SLOW DOWN ARTHUR, STICK TO THIRTY - Softcover

Miller

3.26

54 ratings by Goodreads

9781841152837: SLOW DOWN ARTHUR, STICK TO THIRTY

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1841152838 ISBN 13: 9781841152837

Publisher: Fourth Estate, 2001

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The achingly funny and moving story of the dizzying highs and lows of growing up in the North of England at the height of New Wave.

1980: Billy ‘Kid’ Glover is seeing things in triplicate and the doc prescribes a rest cure. When he returns to Yorkshire, ‘Vienna’ is on the radio and, although subtle, there have been some changes. The seventies have given way to a new decade and the young folk of the old town are waiting in the cold for the opportunities that might come with it. The change is slow and not always welcome. The pits are being closed and the police can’t catch the Ripper. But Ziggy Hero, David Bowie impersonator and ghost rider is planning a gig. He will prove that some things really are worth waiting for.

Sex, drugs and ropey pubs: Harland Miller’s unconventional rites-of-passage novel.

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Review:

It's 1980, "Captain Beaky" is at number one and Billy "the Kid" Glover can't decide what to do with his life. In his Yorkshire hometown, the options stretch to the chocolate factory and impersonating a Victorian for the delight of tourists. After an unsuccessful stint as a cat-burglar, the Kid is forced to leave the parental home and survive on his wits. He falls under the spell of Ziggy Hero, David Bowie impersonator and local landmark, and joins him in his plan to arrange the mother of all gigs. Things never proceed as planned but their mission becomes an Odyssean journey through the underbelly of local life, a world populated by transvestite drug-dealers, murderous gypsies and those who yearn to escape.

To describe Miller's comic tour de force as a "rites of passage" would be a gross injustice. The traditional elements are there--grim pubs, bad trips and doped flatmates--but this author juggles them with a skill and insight rare in first novels. The indignities and glories of North-country life in the 1980s are evoked with unsettling intensity, and steeped in a humour that is 100 per cent original. In future decades, this book will be cherished like an old album. --Matthew Baylis

Review:

'A wonderful, touching funny book which wraps up the horror of a stagnant future in a weirdly attractive coat of surreal humour, then sends it down the pub to get its face smashed in.' -- Big Issue

'Deliciously evocative . . . genuine, heartfelt emotion.' -- The Times

Very rough, very funny -- The Observer

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