Seeds Of Greatness - Hardcover

Canter, Jon

3.59

83 ratings by Goodreads

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0224077732 ISBN 13: 9780224077736

Publisher: Jonathan Cape, 2006

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Two friends grow up in a North London Jewish suburb. Jack is wayward and devious and gets expelled from school. David is bright and parent-pleasing and destined for great things. But it's Jack who gets rich and famous as a TV chat-show host, while David earns peanuts working in a Suffolk bookshop. When Jack dies, his widow and publisher commission David to write Jack's authorised biography. David is a gentle, discreet man who can be relied upon not to dish the dirt about Jack. Or his widow. Or his publisher. David will write what they want - something nice and bland. But David can't do it. He writes Seeds of Greatness instead. It's the truth about his forty-year friendship with Jack, the man who came to dominate his life. It's got sex and drugs and blackmail and jealousy. It's not what he's been paid to write and he knows it can never be published. David thinks that by writing the truth he'll get Jack out of his system. But he finds he'll never be free of Jack. Jack will be with him for as long as he lives. Jon Canter has perfect pitch. Seeds of Greatness is as funny a novel as you'll ever read.

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Review:

"Presented as a wise cracking monologue... laugh-a-line funny but in the tradition of jewish humour, touches a serious issue" -- Financial Times, John Sutherland

'Jon Canter is hilarious and self deprecating, a wonderful, wise and witty writer.' -- Helen Fielding

'well observed, warm humour... perfect parody' -- Andrew Collins, The Times

This is clever AND funny AND moving AND brilliant -- Boyd Hilton, BBC Radio 5 Simon Mayo Book Panel

well observed, warm humour... note-perfect parody -- The Times

From the Publisher:

A legendary comedy scriptwriter writes his first novel; the result: a comic classic.

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