The Brightonomicon

Book Details

Library

Author

Robert Rankin

Category

Humour / Fantasy

Publisher

Gollancz

Printed By

Clays Ltd

Country

Great Britain

Personal

Year Published

2005

Date Read

20/10/06

ISBN

0575076682

Personal Rating

8 / 10

Binding

Paperback

Pages

359

Overview

When our teenage hero take [a girl] away for a dirty weekend in Brighton, things do not go as he might have wished. Instead of a night of passion – his first – our young hero is thrown from the pier by the leader of the The Canvey Island Mod Squad. He narrowly escapes death by drowning when he is brought ashore by the Perfect Master, Cosmic Disk and self-styled Logos of the Aeon (not to mention reinventor of the ocarina), Hugo Rune himself.

But our hero has lost his memory and, in desperation, agrees to join the Lad himself in the solving of twelve cases, or conundrums, based upon the Brightonomicon, the new zodiac signs formed by the alignment of Brighton streets and discovered by Rune: carriageway constellations.

Together they must find the Chronovision, invented in the 1950s by a Benedictine monk, which afford the viewer scenes of past events... and should it fall into the wrong hands, afford ultimate power to the would-be world dictator.

And this being an adventure most exciting, they must find it before the sinister Count Otto Black, would-be World Dictator and all-round bad guy. Or the whole world will go to pot.

Which it will to a certain extent anyway: these are the 1960s after all.

Comment

With Doctor Proctor, Nurse Hearse, Nevil Styver in his Morris Minor and Ahab the Space Crab, this is Robert Rankin at his wittiest.

Ok, maybe not, but this book is extremely funny. Each 'case', although vague, is a surprise, and more often than not, scary for our hero, and the build up to the final showdown is long and violent.

Anyone who enjoys funny stories will enjoy this book.