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The Hell of it All
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Book Description
A new collection from the celebrated and anarchic author of Screen Burn, Brass Eye and Dead Set.
Product Description
'Mankind clearly peaked about 40 years ago. It's been downhill ever since. For all this talk of our dazzling modern age, the two biggest advances of the past decade are Wi-Fi and Nando's. That's the best we can do.'
In his latest laugh-out-loud collection of misanthropic scribblings, hideous Q-list celebrity failure Charlie Brooker tackles everything from the misery of nightclubs to the death of Michael Jackson, making room for Sir Alan Sugar, potato crisps, global financial meltdown, conspiracy theories and Hole in the Wall along the way. The collapse of civilisation has never felt this funny (unless you're a sociopath, in which case it's been an uninterrupted laugh riot since the days of the Somme).
This book is guaranteed to brighten your life, put a spring in your step, and lie to you on its back cover.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
35 of 36 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
If you know anything of Charlie Brooker, you'll be aware of his many, many angry but incredibly funny rants at targets on TV but also increasingly examples of dumbness in the non-TV (real) world. There are few writers and broadcasters who can produce such insane levels of bile and hatred so often in such a skilled and drop-dead funny way. This is probably why he's co-written with the ultimate pitch-black dark comedy genius, Chris Morris.
What's less obvious to the casual reader or viewer is that Charlie Brooker writes with equal humour but infectious enthusiasm about the really good stuff on TV and elsewhere. Here's the end of a piece from "The Hell Of It All" on the BBC's "Life In Cold Blood":
"This is likely to be Attenborough's last major series: the final chapter in an extraordinary legacy. To change the way millions of people see the world is no mean feat, and he's done it with quiet assurance, humour and respect. TV can be many things. Nowt wrong with a bit of mindless entertainment now and then. But when someone with purpose seizes and commands it, it can also do this. Incredible."
That's why this collection of Brooker's writing works: light to go with the dark. The extreme bile directed against the latest twerp-fest of a Big Brother or Celebrity X Factor comes from a sense that TV can do so much better, it's not hatred for the sake of it, it's a hatred of lazy low standards when so much better is possible. This is hilarious savagery with a purpose.
What's less obvious to the casual reader or viewer is that Charlie Brooker writes with equal humour but infectious enthusiasm about the really good stuff on TV and elsewhere. Here's the end of a piece from "The Hell Of It All" on the BBC's "Life In Cold Blood":
"This is likely to be Attenborough's last major series: the final chapter in an extraordinary legacy. To change the way millions of people see the world is no mean feat, and he's done it with quiet assurance, humour and respect. TV can be many things. Nowt wrong with a bit of mindless entertainment now and then. But when someone with purpose seizes and commands it, it can also do this. Incredible."
That's why this collection of Brooker's writing works: light to go with the dark. The extreme bile directed against the latest twerp-fest of a Big Brother or Celebrity X Factor comes from a sense that TV can do so much better, it's not hatred for the sake of it, it's a hatred of lazy low standards when so much better is possible. This is hilarious savagery with a purpose.
51 of 55 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
"The Hell of It All" continues where "Dawn of the Dumb" left off, collecting Brooker's columns in the Guardian from Aug 07 to Aug 09. The chapters are divided between his Screen Burn columns where he talks about tv shows, and his G2 columns where he talks about other stuff. I love Brooker's work especially his writing but always forget his columns are up on the Guardian website each week so seeing a 388 page book appear is always a surprise and a pleasure as I know I've got 2 years of Brooker's views to read first time. So seeing "The Hell of It All" appear suddenly on the Amazon website, I had to order a copy. And is it any good? Of course it is.
Brooker's views on tv are always funny and spot on, like his article on Bruce Parry in "Tribes" where he reimagines an episode based in Glasgow, or his potshots on BB housemates. There's also a fairly mundane article on his fear of spiders until at the end he adds a note saying he had to write this one as his first submission was vetoed as too gloomy for a Monday morning - the article posits the question "Why don't you blow your own head off?". The article is also included in full.
His best work comes in the form of the G2 articles where his descriptions of not caring about anything in the article titled "The Black Hole" are, dare I say it, profound, while the travel piece where he stays in an opulent Las Vegas during the beginning of the economic crisis contains a spot on description of Vegas. There's also a brilliantly funny article on Gordon Brown's dreary time as prime minister, a paragraph of which I loved so much I've typed it out below:
"Here is a man apparently allergic to luck. Nothing goes right for the Brown minister. He can't even pop onto YouTube and attempt a smile without everyone laughing and calling him creepy. And they're right. The smiles were creepy: they made him look like the long-dead corpse of a gameshow host resurrected by a crazed scientist in some satirical horror movie. It's Saturday night, live from Television Centre! The theme tune plays on a church organ. Your children shriek when he bounds on to the screen. As he descends the glittering staircase, one decomposing arm drops off at the shoulder socket, hitting the studio floor with a damp thud. Oblivious, he steps over it to approach camera one, gazing down the lens with frozen eyes, intermittently twitching that smile. Your screen cracks. Hot plasma leaks out. This broadcast is over." (p.351)
Charlie Brooker's written another amazing book where you actually prefer to read about tv than watch it. And great timing too as a fine remedy to all the putrid celeb biographies and cookbooks out any day now. Very funny, very readable, highly recommended.
Brooker's views on tv are always funny and spot on, like his article on Bruce Parry in "Tribes" where he reimagines an episode based in Glasgow, or his potshots on BB housemates. There's also a fairly mundane article on his fear of spiders until at the end he adds a note saying he had to write this one as his first submission was vetoed as too gloomy for a Monday morning - the article posits the question "Why don't you blow your own head off?". The article is also included in full.
His best work comes in the form of the G2 articles where his descriptions of not caring about anything in the article titled "The Black Hole" are, dare I say it, profound, while the travel piece where he stays in an opulent Las Vegas during the beginning of the economic crisis contains a spot on description of Vegas. There's also a brilliantly funny article on Gordon Brown's dreary time as prime minister, a paragraph of which I loved so much I've typed it out below:
"Here is a man apparently allergic to luck. Nothing goes right for the Brown minister. He can't even pop onto YouTube and attempt a smile without everyone laughing and calling him creepy. And they're right. The smiles were creepy: they made him look like the long-dead corpse of a gameshow host resurrected by a crazed scientist in some satirical horror movie. It's Saturday night, live from Television Centre! The theme tune plays on a church organ. Your children shriek when he bounds on to the screen. As he descends the glittering staircase, one decomposing arm drops off at the shoulder socket, hitting the studio floor with a damp thud. Oblivious, he steps over it to approach camera one, gazing down the lens with frozen eyes, intermittently twitching that smile. Your screen cracks. Hot plasma leaks out. This broadcast is over." (p.351)
Charlie Brooker's written another amazing book where you actually prefer to read about tv than watch it. And great timing too as a fine remedy to all the putrid celeb biographies and cookbooks out any day now. Very funny, very readable, highly recommended.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This book is a genuine paradox engine: Charlie Brooker's wit is cynical, sardonic, misantropic and overridden by a hilarious obsession with all things scatalogical and excretory, yet - somehow - remains the most hilarious, refreshing and often uplifting thing about his writing. His books thus far, including this latest one 'The Hell of it All', are anthologies of his Guardian newspaper columns - both Screenburn and his independent subject pieces for the Guide and G2. Turning his eye and cutting wit to television, amongst all sorts of other random subjects, he subverts, reveals and criticises the media with a kind of reckless despair and wonderful surrealism.
For those of us constantly scoffing and sighing in the face of an increasingly deranged world, Brooker is the perfect antidote.
For those of us constantly scoffing and sighing in the face of an increasingly deranged world, Brooker is the perfect antidote.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
The Dyspepsia Generation
Charlie Brooker can work himself into a snit faster than any writer I've read. Often his target is something worthy of a massive tantrum, such as war or trying to quit smoking, but... Read more
Published 1 month ago by takingadayoff
I've not read it yet, but....
I am taking the unusual step of reviewing this book before having read it, but it would appear I'm not the first. Read more
Published 7 months ago by D. Ryan
Sample only - Pensive moments mixed with some laugh out loud moments
I have only recently come to half-heartedly read Charlie Brooker's (2011) Guardian columns, which I find a mixed bag depending on the subject matter and the mood I'm in when they... Read more
Published 8 months ago by Andrew Ives
Great
As a present for my other half, I haven't read it myself but after listening to my partner in hysterics I can only assume this is a good read
Published 9 months ago by H14
brilliant Brooker !!!
No funnier writer in UK today...ascerbic wit and a great wordsmith. Whether on TV or in print Brooker is currently the best
Published 10 months ago by Lexicon
Pugnacious and Hilarious - Brooker at his best.
This collection of Brooker's musings on culture expands from his critique of television and is far broader in the spectrum of artefacts held up to his obsidian glare, such as Las... Read more
Published 11 months ago by T. West
Brutual and Unrelenting
For any fan of Brooker's work this is a must have. Each selected column is an absolute delight to read. Read more
Published 12 months ago by JDavenport
Where's the air gone to?
Nature abhors a vacuum. Which no doubt explains why televisions now use LCD plasma technology and solid-state circuitry, rather than cathode-ray (vacuum) tubes and valves which... Read more
Published 12 months ago by Andrew Kay
Hilarious!
If you like Brooker's humour and writing style then you'll love this book. It's had me chuckling away for hours. Read more
Published 16 months ago by physicsrob
Giving us both barrels
Brooker's anger and spleen sustains him through another great collection of his writing. It's hard-bitten, sneering stuff, and for so much of the time he's absolutely spot on,... Read more
Published 16 months ago by Jl Adcock
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