“Declan Burke is his own genre. The Lammisters dazzles, beguiles and transcends. Virtuoso from start to finish.” – Eoin McNamee “This bourbon-smooth riot of jazz-age excess, high satire and Wodehouse flamboyance is a pitch-perfect bullseye of comic brilliance.” – Irish Independent Books of the Year 2019 “This rapid-fire novel deserves a place on any bookshelf that grants asylum to PG Wodehouse, Flann O’Brien or Kyril Bonfiglioli.” – Eoin Colfer, Guardian Best Books of the Year 2019 “The funniest book of the year.” – Sunday Independent “Declan Burke is one funny bastard. The Lammisters ... conducts a forensic analysis on the anatomy of a story.” – Liz Nugent “Burke’s exuberant prose takes centre stage … He plays with language like a jazz soloist stretching the boundaries of musical theory.” – Totally Dublin “A mega-meta smorgasbord of inventive language ... linguistic verve not just on every page but every line.Irish Times “Above all, The Lammisters gives the impression of a writer enjoying himself. And so, dear reader, should you.” – Sunday Times “A triumph of absurdity, which burlesques the literary canon from Shakespeare, Pope and Austen to Flann O’Brien … The Lammisters is very clever indeed.” – The Guardian

Friday, October 16, 2009

The Witchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy

Eoin Colfer (right, just after stepping out of the Total Perspective Vortex) is currently on the road promoting AND ANOTHER THING …, which is the sixth in the increasingly improbable Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy trilogy. The pic comes courtesy of the Bookwitch (and by ‘courtesy of’ I mean ‘borrowed without asking’), who was in attendance when Eoin did his schtick in Manchester earlier this week, when – among other things – Eoin announced that his first impression of THE HITCHHIKER’S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY was ‘Monty Python meets Pink Floyd, in space’. Hyper-jump on over to the Bookwitch for lots more in that vein …
  As for yours truly, and acknowledging that you care not a whit about my opinion, I’m about two-thirds of the way through AND ANOTHER THING … and enjoying it immensely. It’s close enough to Douglas Adams’ style that it’s a bona fide Hitchhiker’s book, and yet it has enough of Eoin Colfer to make it more than slavish imitation. And Eoin Colfer, although it shouldn’t need to be said, is a very funny man.
  The only downside is the continuing absence of Marvin, the Paranoid Android, who gave voice to what is probably my favourite line in all sci-fi: “Why stop now, just when I’m hating it?” Oh well, you can’t have everything. But if you are in the mood for some depressing whining to get you through the weekend, here’s Radiohead with a particularly mournful live version of Paranoid Android. Altogether now: “When I am King / You will be first against the wall …”. Roll it there, Collette …

4 comments:

adrian mckinty said...

Dec

I read it this week as I knew I would. I've got to say that while I enjoyed the plot and admired its speed and cleverness I didnt find the book particularly funny. I didnt laugh out loud once. Smiled a few times sure, but Adams gave me big belly laughs.

Anonymous said...

Stealing is fine, Mr Burke. However, my photographer, Miss H Giles, is crying in her Shreddies over lack of photo credits. (But I think I forgot that as well...)

Helen said...

That's MY photo... :P

Anonymous said...

Adrian, maybe it's you who changed? I know I react differently to books now than I did 20 years ago. And maybe Douglas Adams would have written differently today, if he'd done the book himself?

When Hitchhiker was new, or the reader very young (whichever came first), Douglas Adams's style was much more of a pleasant surprise.