Man and Wife |
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Tony Parsons
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Pages: (Audio CD)
ISBN: 0007146698
Pub: HarperCollins Audio
Pub date: 2002-09-02
Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 527136
Editorial Review:
Man and Wife, the sequel to Tony Parsons' bestselling debut Man and Boy, follows the marital and parental misadventures of Harry Silver, a mawkish North London television producer. Harry has remarried. Second wife, Cyd, and her feisty daughter, Peggy, provide him and his Phantom Menace obsessed son, Pat, with a family. Harry's luck couldn't be better. His television show, Fish on Friday, is a hit and Cyd's posh catering company, Food Glorious Food, is thriving. However, Harry is not the only one starting again. His ex-wife Gina has also remarried. Her partner Richard (who must be the only thirtysomething male on the planet who hates Star Wars) is Pat's "new father." When the couple announce they are moving to America--taking Pat with them--Harry reacts, in time-honoured fashion, by attacking Richard. Separated from his son by the Atlantic and struggling as Peggy's stepfather, Harry begins to yearn for a good old-fashioned "normal, family life"--the kind his lovely old mum and dear departed dad enjoyed. Rather surprisingly, he decides that Kazumi, an attractive Japanese photographer friend of Gina's, could be the answer to his prayers.
Male frailty and the perils of modern parenting are Parsons' forte, but Man and Wife, although occasionally touching, is overburdened by plot twists, unlikely conceits and whiffs of reactionary sentimentality. Parsons' fans are unlikely to be disappointed but, to indulge in a vaguely pertinent comparison, this follow up is definitely more Attack of the Clones than The Empire Strikes Back. --Travis Elborough, Amazon.com
Reader Reviews:
Tripe (0/0 people found this helpful)
Tony Parsons has been adopting the Chick lit approach of writing novels & passing them off as "blokish" as its from the mouth of a chap. Its just a repackaged Sophie Kinsella/Marion Keynes/Jill Mansell under a guy.
Dismal sentimental rehash (0/0 people found this helpful)
I can't believe I got through this book. It was like a Craig Brown parody of a Tony Parsons book. "Becase that was her. My wife. The woman I loved. Wife. My wife. who loved me." etc. The whole thing is like being cornered by some godawful self-obsessed drunk at a party, mumbling about how he's just an old romantic and if only women understood that he just wants to be loved- meanwhile the women who tried are left abandoned because they're not thrilling enough for Our Hero. To read this, you'd think the author knows nothing about children (did a child in the universe ever speak like the appalling Peggy? Did one ever radiate as much joyful sunlight as His Pat?) and nothing about women. Kazumi is nothing but a puerile male fantasy (ooh, gorgeous Oriental creative with her 'curtain of black hair' and her 'childlike innocence..') Frankly, the whole cynical misogynist rehash of every 'sensitive' lad-lit book ever written made me want to vomit. All over Harry's family. Family. His. Who he loves. Who love him. Good- because nobody else will.
Make this man stop all this drivel (0/0 people found this helpful)
Yes, Parsons knows how to string simple (creative writing course) sentences together - ad nausiam. I truly hate this novel, which is entirely steeped in self pity and self worship- it is all about the writer signalling to the reader what and where he comes from and why he shouldn't be held accountable for his own mistakes.
Behind this disco ball of fancy words and half-digested, second-hand research there is only emptiness - no emotion, no truth, or honesty, no genuine idea and no character development.
It is a second-rate writer (tabloid hack), Parsons, asking himself: "What kind of challenge will I set myself for this next venture of a novel to impress my readers after the success of Man and Boy?"
Well i thought it was pretty good!! (0/1 people found this helpful)
I must admit i haven't read much over the last few years due to having no time with two young children but....i thouroughly enjoyed this book. I read it on holiday and couldn't put it down. It was a little predictable in places and Harry (the main man) needed a good shaking but i think it reflects a lot of mens thoughts and feelings in life. although i hope not my husbands!!
I just wish i had read manand boy before hand!
Thoroughly Dissapointing (2/2 people found this helpful)
"Man and Boy" has the quirky, delightful charm of a relationship between adorable son and father-under-so-many-influences-of-changing-masculinity-that-he-doesn't-quite-know-where-to-put-himself-whilst-everyone-else-seems-so-together-around-him-ok-this-is-going-on-a-bit-but-you-get-the-point.
"Man and Wife" seems to be the story of a socially indept man, whose faults are entirely his own and related in no way to any changing attitudes or shift in moral values, running around dicking as many people as possible, wondering why he can't hold onto everything he apparently holds dear (but seems not to care about anyway).
If there was one book you could reach inside and give the central charcter a full blown slapping to, this would be a it. Like Charles Dickens' Dombey, he simply does not -deserve- the narrative resolution he achieves.
Tony Parsons writing style is all that saves this book, meaning you can get it done and out of your life in a short afternoon.
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Amazon.co.uk places this book into the following categories:
Books -> Subjects -> Fiction -> General
Books -> Subjects -> Fiction -> Contemporary Fiction: 1970 Onwards -> Popular Fiction
Books -> Subjects -> Audio CDs -> Authors A-Z -> P -> Parsons, Tony
Books -> Subjects -> Audio CDs -> Fiction
Books -> Refinements -> Language (feature_browse-bin) -> English