Meantime: The gripping debut crime novel from Frankie Boyle

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For a long time, having to do a stand-up gig would ruin my day". Scotsman.com. 24 July 2007 . Retrieved 14 July 2013. a b Wilson, Laura (3 December 2022). "The best crime and thriller books of 2022". The Guardian . Retrieved 31 December 2022. Either way the last third is much more coherent and funny but the first two thirds are reminiscent of others' work and I'd say both Burroughs and Hunter S Thompson did it better (or worse depending on your point of view). Jeffries, Stuart (19 December 2009). "Frankie Boyle lays into celebrity memoirs as his own is a surprise hit". The Guardian. London. If you like Frankie Boyle you'll more than likely enjoy this. The jury is still out for me. I don't mind a bit of his endless simile style delivery but I do get bored of it after a while. Its almost done to death in the first third.

Lianne (13 November 2008). "Frankie Boyle Live DVD Review". WhatDVD.net . Retrieved 7 December 2009. Part whodunnit, part social safari, part extended stand-up monologue . . . the novel is full of scintillating sentences and perfect lines of dialogue’ Sunday TimesYeah,” says Mina, “but it’s brilliant because it does feel like a modern-day Chandler book. I nearly complimented you there,” she adds, fixing her piercing eyes on Boyle. “If we were on Scottish soil we’d be engaged.” Partners in crime: Boyle and Mina. Photograph: Pål Hansen/The Observer I often wonder, why don't more stand-ups write novels? Well, because half of them do not write half of their own stuff anymore, not without a committee beside them. And we are cynical with any house branded celeb that takes a stab at writing a book, unless it’s some wanky autobiography. This is Scottish comedian Frankie Boyle's debut novel and being a fan of his brand of humour, I knew I just had to read this. It's a crime thriller but it very much reflects Boyle's previous tv and stand up work, in that it's not your conventional crime thriller. It's set in Glasgow just after the Scottish Independence referendum of 2014 and our protagonist Felix McAveety is unemployed, previously having worked at BBC Scotland and pretty much spends his time taking drugs, both the illegal and the prescription variety and washing them down with liberal doses of alcohol. His reasons for doing so are not initially apparent but are explained in a couple of harrowing chapters near the climax of the novel. Felix's best friend Marina is found murdered in a local park and initially Felix is deemed a prime suspect and is taken into custody but is soon released and suspecting Police incompetence and indifference, decides he'll investigate her death himself. He recruits his downstairs neighbour, Donnie, as his partner in crime, who unfortunately has an even greater appetite for illegal substances than Felix and they don't surprisingly get very far. Identifying the need for some 'professional' assistance, Felix manages to engage the services of Jan, an ex-Police Officer turned crime writer who is also fighting the battle against her terminal cancer diagnosis. Their investigation pits them up against a local crime lord, murderous political activists, a deranged stalker, a British Intelligence Officer and artificial intelligence, as they try to unravel a tangled web of drug dealing and corruption to identify Marina's killer.

Docherty creates a distraction at a Burns supper charity event so Jane and Felix can meet Mount, but Brond takes them aside instead. Felix taxis away with Tom and Sophie from Beloved Intelligence, who give him information on Chong and Marina. The next day, Mount tells Felix that while running a campaigning magazine he was sent a large amount of classified information. As leverage, Brond positioned Mount as prime suspect in Marina's murder, and killed the witness Rachael. After speaking to Felix, Mount kills himself. a b c Stephen Wilkie (31 July 2022). "Frankie Boyle: Controversy as comic makes 'rape joke' about TV presenter Holly Willoughby". The Scotsman. Boyle’s route into crime fiction has been more circuitous but with a much shorter gestation. Having written a couple of memoirs, including the memorably titled My Shit Life So Far, he found himself experimenting with a narrator’s voice but not with the intention of developing it into a novel. Then he started looking at a detective format and decided he wanted to examine the “postcolonial thing in Glasgow”. Margaret Thatcher: Let's hear it for the Iron Lady, comedy's greatest straight man". The Independent . Retrieved 29 September 2019. It's another of those books that I would also pop into one of my favourite genres - that being bonkers. It is, and then some. Characters who are completely larger than life, lots of weird and wonderful shenanigans. And more drugs than the whole Trainspotting series - and that's just chapter one - no not really, but almost! And that is the ONLY comparison to make with Welsh's series. Anything else is an insult to both...

Frankie Boyle: I'll quit comedy in two years". Nowmagazine.co.uk. 27 December 2008 . Retrieved 26 July 2009. Herbert, Charlie (16 August 2022). "Frankie Boyle delivers horrifying but hilarious takedown of Rishi Sunak". Joe . Retrieved 9 October 2022. Marina is dead, Felix is a suspect. But he also an addict - big time - and spends the majority of his life out of his head. So he could have done it, but he suspects not, he sort of has an alibi. He is our narrator and, as you can expect from a man of his "highs" the story is somewhat confusing in places. He also enlists several of his friends and associates to assist him in his endeavours to discover the real murderer as he believes that the Police don't really care. In 2014, Frankie Boyle starred in the short comedy film Gasping for BBC Scotland, written by Greg Hemphill. The title refers to an expression in Scottish English, communicative of an irresistible compulsion to do something, such as smoke a cigarette; or, as here, to drink alcohol. The short feature is an at-times-farcical but generally deadpan treatment of a man's attempted recovery from alcoholism. I'd give it 7/10 if I was able. I'd say I enjoyed slightly over two thirds but the other third appeared to simply be a manual on what drugs to take and when and what they did to our protagonist.

So far Boyle appears to have pleased the critics. The Observer reviewer, who happened to be Merritt, gave it a rave notice, calling it “enjoyably dark and entertaining”. The Daily Telegraph called the book “a gloriously funny treat of a novel”. How does it feel to get support from that quarter? “I’ll take it,” he says, although he admits that he hasn’t fully read the Telegraph review. “I don’t know that the paywall dropped long enough for me to finish it,” he quips. Felix McAveety – a Glaswegian in his 30s and former BBC Scotland employee. He is addicted to drugs and alcohol, particularly Valium.Claire Sawers (20 December 2009). "Where Frankie Boyle got his shot at fame". London: Times Online . Retrieved 24 December 2009. The main twist was learning about Felix's history, and I wish we'd heard a bit more about this story, perhaps in conversation with Jane? I would have liked more time to learn about him and his past in depth. The same goes for Jane and Amy - I feel that their characters were rushed off the scene to wrap things up, and so this is why I'm giving 4 stars. Reviewers found that the plot is of secondary importance to the novel's social commentary. [12] [13] It explores a post-referendum "battleground" over what it means to be Scottish or British. [1] The novel is set in the aftermath of the 2014 Scottish independence referendum and also explores Scotland's role in colonialism. Social commentary includes criticism of capitalism and liberalism. [12] Jake Kerridge of The Daily Telegraph found that—similar to Raymond Chandler's novels—atmosphere-building, misanthropic jokes and social commentary are prioritised over plot and the message is not nihilistic as Felix is not amoral. [14]

King's coronation: Frankie Boyle to host Farewell to the Monarchy show". The National. 18 April 2023 . Retrieved 6 May 2023. Wyatt, Daisy (7 March 2013). " 'I wish the Queen had died': Offensive Frankie Boyle jokes cut from BBC Comic Relief broadcast". The Independent. London . Retrieved 8 April 2013. No,” he says, “because it was just like, what do I like to read? And maybe that’s part of this thing of not really needing to earn a living from it.” Giving his narrator a drug-fogged worldview is also in part a reaction to “this modern thing of people being incredibly emphatic. It partly comes from social media where everybody’s very polemical all the time, and I think it’s difficult to communicate that way.”Singh, Anita (14 June 2011). "Rebecca Adlington: I'm over the Frankie Boyle spoon jibe". The Daily Telegraph. London. Archived from the original on 12 November 2020 . Retrieved 20 October 2011.