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 enlarge | Author: Terry Darlington
Publisher: Bantam Books
Category: Book
List Price: £7.99
Buy Used: £0.01
You Save: £7.98 (100%)
New (29) Used (41) from £0.01
Avg. Customer Rating:  89 reviews
Sales Rank: 2253
Media: Paperback
Edition: New edition
Pages: 329
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 7.8 x 5 x 1.2
ISBN: 0553816691
EAN: 9780553816693
ASIN: 0553816691
Publication Date: May 3, 2006
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
 I could not finish this book July 28, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This is one of the most frustrating and irritating books I have ever read.
Half the time I did not know what on earth he was going on about as he spoke in riddles or made allusions to things in the fantasy world in his head. Also there was a lot of repetition of the same sort of conversations about his dog - usally involving someone else who had a whippet too but it died.
I think the subject matter is fascinating but I could not finish this book.
I felt let down by it.
 A jaunt through the human heart July 23, 2008
This is a good read for anyone who enjoys a wry (dare I say northern?) sense of humour who wants a good summer read and to enjoy a sense of longing for a journey from their deckchair. The writer has a great style - he undermines himself and everything he sees and everyone he meets - a bit like what it is like being brought up in Lancashire! It's the simple and unverbose descriptions that make this a gentle, sunny and funny read. He's got the British vernacular really well ('Frenchmen fancy English ladies of a certain age, like Jane Birkin or Charlotte Rampling, and when they think they have spotted one they chuck their dredgers around like anything'). The descriptions of Jim the dog are evocative and delightful - you can feel his whiskers tickle your face as he licks it. His long-suffering partner - he expresses her various anxieties about crossing the Channel or navigating another difficult lock with that familiar worried rant and lashing-out that I recognise so well in myself. With no sign of guests for their party she paces about the place: 'We'll be disgraced...There's no one coming and it's half past six. And if they come they'll be awful and they won't like us. Another of your lunatic schemes has gone wrong!'. So, while the writing seems simple, it does indicate other deeper things, of the heart of human behaviour under pressure - whether it's 'guest anxiety' or real terror on the waves. And as for the French, he says it all: 'In England shops are normally open, and in France they are normally shut...The restaurant sells wine by the gallon, but that bit is shut' - come on, we've all been there.
funny travel book July 23, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I absolutely loved this book.
I was slightly worried it wouldn't be funny and a bit boring ( more for older people ) when I found out the subject matter.
How wrong I was. The first paragraph made me laugh!
I can't recommend this book enough to people who love funny travel writing books. Terry writes in such a way you laugh out loud every page and the descriptions Monica & Jim's adventures are brilliant.
I can't wait to read the sequel.
Fast-paced and opinionated - but always huge fun May 27, 2008
This is real 'stream of consciousness' stuff, written by a true enthusiast telling about life as it is. As a fellow dog owner and boating fan, I found myself mentally selling up and packing my bags halfway through chapter 1 so that I could share in their huge adventure.
Good luck Terry, Mon and Jim - I can't wait for Indian River to arrive.
Rotting hull April 28, 2008
2 out of 4 found this review helpful
I am glad I came across this book in a library and didn't have to pay for it. The author is xenophobic, narrow-minded and generally the sort of person whom the customs-men at Calais should have turned back upon his arrival. He can write, it is true. But maybe if he'd considered that forty years previously before working for the European Commission we might have been more interested. As it is, swanning about in his boat enjoying his retirement and taking the piss out of everyone and everything except his bloody dog and his wife doesn't make for a good read... I'm fortunate that no canals his narrowboat can navigate reach to where I live. Because like that I don't have to listen to self-edification stories like his. If he had just written about his adventurous channel crossing in a canal narrowboat, that would have been fine, notwithstanding the fact that he didn't know how to fettle his engine if necessity called. But then having chosen to undertake this voyage, then belittling everything and everyone he and his spouse (plus dog) met on their way makes me wonder what they wanted to do it for to start with. If the idea was to prove something to either themselves or someone else, they've failed dismally.
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