Diary of a Somebody

Product Information

Read this novel in short bursts, pausing to savour its individual brilliancies * Guardian * Bilston is the greatest English anti-hero of our time. Imagine a mash-up of John Cooper Clarke, Ed Reardon’s Week and James Joyce, and you’re about halfway there.

I can see why Brian Bilston is such a popular poet and he seems like the kind of person with whom you'd share a few pints. The book picked up in excitement in the ninth month, but it was too late, and even though the book became more exciting, the main character never improved quite enough for you to feel too happy about any good coming his way.

Diary of a Somebody is packed with droll puns, whimsical riffs and deft parodies, some of which I was pleased to spot before I realised (deflatingly) that they are all attributed in a list at the end. In this case the person hurt is not the hero clown (who is seems blissfully unaware of how dysfunctional he is). Brian is my hero, stuck in a rut, divorced with a teenage son with going nowhere job, dreams to become the next big poet. Diary of a Somebody keeps up a stream of witticisms that is admirable and relentless and, in the end, a little bit tiresome. But there is an obstacle to his happiness in the form of Toby Salt, his arch nemesis in the Poetry Group and rival suitor to Liz, Brian’s new poetic inspiration.

I have long envied artists who draw and sketch each day; who are able to transform ordinary visual experience into art – I imagine it to be a joy.In 1892, George and Weedon Grossmith published The Diary of a Nobody, now a classic of comic writing. A combination of traditional story peppered with pithy poems about love, life, music through the ages and family dynamics. Nobody must find out about this unique gem, because I’m giving it to EVERYONE, and I want to appear clever and discerning. This was an interesting, semi-autobiographical novel by one of my favourite poets, Brian Bilston, based on the author's purported diary for a year.