Some time ago I read Ben Elton's "Dead Famous" in just two days.
I hated it.
The problem probably stems from the fact that I am quite interested in reality tv and do hold some respect for the genre, trashy as it is in many ways. However, right from the start I was having problems with ... Read review
Ben Elton's Dead Famous brings together his talents in comedy and crime writing to produce ... more
a hilarious and devastating novel on the gruesome world of reality TV. Peeping Tom productions invent the perfect TV programme: House Arrest. Its slogan is: "One...
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Ben Elton's Dead Famous brings together his talents in comedy and crime writing to produce ... more
a hilarious and devastating novel on the gruesome world of reality TV. Peeping Tom productions invent the perfect TV programme: House Arrest. Its slogan is: "One...
Postage & Packaging: refer to website Availability: Check Site.
Ben Elton'sDead Famousbrings together his talents in comedy and crime writing to produce a ... more
hilarious and devastating novel on the gruesome world of reality TV. Peeping Tom productions invent the perfect TV programme:House Arrest. Its slogan is: "One ho...
Postage & Packaging: £2.75 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days...
Ben Elton'sDead Famousbrings together his talents in comedy and crime writing to produce a ... more
hilarious and devastating novel on the gruesome world of reality TV. Peeping Tom productions invent the perfect TV programme:House Arrest. Its slogan is: "One ho...
Postage & Packaging: £2.75 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days...
Advantages: An easy read, mildly amusing Disadvantages: It was pretty awful overall
Some time ago I read Ben Elton's "Dead Famous" in just two days.
I hated it.
The problem probably stems from the fact that I am quite interested in reality tv and do hold some respect for the genre, trashy as it is in many ways. However, right from the start I was having problems with the novel. The characters were over the top characatures, sure, I don't have much of an issue with that. However, I think ... ...
Ben Elton chooses to ridicule the language used by the characters, emphasising the trite and the gushing, however this is carried across all of the characters, all ten inmates. Where's the variety? Despite skirting around the edges of what it's actually parodying in names (Big Brother as a show name is replaced with House Arrest, Big Brother as the overseeing presence is replaced with Peeping Tom) the parallels are so utterly obvious in terms ... more
Some time ago I read Ben Elton's "Dead Famous" in just two days.
I hated it.
The problem probably stems from the fact that I am quite interested in reality tv and do hold some respect for the genre, trashy as it is in many ways. However, right from the start I was having problems with the novel. The characters were over the top characatures, sure, I don't have much of an issue with that. However, I think the novel could have been far better crafted.
Ben Elton chooses to ridicule the language used by the characters, emphasising the trite and the gushing, however this is carried across all of the characters, all ten inmates. Where's the variety? Despite skirting around the edges of what it's actually parodying in names (Big Brother as a show name is replaced with House Arrest, Big Brother as the overseeing presence is replaced with Peeping Tom) the parallels are so utterly obvious in terms of the rules and the format that the actual show being referred to is definitely Big Brother. Think back to that show and it's clear that there are always a variety of characters introduced. series 1 had the calm laid back Anna pitted against cheeky Craig and loud Caroline. Series 2 saw the older and laid back Dean holding his own against the joker Bubble and the rather dopey Helen. There were distinct characters. True, as time passed the people chosen were more similar to one another but there was always variety.
Ben Elton misses this, bringing us a cast of characters who carry the habits of those like Big Brother's Sada who refer to everyone as a "lovely, strong person" and want to be at one with the whole experience in a, like, spiritual way, Along with the speech of some sort of hybrid Bubble/Nicola character but exaggerated beyond belief until they all talk in the manner the author believes the youth are currently using for day to day chat. Perhaps it's a deliberate comment on youth culture, but if so, it fails because a reality show can't function if every character is a shadow of the others and if every single one of them sounds so patently ridiculous when they open their mouths. By a third of the way into the book I was heartily sick of the "strong woman" comments, the phrases such as "wicked" and "amped up" and "having it large". If it were one character, or a couple, fair enough - but everyone spoke in this manner, presumably in order that the hero of the novel, the investigating police officer, Coleridge can look down on them, whilst being ridiculed himself for being too stuffy. Oh, don't get me wrong, I did spot differences in speech patterns. Londoner, Garry says "fahking" while Mancunian Moon says "fookin'". The rest say "fucking".
And "amped up".
And "having it large".
Way too often. As does the host of the show, Chloe. Even the minister for culture joins in. Purlease... there's characature and there's beyond stupid.
There's a big dose of cynicism in this book. Too big a dose - and this accusation comes from a confirmed cynic. Clearly Ben Elton hates reality TV, isn't too enamoured with the police, thinks TV is rather shallow and that making money out of turning "reality" into a phenomena is a bit suss. What a pity, then, that by writing the book he's doing exactly the same himself.
The difference is, when Elton writes there are no real people being ridiculed, bullied and affected. Except, if you know the show he's talking about you realise that there are. To take a pretty female Irish lass as a character might put one in mind of Anna Nolan, a popular contestant from series one of Big Brother. We later discover Dervla's surname: Nolan. Coincidence? I doubt it. It's no more a happy accident than the instance of Nasty Nick being referred to directly, only his name has been changed to protect the guilty to some other trite piece of alliteration.
What pushed things a little too far, though, was the suspicion that Garry is actually a stand in for Bubble being 100% confirmed when Bubble's "We like that" phrase is repeated a few times before a section that reads almost like a transcript of Bubble's confession that his daughter was what "opened up his heart". There are all the references to a past he is ashamed of but accepts he is responsible for, the talk about drugs as a part of it, the undying love of football, and then the clincher: The story of a child he sees only at weekends, who brought him to his senses by asking Daddy to play. Bubble's child is a girl. Garry's is a boy. Big difference, Mr Elton, dirty trick to play.
Yet, despite all the problems, the book kept me gripped. Even though the murderer is not revealed until the end (like all good mysteries) and even the victim isn't clear until over halfway through the novel. Although the set up that leads to the murder is utterly unbelievable (a reality TV show where the action is deliberately masked for four full hours? Come off it, no one would go for that, producer or viewer), the characters are largely soulless puppets and the timeline jumps about all over in order to acheive it... there is suspense. There is a desire to find out what is going on, who murdered who, why they did it. There are blind alleys and red herrings and there's suspense enough to make me grudgingly overlook the clumsy sentence construction ("...led to a girl's being murdered" should surely be "a girl" or "a girl's murder"). I put up with the ridiculous passages to get to the conclusion and see what it's all about. And yes, the ridiculous really is truly ridiculous:
"What I could to(sic) for you sir, is upload the tapes from the VCR onto digital format in my camcorder, bung it across a flywire into the new iBook they gave us, chop up the relevant bits and crunch it down via the movie-making software, export it to a Jpeg(sic) file and email it straight to you. You could watch it on your mobile phone when you're stuck at traffic lights if we get you a WAP."
Sorry, a Jpeg is more generally termed a JPG, whilst the word you've heard and are attempting to reach for here is probably "firewire" rather than "flywire". A JPG or Jpeg is an image, not a movie, and thus would be useless for the purpose being proposed. A mobile phone with WAP is not capable of viewing a JPG via WAP, though a new phone could perhaps have an image sent to it (such phones were much rarer when you were writing this novel, though). Still, this does not require WAP and the fact remains, the guy's not going to be watching a movie on the phone and the solution being offered is absolutely nonsensical.
And as you dredge through the dross and overlook the problems it is possible to be entertained whilst coming to realise that Ben Elton is possibly the most cynical man alive and also ranks high in the hypocrisy stakes. The conclusion comes from nowhere, and is, like much of the rest of the book, verging on the ridiculous. If we assume Coleridge to be the protagonist given that the point of view jumps several times per page with more alarming regularity than the timeline we follow, then the protagonist sees a happy ending which could have been predicted a mile off and everything wraps up nicely just in time for Ben Elton to run off and pen a musical with Andrew Lloyd Webber.
Somehow this became one of the books I read most quickly, I really was unable to put it down. What baffles me is why. I pretty much loathed it throughout. Not recommended.
Advantages: Found it very hard to put down. Disadvantages: Could find it a tad confusing keeping up with the days.
I've just finished reading 'Dead Famous' by Ben Elton. I've never read one of his books before, so didn't really know what to expect. I only bought the book really, as I've enjoyed watching the past 3 series of 'Big Brother'. Read on.....
The book is based on the hit show 'Big Brother'. The book was written with the help of the first two Big Brother UK contestants, and the Australian BB. This particular house is, however, called 'House Arrest'. ... ...apparent throughout the book.
House Arrest consists of 10 contestants, all of which are very different people. Some, you may think, even strange! At the beginning of the book is a short run-down of the contestants. They are:
~ David - Actor - Aries
~ Jazz - Trainee Chef - Leo
~ Kelly - Sales Consultant - Libra
~ Sally - Female Bouncer - Aries
~ Garry - Van Driver - Cancer
~ Moon - Circus Trapeze artiste and occasional Lap Dancer - Capricorn
...
Louise90 02.11.2002
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Dead Famous - Ben Elton
Advantages: Very funny Disadvantages: none if you like is work.
It would be an understatement to say that this is a send up of Big Brother and the rest of the reality TV phenomena. The one big difference between this book and the real thing though is the fact that this is compulsive reading whilst I would hardly describe Big Brother as compulsive viewing.
Ever since I saw Ben Elton perform live in Birmingham during my student days I have been a bit of a fan even if some of has recent material has seemed a bit ... ...a talented comedy writer with a string of credits both in the world of TV, theatre and fiction writing.
The Plot
The clever part of this book is that it is not only a murder mystery in that you want to know who did it and how but also for the first half of the book you want to know actually who has been murdered. At the start of the book you are introduced to the ten contestants in House Arrest and also Inspector Coleridge the man charged with ...
atticusuk 17.04.2006
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Dead Famous - Ben Elton
Advantages: Different approach in an otherwise staid genre. Disadvantages: Elton's style may grate for some.
Nominations, eviction, nomination, murder. This is the shocking chain of events that makes this series of "House Arrest" the most lucrative and popular yet. Much to Detective Inspector Coleridge's disgust the show goes on regardless and to make matters worse every one of the housemates has a motive. But first the Detective must figure out how somebody can murder someone in the full view of millions and yet leave no trace of their crime?
"Dead Famous" ... ...Elton incorporates elements of thriller, drama and humour into his parallel world of reality television. Obviously drawing on the many series of Big Brother as his inspiration, Elton creates the ultimate in reality television shows in the form of "House Arrest". With a full complement of housemates from the anarchist to the token lesbian what Elton has created is a scathing attack on the reality TV phenomenon in the form of a traditional whodunit.
...
Shortsharpshock 28.08.2005
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Dead Famous - Ben Elton
It can only be a matter of time before reality TV is crossed with a murder mystery weekend, and we spend several days or weeks trying to work out whodunnit ...and how. Ben Elton was quick to see the potential of having a Big Brother contestant bumped off (although not as quick as the producers of Diagnosis Murder were.)
I was looking forward to reading this book - well, I'm a sucker for a good locked room mystery, and Jonathan Creek seems to have ... ...over from Caroline Quentin as his sidekick. Mind you, who can blame him? But I digress...
"One House. Ten Contestants. Thirty cameras. Forty microphones. One Survivor." That's the slogan a TV production company called Peeping Tom give to their show House Arrest. The "one survivor" bit starts to look grotesquely inappropriate when one of the inmates is bumped off while on the loo. A modern twist on those old-fashioned bog-standard whodunnits, decorated ...
PJE_ 24.05.2002
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Dead Famous - Ben Elton
Advantages: Interesting, Satirical, Comic, Mysterious, Gripping Disadvantages: Steals from real events a little TOO obviously
I am a fan of Ben Elton's works and enjoyed this novel, and found it difficult to put down. However, there are obviously pros and cons.
The first thing to get over is Ben Elton's satirical and potentially offensive writing style. If you are put off by over-use of expletives, or over familiar mention of sex toys and homosexual activity, then this is not a book for you. If you can read about these things indifferent to the rest of the content however, ... ...Not only clever because you don't know who done it, not only fun to read as it all makes sense, but clever in the narrational timescale. Set around a Reality TV show, all dates are in terms of 'Day 32 in the house' or 'Day 4' in the house-all relative to the show itself. To an example. We begin by learning a murder occured on day 27. We then join the police team at the station on Day 30 viewing tapes. The tapes are of Day 1. Then we join the team ...
Egdelwonk 05.09.2004
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Dead Famous - Ben Elton
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Advantages: Great characters, amusing Disadvantages: not hard to put down
The Blurb
Chart Throb. The ultimate pop quest.
Ninety five thousand hopefuls. Three Judges. Just one winner.
And that's Calvin Simms, the genius behind the show.
Calvin always wins because Calvin writes the rules. But this year, as he sits in judgement upon Mingers, Clingers and Blingers whom he has pre-selected in his carefully scripted 'search' for a star, he has no idea that the rules are changing. The real is about to be put back into 'reality' televison and Calvin and his fellow judges are about to become ex-factors themselves.
benElton, author of Popcorn and DeadFamous, returns to blistering comic satire with a savagely hilarious deconstruction of the world of modern television talent shows.
Chart Throb. One winner. a whole bunch of losers.
The Story
Here we meet Calvin Simms, the richest and most powerful ...
Advantages: Entertaining thriller. Disadvantages: Some of the violence and one sex scene may seem too graphic to some.
to be cut completely, to avoid getting an 18 rating. I assume it was in the book to help demonstrate the dreadful mental state of one of the characters, and the vulnerability of another, but it is not, in my opinion, crucial to the storyline.
The only other book by BenElton I have read so far is DeadFamous, but as I have enjoyed both these books, I will be reading some more.
This was released as a hardback on 1 November 2004, and as a paperback on 2 May 2005.
List prices are £17.99 hardback, £6.99 paperback.
Amazon prices are £12.59 hardback, £3.99 paperback.
As this is one of the current Tesco best selling paperbacks, they are presently selling it for £3.73, but I don't expect this offer to last for long. ...
Advantages: Keeps you interested, a page turner, very cleverly written Disadvantages: Might not be your sort of thing...
I was up ‘til 1:30am last night, finishing off the last hundred or so pages of this book – Blast from the Past by BenElton. I have previously read some other of his novels - Stark (years ago) and more recently, Inconceivable (okay) and DeadFamous (very good). I wouldn’t say he is in my list of favourite authors, but he’s worth a read.
This book is set over one night, but told over a lot of flashbacks and discussions about previous events. The ‘action’ is quite near the end, most of the novel is taken up with introducing you to the main characters and showing you their views of what has happened in their lives.
Our heroine is Polly, but in some ways, she’s a bit of a failure. Once a member of the Greenham Common peace camp, she is still fiercely political but now has a respectable job. She ...
