Sex & Bowls & Rock and Roll
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Review
"Alex Marsh's charming and funny book charts his trajectory through East Anglia armed with nothing but four chords, the truth and some chickens" AL MURRAY
Product Description
The story of a man who gives up the rock ‘n’ roll dream… to play bowls.
Alex Marsh wanted to be a rock star - but it didn’t work out. Instead he toiled away in the big city - only to give up his career, move to rural Norfolk, and become a househusband.
But he isn’t a very good one. Whilst his pride won't let him admit it, he struggles with the cooking, the housework and the isolation. He hires a cleaner without telling his wife, his repertoire of baked potatoes exhausts quickly. He becomes hooked on daytime television and computer solitaire. He is in danger of becoming weird.
So he takes up bowls.
In Sex & Bowls & Rock and Roll we follow a season in the life of the village bowls team, a group of amateur sportsmen and mild eccentrics. In doing so we see this unfashionable pastime in a whole new light, and very funny it is too.
But Alex hasn’t quite given up on his dreams of rock stardom. Discovering that some of his mates down the pub are a bit handy with bass and drums he makes one final stab at being in a band, with an eagerly awaited local gig. It is a complete disaster.
Join Alex has he comes to terms with life as a domestic disappointment, attempts to learn the fine art of bowls and finally realises that supporting the Sultans Of Ping at the Pink Toothbrush in Rayleigh really was the highpoint of his musical career.
Sex & Bowls & Rock and Roll is a hilarious account of the life of a genuinely modern man. Everyone will recognise themselves (or their husbands) and you will be hard pressed not to laugh out loud.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
13 of 13 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Did you ever watch Northern Exposure in the nineties, and think "I'd like to live there in that hostile and cold, moose-filled place with those few and quite mad people"? Or watch Hamish MacBeth and fall inexplicably in love with Robert Carlyle and his dimwitted villagers? At a stretch, did you not entirely want to have the whole of Ballykissangel electrocuted with Dervla Assumpta Kirwan because you might like to move there and you'd need someone to be manning the pub?
Well, I have fallen for a little village in Norfolk, where there's a pub and a bowling team, and an 18th century cottage, split down the middle, where, in a shared back garden some chickens live. In one half of the cottage lives Tony (who is short) with his wife and kids. In the other lives Alex and his long suffering LTLP (long term life partner) who puts her head in her hands quite a lot and they have a very special bookcase. This is where Sex and Bowls and Rock and Roll is set.
This little Norfolk village -- the name of which we will never ever know, lest it befall the same fate as the village that was the protagonist of Peter Mayle's "A Year in Provence" and gets over-run by twots in Volvos -- is just like Ambridge in my head (only the interior of the pub is unlike The Bull and the villagers are far less preachy about sustainable farming) and I would like to live there if it weren't for the fact that I already live in a village that twots would like to descend upon in their Volvos.
I laughed out loud and sniggered and grinned all the way through Sex and Bowls and Rock and Roll. I never laugh out loud when I'm reading, rather like the fact that I don't drink on my own... although now I've discovered that laughing out loud on my own at chickens and lawn bowls and really quite brilliant musical careers is quite fun, I may start drinking alone too.
It is just really, really funny, gently funny, sad funny, hapless funny, and recognisably true funny. Alex's account of being a London-leaving newcomer with a new job title of househusband and being a bit hapless and crap at housework resonates with this London-leaving newcomer housewife who is quite hapless and crap at housework. It also made me feel extremely homesick for so much of England, such an English village, such an English story, such an English use of the English language.
I love this book, loved it from the first page to the last and I shall be reading bits of it to those among my Portuguese friends who still need to be schooled in what is utterly brilliant about the English.
Well, I have fallen for a little village in Norfolk, where there's a pub and a bowling team, and an 18th century cottage, split down the middle, where, in a shared back garden some chickens live. In one half of the cottage lives Tony (who is short) with his wife and kids. In the other lives Alex and his long suffering LTLP (long term life partner) who puts her head in her hands quite a lot and they have a very special bookcase. This is where Sex and Bowls and Rock and Roll is set.
This little Norfolk village -- the name of which we will never ever know, lest it befall the same fate as the village that was the protagonist of Peter Mayle's "A Year in Provence" and gets over-run by twots in Volvos -- is just like Ambridge in my head (only the interior of the pub is unlike The Bull and the villagers are far less preachy about sustainable farming) and I would like to live there if it weren't for the fact that I already live in a village that twots would like to descend upon in their Volvos.
I laughed out loud and sniggered and grinned all the way through Sex and Bowls and Rock and Roll. I never laugh out loud when I'm reading, rather like the fact that I don't drink on my own... although now I've discovered that laughing out loud on my own at chickens and lawn bowls and really quite brilliant musical careers is quite fun, I may start drinking alone too.
It is just really, really funny, gently funny, sad funny, hapless funny, and recognisably true funny. Alex's account of being a London-leaving newcomer with a new job title of househusband and being a bit hapless and crap at housework resonates with this London-leaving newcomer housewife who is quite hapless and crap at housework. It also made me feel extremely homesick for so much of England, such an English village, such an English story, such an English use of the English language.
I love this book, loved it from the first page to the last and I shall be reading bits of it to those among my Portuguese friends who still need to be schooled in what is utterly brilliant about the English.
11 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Sex & Bowls & Rock and Roll is a warm and funny tale of a man trying to embrace his new life in Norfolk - being a househusband, keeping chickens and playing bowls - whilst remaining true to his teenage dreams of rock stardom.
What sets this book apart from any other moving to the country memoir is the self-deprecating charm with which the author relates his minor domestic disasters and past musical "triumphs". Like a good wood the book is well-aimed, perfectly paced and rolls happily along to a very satisfying conclusion. It is also very, very, very, very funny.
What sets this book apart from any other moving to the country memoir is the self-deprecating charm with which the author relates his minor domestic disasters and past musical "triumphs". Like a good wood the book is well-aimed, perfectly paced and rolls happily along to a very satisfying conclusion. It is also very, very, very, very funny.
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Kindle Edition
I bought this book after reading the other positive reviews, and I wasn't disappointed. The author's style is fresh, witty and absorbing. His description of life in rural Norfolk is very entertaining, and the whole book is written in an easy manner, with lots of short episodes knitted together into a very funny and believable story. An excellent read - I would highly recommend it.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Boring
I expected to enjoy this book, I'm both a guitar player, and a bowler and thought I was bound to like this,but it wasn't the case. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Mrs. A. Thomas-davis
Sex & bowls & Rock & Roll
A fairly humourous read for any villager / bowler / rock and roll failure. I bought this one as a raffle prize at the bowling club Christmas dinner. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Mr. R. Morton
Very, Very Funny Indeed
I thought long and hard about buying this book as the subject matter sounded as dull as ditch water. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Nick Pendrell
great book
Well,just felt I had to read this book,because I play a lot of bowls both indoors and outside and in west norfolk where this book is set,I foumd myself trying to identify which... Read more
Published 6 months ago by squiffy
love it
can never usually be arsed to write reviews but i totally loved this book. like his blog only even more so. very very funny and sweet. more please.
Published 7 months ago by jennysqueak
The gift was much appreciated.
Purchased this book for a female bowls player. The recipient loved it and found it very funny. A good purchase.
Published 9 months ago by Sha Cha
Fantastic - I laughed (and cringed) from start to finish
So, what qualifies me to identify with the narrator in this book:
I'm a wannabe rock star - check
I'm a middle aged man, slightly past my prime - check
My... Read more
I'm a wannabe rock star - check
I'm a middle aged man, slightly past my prime - check
My... Read more
Published 10 months ago by Alec
Damn that Strategic HR Review
I have a common bond with Mr Marsh. I followed in his footsteps mere days behind him. I started my first major job with the same company he joined but a week before. Read more
Published 11 months ago by Clarkeyboy
The Funniest Memoir I've Ever Read
Alex Marsh writes in the first person and presents this book as a memoir, but it can't be, quite, because the central character is such a hapless, hopeless Everyman that he would... Read more
Published 23 months ago by Dr. H. Kara
Without doubt THE best book I have ever read about sex, bowls and rock...
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Published 23 months ago by justthoughtyoumightbeinterested
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