Will Self Books

While I found Shaddock's book interesting and well-written what intrigued me more than the book itself was trying to figure out whether David Shaddock is David Shapiro in disguise.... Is this a psychoanalytic slight of hand? An intersubjectivity joke? A post-modern name game? Whatever might be going on here, if you're interested in Kohut' Self-psychology, intersubjectivity theory and how they might be applied in couples therapy this book should do you fine.

Will Self is sui generis, there is no one like him. He has plied his weird, surrealist trade in fiction and journalism for a while now, but I think this book tops his others in the bizarre stakes. Personally, I didn't think it was as good as his three previous short story collections: The Quantity Theory of Insanity, Grey Area and Tough Tough Toys For Tough Tough Boys.

About half the book is taken up with the title story which pits Hindu against Jew, junior against senior psychiatrist who send each other deranged patients under the auspices of requesting a second opinion. Mukti, jealous and angry at the ludicrous, arrogant tele-psychiatrist Busner, becomes convinced that he is being controlled by a cabal of psychiatrists, led by Busner, determined to undermine him. All sinews of sanity are unravelled by the end of the story.

After that there is a mixed bag of short stories. 161 is written in the shadow of Ballard, the grey area of a tower block in Liverpool. A pensioner befriends a youth, threatened by gang men, and despite seeming to be a vulnerable incontinent old man, he keeps his real intentions close to his chest. The story, as revealed in the acknowledgements, was commissioned as part of a Liverpool Housing project. Self actually wrote the piece from a Liverpool tower that was about to be demolished which reveals an interesting desire on behalf of the author to fuse his work with the real world in interesting and original ways.

The Five-Swing Walk, set amongst the scrubby park areas of South London is a bleak, dark meditation on fatherhood. A weekend visiting rights father takes his son to the swings, and becomes disturbed by the nightmarish responsibilities of his role. This is the darkest piece of the lot.

Cheer yourself up somewhat with Conversations with Ord about two lonely middle aged men who conduct a friendship based on visceral hatred and imaginative conceits - mental games of Go-Chess, and pretending to be Ord, a general in his 80s. They discuss the notion of going up in a hot air balloon, stationed over Vauxhall Bridge.

The final piece, Return to the Planet of the Humans, is little more than a coda to Self's earlier novel, Great Apes.

New publicists and small business owners should read this book to learn about the likes and dislikes of journalists before pitching a story so you won't come off as a pest. While it's a good starting point and tells you WHAT to do, it doesn't teach you HOW to do it. For a more in-depth look at publicity, I suggest Marcia Yudkin's collections.

These pieces, generally longer than those anthologized in the second volume of Self's journalism, Feeding Frenzy, are an entertaining bag focusing on the themes that dominated Self's early writing career - drugs, Martin Amis, drugs, contemporary cult culture, drugs, Motorway driving, American Psycho, more drugs. You get the picture. The style isn't as clean and honed as in his more mature non fiction, but the supreme mastery of the English language and all its rough texture is very much in evidence. Worth a read for Will Self non-fiction completists, but necessarily dated.

your instructions were very easy to follow, I will tell others

Frankly, I didn't get much out of this book except that there are some pretty interesting mind map samples reproduced in the book. There is perhaps a key point or two, but I'm sorry to say I'm not enlightened. I've attended a CPD talk on the same topic and I must say, I gained more from there than from this book.

This is a high pressure sales pitch for a guy who is obviously into himself. For someone from a Hutterite-Mennonite like background, he seems to have lost all of the values that he must have learned as a child. At first I thought this was the story of a man who found faith and arose in that faith. This is the story of a guy who was and is totally into himself. Pride of self achievement bursts through every chapter. Sad. A total disappointment. I would not recommend this book.

What I liked Ben Kubassek's book is that it has such interesting stories - the example of the Hugging Judge for instance.

He also has some good ideas on being a parent. His recommendation of two minutes of cheek to cheek time with each of your children is something I now try to remember to do everyday.

The contains the important stuff we continually need reminding about. It is a great read.

Title says it all ... it's just pornographic twaddle impersonating cool. Even makes Jay McInerney look good.

I will be honest: My Idea of Fun is an excellent book albeit confusing. The story of Ian Wharton, a taciturn eidetic, sometimes blurs the fine line of reality and the subconscious. Will Self fuses together elements of economics, psychology and capitalism into a satirical tour-de-force that can easily be overlooked because of its brilliance. Self's vocabulary is expansive; when reading MIOF (or any of Self's books, for that matter) make sure that a dictionary is handy. Self employs an arsenal of words, expressions and beautiful linguistic explorations that raise the bar of the English language. More often than not, Self's prose is beautiful and challenging. Self's lexicon may make MIOF daunting and intimidating but it is undoubtedly a rewarding read.

Once I started reading MIOF, I couldn't put it down. It is simply a great read. Will Self is hands-down on of the best writers that a 21st century literary critic could have the pleasure of reading. Self is often described as a disciple of Martin Amis, but I find Self to be much better than Amis (with the exception of Amis' Money).

Read My Idea of Fun. Look up the words and pay attention. You'll be glad you did.

I found this book by chance while browsing in a bookshop, and I was very pleased with my selection. I recommend the book for its originality and humour. Self attempts to explore absurb ideas in a realistic manner, which results in some very funny passages. The title story is exceptional, and very memorable.

However, while it contains very interesting content, the style is not strikingly original. Furthermore, I cannot advise that the book as a whole is excellent, because although many of the ideas contained within are unusual, I found that I was sometimes raising an eyebrow in confusion, rather than delight.

If you are interested in bizarre ideas, I would recommend this book for the main story (ie. "The Quantity Theory..."), and the opening tale. While the others are interesting, they are not as memorable.

Sit down and write a clever, although overdone, Twilight Zone-esque short story. Great. Now you have to write a dozen or more short stories to fulfill the contract with your publisher. Oh, the pressure! Just whip out the heavy drugs and let them do the writing for you. This appears to be the strategy that Will Self took in this understandably out of print volume.
It is the rare book that I don't finish once I start it. But the stories just kept getting more incoherent, and I had to put it down. The author just got obsessed with the idea that the only difference between the sane and the insane is that insane people do more crazy things than the sane ones do, and couldn't let it go.
If you are looking for a quirky collection of modern short stories, go with The Acid House by Irvine Welsh and avoid The Quantity Theory of Insanity for the sake of your own sanity.

This is probably the worst book on business that I have ever read. The business suggestions that Tyler Hicks gives are not realistic and will NOT make you rich. Additionally, he spends most of his time selling his other products. To me, this book is the prototypical "get rich quick" scheme that never works for anyone. Don't waste your money.

Should be titled: 203 OTHER BOOKS AND THINGS YOU CAN BUY FROM TYLER HICKS TO MAKE HIM RICH!

Ty Hicks writes books that are pre-sale materials for his other more detailed products. They are intended to show the wealth seeker the possibilities. Many of the reviewers that critized the Hicks materials probably paid thousands for an education that has not made wealthy other wise they would not have looked at this book. Specialized knowledge is what Hicks is selling. The "kits" provide the details. They are larger and more expensive and would be marketable in a book store. The newsletter has real info on loan sources. Hicks does actually answer his phone and will answer your questions. There are no other books in a book store that will give everything needed to actually run a business and learn the business. Even my other favorite, Robert Kiosaki, doesn't tell what to do in any of the Rich Dad books. So get over it and get off you rear and stop read these books and start doing business.

While I would agree with most other reviewers that this is more of an "idea" book and not much on the nuts-and-bolts, still, every great business in the world did start with an idea.

The author uses repeated references to his own products because that is what he knows best and his product line was fabulously successful in sales! I did not find these mentions distractive.

The reference list of associations in Chapter 5 is useful and handily organized. The list of products/services in the back does contain some business ideas that I had not considered before.

The banking and loan information tips are particularly valuable and presented in easy-to-understand terms. The author's advice is excellent, and the average person probably does not know how to approach the applications in the way he explains.

One or two tentative ideas hidden amongst 342 pages of adverts for more of his products. Every time I came across another "plug" for one of his "kits" or "handbooks", I believed less and less in what he had to say.
Sort of like the literary equivalent of the door-to-door insurance salesman!
If you could get past the adverts, then there is some value in the ideas and motivational messages.