A first novel written by a Welsh poet and not at all what I expected - not many books make me laugh out loud but this one did! It's the story of Oliver, a teenager, full of angst, self obsession and curiosity and part of a dysfunctional family. Oliver is a cross between Adrian Mole, Christopher (Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime) and Holden Caulfield. A definite edge there along with the humour.

... I have been using covert analysis to discover my parents' secrets. One of the things I have discovered is that, although my father's beard looks ginger at a distance, when you get close it is in fact a subtle blend of black, blond and strawberry. I have also learnt that my parents have not had sex in two months. I monitor their intimacy via the dimmer switch in their bedroom. I know when they have been at it because the next morning the dial will still be set to halfway. I also discovered that my father suffers from bouts of depression. I found a bottle of tricyclic antidepressants that were in the wicker bin under his bedside table. I still have the bottle among my old Transformers. It takes all of my intuition to find out when a bout of my father's depression has started. Here are two signals: one, I can hear him emptying the dishwasher from my attic room. Two, he presses so hard when he handwrites that it is possible, in a certain light, to see two or three days of notes indented in the surface of our plastic easy-clean tablecloth.
...'Please record channel 4, 9pm, LLoyd '
My father does not watch TV, he just records things. There are ways of detecting that a bout of depression has finished: if dad makes an elaborate play on words or does an impression of a gay or oriental person. These are good signs.

Brilliant! You will laugh out loud at this feast of ironic and tongue in cheek humour. Liam buys the house next door to his best friend, but doesn't tell him. He then knocks a hole in the wall between the two houses so that he can 'visit' while they are out. Will he be found out or will his excuses save him? Great holiday read.

I got in and shut the wardrobe door behind me. (Remembering, as I always seemed to, that 'It is very foolish to shut oneself into any wardrobe' and delighting in ignoring it.) I slackened off the fishing line at each corner of my wardrobe. Then I moved the bowling ball (still in its box) and lifted out the brick plug at the bottom left. Nudging out the white board, as usual, I was able to tip it forward to rest against Iman's clothes rail. I slow-dived through the bottom left corner of my wardrobe into the bottom right corner of Iman's. I reached back through for the white carrier bag. Nice and easy.

If you want to be embarrassed, read this book while commuting. You will definitely giggle and sometimes laugh out loud. And people will give you some very peculiar looks. This is a fun read - it took me no time at all to get through it. Oh, and it helps if you like David Bowie.

He was wearing a rainbow sweater with knitted crochets and quavers. I couldn't take his depression seriously. His jumper wouldn't let me.

Will teenage Jack and his faithful Eddie Bear find out who murdered Humpty Dumpty and Little Boy Blue? Of course they will, but as the crazy plot and inimitable dialogue spin ever more out of control who really cares? Just enjoy another amazing book from the (luckily) fertile pen of Robert Rankin.

'Well', said Miss Muffett, it would appear that you two have the perfect relationship.'
'We do,' the pair agreed.
'But,' said Miss Muffett, 'things are not always as they appear and after the commercial break that is coming right up, I'll be introducing several other guests: a clockwork fireman who claims that for the last three years he has been having a gay relationship with Garth, and two dollies who have borne his children. And if that isn't enough, we'll be bringing on a straw dog who insists that Chardonnay is, as he puts it, his bitch.'

This quirky little tale of a widow's love for her husband, stray dogs, table football and classical music set in a village full of interesting characters is an absolute joy to read. Poignant and hugely entertaining, its sombre themes of loss and ageing are handled in a hugely agreeable way.

Everyone would remember that it happened the year a cow became mayor of Oucwègne. A cow, that's right - more precisely, a Blonde d'Aquitaine, known by farmers as an exceptional beef breed. Her phenomenal rump made her the queen of the annual fairs, her coat of soft-pile carpet had a colour that went well with most furniture, even modern, and when she mooed it was never with discontent but always an apt comment from the sidelines, witty and pertinent.

Arcadio is desperate to find love; when he buys and grows some love seeds the results are funny, chaotic and unexpectedly successful. With a style as lush as the results of the cloud of ardour released over the unsuspecting friends and neighbours - no one is spared the effects and that includes Gezabel, the articulate and love struck mule who tells the story.

The impulse that was ticking away in Arcadio Carnabuci was not confined to himself and the plants. No. Animals felt it too. The spiders in their spangled webs yearned for love, and spun sonnets of a fragile and unbearable beauty, glazed with tears of dew. Scorpions in dark corners clipped their castanets in courtship, and then curled up in pairs in discarded shoes, snug as bugs .... The humble newts in the waterspout sang in deep voices. The frogs and the toads joined in with them, and soon a chorus of magical croaking was filling the air. The music they made was so beautiful it made those who heard it weep and yearn for the life of an amphibian so they could unlock the secret of the song.

I loved this book. Mark Haddon seems to get hold of the silly things that occupy all of us and turn them into a believable story. George and his 'dysfunctional' family are both funny and touching, like most families.

After putting the phone down he realised, of course, that he had forgotten to find the chisel before getting into the bath. Jean was going to be cross enough already. If she discovered that he had made the mess while cutting the cancer off with her special scissors she would be incandescent.
The chisel, however, was in the cellar, and the cellar was a long way away.
He wondered whether he had remembered to put the phone down.
Then he wondered whether he had got around to remembering his address before putting the phone down. Assuming that he had indeed put the phone down.
They could trace calls.
At least they could in films.
But in films you could make someone pass out by squeezing their shoulder.
He caught sight of himself in the hall mirror and wondered why a crazy, old, naked, bleeding man was standing next to their phone table.

Wonderful depiction of family relationships seen through the eyes of an eleven year old boy. Extremely funny at times but also very dark and disturbing.

I sit up till late reading the library book, The Truth about Lie Detection, and with a new pen and a new exercise book I start writing about lies and the way people behave when they lie. I call the book The Gol of Seil and I write about my father's lie and about my grandmother's lie and then about my mother's strange reaction to the truth.

The habits and lifestyle of people in foreign countries take some getting used to and even when you have worked them out don't always seem sane. For our hero from another planet this is doubly the case. I have more sympathy for him than for the citizens and officials of Barcelona on this evidence! May well appeal to fans of Monty Python.

19.15 Been on the ceiling for an hour now, and the mastiff looks neither tried nor bored. Try hypnotizing it, but its brain is so elementary that there is hardly any difference between it being awake or asleep. Only succeed with great difficulty in making it squint, which means it no longer looks so menacing, but twice as ugly.
20.15 Two hours on the ceiling and this sonofabitch is still growling at me. In the end it is bound to get bored and go off to sleep somewhere, but I am worried at the idea that my neighbour might come back before this and find a Hindu stuck to her ceiling.

This tongue-in-cheek view of the world of music is the tale of unconventional pop duo 'Down by law' and their search for notoriety. The surreal experiences and characters made me laugh out loud on more than one occasion. With Mickie James disabled by a hunchback, this rising pop sensation defies the stereotypical boy band mould. It’s their passion for their music, and for each other, which makes this such a heart-warming read.

'Listen', I said. 'I've got this line going around in my head, "Potato peelers of the world unite," and I think I've got a bit of a chorus.' I put down the potato I was holding and hummed the few bars I had.
'That's not bad actually,' said Mickie James, 'but I think we'd have to change the words 'potato peelers'. The repetition of the p sound is a bit obvious'.
'I know what you mean,'
'Shut that door', said Mickie James, 'it'll give the room better acoustics.'
That's what's good about Mickie James; musically no one can touch him. With the door closed the room had a kind of haunting echo to it. The echo was further given a dampening effect by all the potatoes over the floor. We couldn't have wished for a better studio.
Pretty soon we had the whole of the first verse worked out and a title. We called it, 'The Uniting of the Potato Two'. The song was kind of a working-class anthem, sort of the thing Elvis Costello usually writes. What was genius about our song though was that Mickie James worked out this whole staccato bass beat backing which pushed it into Kylie territory.