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‘Fascinating and hugely entertaining’
Daily Telegraph
‘It’s not like other comedians’ memoirs. It’s funny’
Guardian
The Sayles might not have been the only Jewish atheist communist family in Liverpool, but Alexei knew from an early age that they were one of the more eccentric.
Born on the day egg rationing came to an end, Alexei was the only child of Joe, an affable trade unionist who led the family on railway expeditions across eastern Europe, and Molly, a hot-tempered red-head who terrified teachers and insisted Alexei see the Red Army Choir instead of the Beatles.
Perceptive and hilarious, this is a portrait of a family, a city, a country and a continent going through enormous changes.
‘Sayle’s book has charm and substance, both as memoir and history’
Times Literary Supplement
Daily Telegraph
‘It’s not like other comedians’ memoirs. It’s funny’
Guardian
The Sayles might not have been the only Jewish atheist communist family in Liverpool, but Alexei knew from an early age that they were one of the more eccentric.
Born on the day egg rationing came to an end, Alexei was the only child of Joe, an affable trade unionist who led the family on railway expeditions across eastern Europe, and Molly, a hot-tempered red-head who terrified teachers and insisted Alexei see the Red Army Choir instead of the Beatles.
Perceptive and hilarious, this is a portrait of a family, a city, a country and a continent going through enormous changes.
‘Sayle’s book has charm and substance, both as memoir and history’
Times Literary Supplement
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Reviews
'Sayle shares with [Alan] Bennett the genius for making the mundane fascinating'
If the result is like his other books, it will have a moral centre, there'll be bleak bits - and it will be very funny indeed.
'The brilliant satires on modern life of Alexei Sayle (the only comedian worth his salt as a novelist) are contemporary gems.'
'Being able to wrap up a big moral conundrum with the guise of a fizzing entertainment is a considerable gift...it is wonderfully entertaining and tells us a lot about what it is like to live in 21st century Britain.'
Sayle's book has charm and substance, both as memoir and history.