superb biography. So it's a shame that I have to admit I've never thought much of his own fiction, which always seems to be quite bland, cliched prose stapled together with awkward attempts at Johnsonian formal experimentalism, which only emphasise how far he's falling short of his
I could not finish this book. The characters are boring and flat. The author switches between the charecters so frequently and at such quantity its hard to keep up with the names and relations.
By page 300 I was pretty sure about the review I'd give this book. I definitely wasn't expecting this... The end really messed me up. The whole Green napkin part was excrutiating. A ~40 page long sentence????? ARE YOU PEOPLE MAD? IT WAS HORRIBLE. The whole time I thought this sure makes up for Benjamin's lack of responses during conversations throughout the book. "Longest English sentence. 13,955 words". Damn you, Jonathan Coe. This book left me exhausted. Loved it.
Damn, I loved this book. Keeping one half of my mind on what I was reading and the rest on how I was feeling, thinking and believing in respect to what he had to say. This book kept me present in the moment - completely and authentically witnessing whatever was being conveyed. Few books manage to accomplish this. When those times came where my reading was interrupted I couldnt wait to return to the story. Coe makes it so easy to pick up his characters transmissions. There is zero interference.
Much to my delight, this held up very strong on the second read. Before I re-read it, I browsed through some of the reviews others had written on this site, and it made me nervous - maybe I just loved this book so much because I was young and it's about youth, so I just connected to it out of a common vim and vigor.Not the case.Not only did I love it the second time around, I think I liked it even more.As much as I don't like to compare authors so much, I can't help but describe this as Rushdie
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