- Hardcover: 272 pages
- Publisher: Bantam Press; First Edition edition (3 Sep 1998)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0593044142
- ISBN-13: 978-0593044148
- Product Dimensions: 23.4 x 15 x 2.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (58 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,163,478 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Amazon.co.uk Review
It's 2.15 a.m. and the phone wakes you. Only someone bad would ring you at such an hour, or someone with bad news, which would probably be worse. You hear the answer-machine kick in and feel your heart beat. You listen. And then you hear the voice you least expect - a blast from the past."
Blast From The Past is the fifth novel from Ben Elton, the celebrated and controversial comedian/playwright/author whose TV credits include The Young Ones and Blackadder as well as the previous novels Stark and Popcorn. Jack Kent, US Captain stationed at Greenham Common during the early eighties, has a secret and unlikely affair with the Polly Sacred Cycle of the Womb and Moon, a 17-year-old ideological peace protester:
the star-crossed lovers made Romeo and Juliet look like an arranged marriage! Pamela Anderson and the Ayatollah Khomeni would have made a more natural-looking couple.Sixteen years later and a four star General, Kent returns to Britain to seek out his only true love. Polly, now a lonely thirtysomething Equal Opportunities employee, is being stalked by the Bug when the phone rings.
Set in the staid, politically-correct nineties of New Labour Britain, the story flashes back with comic effect to the early eighties, a time of protest, strikes and Cold War. While hardcore Elton fans might be disappointed with the weak plot and smaller helpings of piercing wit and wacky socio-political observations, Blast from the Past still offers up some laugh-out-loud lines and entertaining reading. --Andrew Crawford
Review
Praise from the UK for "Blast from the Past: "
" The action is tight and well-plotted, the dialogue is punchy, and the whole thing rolls along so nicely."
--"The Guardian"
" Ben Elton's in top form with this gripping black comedy--a sure-fire hit."
--"New Woman"
" A lively thriller of sexual politics and morality. Elton's best book yet."
--"Elle"
" Blast from the Past is Elton at his most outrageously entertaining."
--"Cosmopolitan"
" The action is tight and well-plotted, the dialogue is punchy, and the whole thing rolls along so nicely."
--"The Guardian"
" Ben Elton's in top form with this gripping black comedy--a sure-fire hit."
--"New Woman"
" A lively thriller of sexual politics and morality. Elton's best book yet."
--"Elle"
" Blast from the Past is Elton at his most outrageously entertaining."
--"Cosmopolitan"
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It was 2:15 in the morning when the telephone rang. Read the first page
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I've come to expect big things from Ben Elton, but this ain't it.
The story is good and the characters are good fun. I suspect he's taking the mickey out of aspects of good friends (including himself), and he brings things to life well, as always.
The plot isn't as complete as others he's written though, and there's nothing to really offer the suprise element that he does usually.
Having said that, his class is still there, and my 3 stars indicates that it's good, not bad or excellent. Many writers would love their best efforts to match Eltons weaker ones.
The story is good and the characters are good fun. I suspect he's taking the mickey out of aspects of good friends (including himself), and he brings things to life well, as always.
The plot isn't as complete as others he's written though, and there's nothing to really offer the suprise element that he does usually.
Having said that, his class is still there, and my 3 stars indicates that it's good, not bad or excellent. Many writers would love their best efforts to match Eltons weaker ones.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Following Stark, Gridlock, This Other Eden and Popcorn, Blast From The Past is Ben Elton's fifth novel. It's his worst.
It tells the story of a Polly - a principled 17 year old feminist leftwing peacenik who hates nuclear weapons and campaigns outside Greenham Common in the 1980s - and Jack, a high ranking rightwing US soldier in his 30s. They meet, bizarrely fall in love but then after a summer of love Jack leaves her. Suspense is provided by the 'Bug', a man obsessed by Polly who watches her and is determined to possess her no matter what. The novel charts his obsession as a sideline to Polly and Jack's relationship, his departure and his subsequent surprise arrival on her doorstep 16 years after he left her.
I'm reading Ben Elton's novels in the order they were published and this is his worst to date - why?
It is written adequately enough but the problem is that it is just not funny enough for a comic novel, nor is it gripping enough for a suspense novel. Yes it does have jokes but nowhere near as many as Stark or Gridlock - whole chapters fly by between them - and in a comic novel a joke every 10 to 15 pages is not enough. Moreover, the suspense formed by the Bug wanting Polly only takes off in the last 75 pages of the novel, and this is a BIG problem.
This story would work well as a short story because endless conversations between two people about the same subject ('Why have you returned, Jack?') cannot be sustained over 350 pages. There are only three main characters yet Ben Elton is still afflicted with his problem of excessive wording and poor editing, and whereas Stark is funny but overly long (with huge sections of samey samey leftwing sentiments), Blast From The Past is overly long with fewer jokes and far too much dialogue.
Most of these chapters are conversations going over the same ground, and it would have been far more effective (and less tedious for the reader) had this been accomplished in fewer chapters.
The narrator viewpoint switches at whim from Polly to Jack and back again, so we are never clear who we are supposed to be sympathetic for (if any). To compound matters, instead of showing us how the characters feel through dialogue and body language, we are constantly TOLD what they feel, which is both clumsy and annoying.
It's a shame because Ben Elton can write better suspense (Popcorn) and can also write funnier jokes (Stark). Stick with these and avoid Blast From The Past.
It tells the story of a Polly - a principled 17 year old feminist leftwing peacenik who hates nuclear weapons and campaigns outside Greenham Common in the 1980s - and Jack, a high ranking rightwing US soldier in his 30s. They meet, bizarrely fall in love but then after a summer of love Jack leaves her. Suspense is provided by the 'Bug', a man obsessed by Polly who watches her and is determined to possess her no matter what. The novel charts his obsession as a sideline to Polly and Jack's relationship, his departure and his subsequent surprise arrival on her doorstep 16 years after he left her.
I'm reading Ben Elton's novels in the order they were published and this is his worst to date - why?
It is written adequately enough but the problem is that it is just not funny enough for a comic novel, nor is it gripping enough for a suspense novel. Yes it does have jokes but nowhere near as many as Stark or Gridlock - whole chapters fly by between them - and in a comic novel a joke every 10 to 15 pages is not enough. Moreover, the suspense formed by the Bug wanting Polly only takes off in the last 75 pages of the novel, and this is a BIG problem.
This story would work well as a short story because endless conversations between two people about the same subject ('Why have you returned, Jack?') cannot be sustained over 350 pages. There are only three main characters yet Ben Elton is still afflicted with his problem of excessive wording and poor editing, and whereas Stark is funny but overly long (with huge sections of samey samey leftwing sentiments), Blast From The Past is overly long with fewer jokes and far too much dialogue.
Most of these chapters are conversations going over the same ground, and it would have been far more effective (and less tedious for the reader) had this been accomplished in fewer chapters.
The narrator viewpoint switches at whim from Polly to Jack and back again, so we are never clear who we are supposed to be sympathetic for (if any). To compound matters, instead of showing us how the characters feel through dialogue and body language, we are constantly TOLD what they feel, which is both clumsy and annoying.
It's a shame because Ben Elton can write better suspense (Popcorn) and can also write funnier jokes (Stark). Stick with these and avoid Blast From The Past.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Blast From The Past is a curious book. I deliberately picked it as my next book to read as I was on a business trip and could read the whole thing in the time I was travelling. It is quite a short book and maybe that's where for me, it lets itself down.
The story is set around a phone call Polly received in the early hours of the morning. From here it hives off into a range of story lines, some happening at the present time and some being flashbacks to major characters pasts.
The main interactions in the book are between Polly, Captain Jack Kent and the completely unnecessary "Bug" who Polly has named as such due to his penchant for stalking her. Her attempt to impersonalise him is admirable, but in all honest completely irrelevant, just as he is as a character.
Books like this that only cover a very short space of time often suffer from either going too fast or too slow. An example of a book that avoided these pit falls is Cathedral by Nelson Demille - an excellent read. Blast From The Past in my mind avoids this problem as well by traversing the ages and looking back at characters past lives, this however loses some of the momentum the main story line has and in my mind chips away at the quality of the book. Ben Elton insists on splicing stories chapter by chapter and doesn't really allow me to get into the book, this is where a longer more thoughtful novel could have succeeded
Overall I have read a lot worse, its interesting in concept and certainly entertaining in parts, I have however read better Ben Elton's, and in all honesty, just better books overall.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Surprisngly good!
My significant other said he was pretty sure I'd like this book so I gave it a go. The main characters are a bit improbable for a romance - a teenage Greenham Common peacenik and a... Read more
Published 10 months ago by Carol Mabberley
A great book
This was the first Ben Elton book I read and I still love it. The tale of two unlikely former lovers (a soldier and a hippy peacenik who meet up again after many years) keeps you... Read more
Published 12 months ago by StormSworder
A sharp page turner that will keep you guessing
The first few pages of this book will keep you turning and you won't stop until it's finished.
When Polly awakes in the middle of the night to her telephone ringing, her first... Read more
When Polly awakes in the middle of the night to her telephone ringing, her first... Read more
Published 12 months ago by Ms. Cl College
Boring
Terrible book. Boring from start to finish. Highly predictable. Characters no-one could care about. Awful dialogue. Tragic from someone whose first few books were fantastic.
Published 13 months ago by Rory
Funny, but aged
I started this book on a plane journey once, many years ago. I think the person next to me fell asleep and left it on their tray and I thought why waste a good opportunity to... Read more
Published on 15 April 2010 by Apurva
A thin story spread very thinly
I've always been a bit a bit unsure about whether I like Ben Elton's work or not. As a comic, I've always thought him very clever - too clever sometimes - but also a bit smarmy. Read more
Published on 20 Mar 2010 by A. Brown
amateurish work from ben elton
this is the fourth book by Ben Elton I've read and I adored the other three, I couldn't gobble them up fast enough. It's hard to believe this book is by the same author. Read more
Published on 9 July 2009 by H. Seymour
Not enough happens...
Big fan of Ben's loved Past Mortem and Dead Famous both riveting reads; currently reading High Society which is possibly the best of the lot. Read more
Published on 29 Jun 2009 by Martin Tapp
A waste of time and money - let alone ink and paper!
Before reading this book, all my exposure to Ben Elton was in the form of 'Blackadder' and 'The Thin Blue Line' and as such i was expecting Elton's novels to be approaching the... Read more
Published on 3 Aug 2007 by Wildlife Bookworm
Entertaining
Blast From the Past takes a break from the more politically-motivated novels written by Ben Elton. In High Society and Stark for instance, his characters tended to be soap-boxes... Read more
Published on 15 May 2007 by Mr. S. J. Downing
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