Dead Famous

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Ben Elton

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Pages: 384 (Paperback)

ISBN: 0552999458

Pub: Black Swan

Pub date: 2002-07-01

Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 23888

Editorial Review:

Ben Elton's Dead Famous brings together his talents in comedy and crime writing to produce a hilarious and devastating novel on the gruesome world of reality TV. Peeping Tom productions invent the perfect TV programme: House Arrest. Its slogan is: "One house. Ten contestants. Thirty cameras. Forty microphones. One survivor." This is all a clever parody of the massive TV hit Big Brother, with its vain, ambitious contestants with their:
tattoos and their nipple rings, their mutual interest in star signs, their endless hugging and touching, and above all their complete lack of genuine intellectual curiosity about one single thing on this planet that was not directly connected with themselves.
However, Elton adds a clever twist to this very funny send-up. On Day 27 of the programme, one of the housemates is killed live on TV. Everyone in the country has a theory about the killer, "indeed the only person who seemed to have absolutely no idea whatsoever of the killer's identity was Inspector Stanley Spencer Coleridge, the police officer in charge of the investigation". Coleridge is an old fogey from the 1950s, who has to learn quickly about lesbians, piercings, blow jobs and the seductions of TV fame before he can crack the case. Elton's wicked parody of the housemates is brilliant, the murder fiendish in its ingenuity, and the ending wonderfully over the top. Dead Famous is great fun, and even has some social comment thrown in for good measure. --Jerry Brotton

Reader Reviews:

Insufferably smug sneer at popular culture (0/1 people found this helpful)

The only other Ben Elton book I'd read before I attempted this was his Great War whodunnit The First Casualty and I thought that was so-so. It was predictable and clichéd. So I thought I'd try this one for only 99p. It has to be worth 99p, right? Er, no. If the reality television show Big Brother is vacuous and boring in its spontaneity then this book is even more vacuous and boring for trying too hard to belittle Big Brother and its viewers. After all, this generation's popular culture is next generation's high culture! And this generation's high culture (with which I'm sure Elton would like to be associated) is next generation's quaint misapprehensions.

I think if you're a secret Big Brother viewer and a critic of it in public then you'll really enjoy this book as it will satisfy both needs. If you love Big Brother and you're proud of it then you'll probably think Elton is an insufferable snob. If you're like me and you think Big Brother is boring but you respect the right of others to like it then you'll find Elton both boring and objectionable. However, the boring bit far outweighs the objectionable bit. Simply put, and like with First Casualty, the characters have about the depth and transparency of a gold-fish bowl (i.e. not very deep, very transparent) which meant that after the first chapter I couldn't care less (1) who had died, (2) who the killer is, (3) what the motive was, (4) if the killer was caught, etc. My main concerns are (1) have I creased the spine after only one chapter and (2) can I sell it on as new?

Verdict: vote Elton off. Don't bother reading this. The theory's good but the execution is poor.

This will happen one day (0/0 people found this helpful)

This is yet another great book by Ben Elton.But there have been so many reviews that everything has been said.so, i'm just gonna agree with the good ones.Highly recommended.

Bigged Up. We Like That. But Not Perfect. (3/3 people found this helpful)

I actually read this book after having read "Past Mortem" and I have to say that while it is a great page-turner, it is not quite as "maturely" written as I would have liked.

A classic whodunnit style with a few twists and plenty of Eltonesque comedy. Not very taxing on the brain (and fairly predictable) which is fine, but it only just hits the mark as far as the intended "social commentary" is concerned.

Either way, I'm glad I read it, and I would recommend it as an entertaining read.

Not that good really (2/4 people found this helpful)

I read this book and never quite got to the end - it just wasn't worth the effort. The work-reward ratio didn't make it worth finishing.
It is predictable, and nowhere near as clever as Ben thinks it is.
Characters were very two dimensional and the whole plot just plods along, and I think it was generally a poor effort.
I think there was too much emphasis put on Ben's 'clever message' to the world and not the story and characters.
By the way - I'm a big ben elton fan - but just not of this book.

Comedy meets social critique (2/2 people found this helpful)

I'm one of those people who think you can't go far wrong with Ben Elton - his sarcasm and biting wit never fail to hit the spot.

This time, he takes on the Big Brother / reality TV phenomenon and really rips into it, creating not only an excellent social commentary but a brilliant murder mystery as well.

A page turner and a very funny read

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