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Eight Minutes Idle (Paperback)

by Matt Thorne (Author) "Some days having a job seems the most decadent pursuit imaginable ..." (more)
3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)

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Product details

  • Paperback: 480 pages
  • Publisher: Sceptre; New edition edition (4 Nov 1999)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0340738839
  • ISBN-13: 978-0340738832
  • Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 483,904 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in this category:

    #31 in  Books > Business, Finance & Law > Management > Call Centre Management

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Product Description

Independent on Sunday

'Thorne is an extraordinary writer ... A courageous, testing novel'


TLS

'a dextrous, assured, engrossing fiction, written with a good ear for speech and a keen eye for details'
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Inside This Book (Learn More)
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First Sentence
Some days having a job seems the most decadent pursuit imaginable. Read the first page
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Eight Minutes Idle
65% buy the item featured on this page:
Eight Minutes Idle 3.7 out of 5 stars (15)
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Cherry 3.9 out of 5 stars (8)
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Customer Reviews

15 Reviews
5 star:
 (5)
4 star:
 (4)
3 star:
 (3)
2 star:
 (2)
1 star:
 (1)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.7 out of 5 stars (15 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars Funny, Makes me paranoid about call centres, 25 Jan 2001
By A Customer
This review is from: Eight Minutes Idle (Paperback)
I haven't read anything else by Matt Thorne, and still don't know if I want to. I enjoyed '8 Minutes Idle', and found myself laughing aloud many times (the film with Nigel Havers and Andrew McCarthy does exist I discovered with research!). I now can't take it seriously if I have to phone help-lines because I am thinking about what the other person is doing whilst talking to me. I was disappointed with the end though, which was vague, and hurried. I felt like he had been given a word limit and was trying to cram the ending into as few words as possible. I recommend it if you want to laugh, but be prepared to be let down if you want a conclusion.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars starts v well...but no ending, 16 Dec 1999
By A Customer
This review is from: Eight Minutes Idle (Paperback)
v enjoyable book till near the end when it just fizzles out. the ending is really poor and the author obviously got bored and couldn't be bothered to finish it properly. worth a read if you're bored but stick to more mainstream authors who actually deliver.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars A good novel, understated and brilliantly funny., 4 Mar 2008
Eight Minutes Idle plunges you into a rather comic frantic world of call centres, constantly ringing phones, clipboard carrying team leaders with targets and irrate customers on the end of phones speaking to staff who couldn't care less. The novel succeeds in entertaining you with series of funny mishaps that befall our main character. The pace of the book is uneven given that the beginning and middle are full of detail and told almost in slow motion...whereas the ending appears rushed and detail is sparse. However given the setting this structure mirrors the very topic it devotes itself too namely call centres...all calls start slow and as the chat proceeds so does the pace until before too long you are hurridly rushed off the phone....eight minutes idle is what it is and makes no apologies.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Very funny,intelligent prose: excruciating relationships
I heartily recommend this book- a searingly honest witty and intelligent inner dialogue about a few eventful weeks in the life of a young call centre employee who practises... Read more
Published on 25 Jan 2001

3.0 out of 5 stars Living on the edge
This is Matt Thorne's second book, and like his first, Tourist, is about someone getting by, but only just. Read more
Published on 10 Dec 2000

5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant
Anyone who has been put off Matt Thorne by his dire third novel, 'Dreaming of Strangers', should not be disheartened. Read more
Published on 24 Sep 2000

4.0 out of 5 stars a bit douglas coupland-y only english.
takes a little while getting into the mindset of the characters & even longer to care about them. Then the book is like a transatalntic flight. Read more
Published on 11 Jun 2000

4.0 out of 5 stars Too Clever by Half
Told in the first person, this black comedy is ostensibly set in a Bristol call-centre. Dan is a twentysomething ne'er-do-well coping with an increasingly complex personal... Read more
Published on 10 Mar 2000

2.0 out of 5 stars Interesting commentary but inconsistent
With plot lines centred around a call centre and the tedium of the labour within, Thorne has in general manufactured an interesting story with enough detail to enable the... Read more
Published on 13 Feb 2000 by domfay@hotmail.com

1.0 out of 5 stars rather weak and oversold
I found the book to be a rather uninteresting addition to the current vogue for the overly ironic. Somebody said this was a cross between Adrian Mole and Martin Amis. Read more
Published on 26 Nov 1999

4.0 out of 5 stars A funny and endearing book: Adrian Mole meets Martin Amis
This is an extremely well-written and cleverly perceptive book about a young bloke who is trying to eke out an existence in the worst of all office jobs: the call centre, whilst... Read more
Published on 16 Nov 1999 by jemma.selby@hefce.ac.uk

5.0 out of 5 stars Intelligent, scarily apt account of life in a call centre.
Matt Thorne takes a simple situation and turns it into a depressing yet interesting and compelling work of fiction. Read more
Published on 6 Oct 1999

2.0 out of 5 stars You think it's going to be good but...
I couldn't agree more with the two previous reviewers, in terms of characters, storylines. However, whilst I don't want to spoil the ending for people reading this, when I read... Read more
Published on 3 Aug 1999

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