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Blast from the Past (Paperback)

by Ben Elton (Author) "It was 2:15 in the morning when the telephone rang ..." (more)
3.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (53 customer reviews)
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Product details

  • Paperback: 362 pages
  • Publisher: Black Swan; New edition edition (15 Jul 1999)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0552998338
  • ISBN-13: 978-0552998338
  • Product Dimensions: 19.8 x 12.2 x 2.8 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (53 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 86,910 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in this category:

    #15 in  Books > Fiction > Authors, A-Z > E > Elton, Ben

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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 --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Description
It's 2.15a.m. and the phone rings. The protagonist of this tale is lying awake, listening to the sound of his own voice on the answer machine informing the caller that there is no one there and thinking that only someone with bad news would ring at this time of night. He is right, it is a blast from the past.

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Customer Reviews

53 Reviews
5 star:
 (8)
4 star:
 (19)
3 star:
 (13)
2 star:
 (5)
1 star:
 (8)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.3 out of 5 stars (53 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars A lighterweight quick flick, 5 May 2006
By Some Bloke (UK) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   
This review is from: Blast from the Past (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.
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7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars At least it was short!, 23 Jan 2006
If you like a good story-dont bother. If you like well rounded characters-dont bother. If you like a good ending-dont bother.
If you like plot twists-dont bother. If you're idea of a good book is something you can read in 3 or 4 hours without taxing your intellect then go for it. This is such a poor book. I have never written one of these reviews before, despite having read some excellent, indifferent and shockingly bad books in my time, but this one was so poor I felt compelled. I got this book in a job lot and as it was sitting gathering dust I thought I'd give it a go-not having read any of Ben Elton's books before but admiring his comedy writing in the past. There is very little point to this book, the story is wafer-thin. The characters are all cardboard cutouts with no depth whatsoever and appeared to change their patterns of speech and vocabulary at will, making them wholly unconvincing. The plot is extremely predictable, making the twists as twisty as a straightedge and the ending is truly terrible. The book is not even particualrly well written. It appeared that the story couldve been written in 10 pages. It was all filler no killer.
Elton could have indeed summed this book up himself in his script for blackadder goes forth when edmund reviews baldricks poem "the german guns":
It started badly, tailed off in the middle and the least said about the ending the better! Indeed Elton himself seemed all to happy to recyle his own old stand up gags at various inappropriate points.
I can only wonder if it was not for the name of the author, would this have been deemed worthy of publication at all??
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars Should have been better, 12 Jul 2005
By Chris Chalk "Chris" (Croydon, United Kingdom) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Blast from the Past (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

2.0 out of 5 stars 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 2 days ago by H. Seymour

2.0 out of 5 stars 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 12 days ago by Martin Tapp

3.0 out of 5 stars An average novel
Ben Elton provides an excellent commentary on political events delivered with sharp humour and really insightful. Read more
Published 4 months ago by P. DATTA

1.0 out of 5 stars 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 23 months ago by Wildlife Bookworm

3.0 out of 5 stars 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

2.0 out of 5 stars Average: too long winded, not a lot happens
Following Stark, Gridlock, This Other Eden and Popcorn, Blast From The Past is Ben Elton's fifth novel. It's his worst. Read more
Published on 11 April 2007 by Phil Latham

1.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing
I loved Dead Famous and Chart Throb, so I picked up Blast From the Past at the library and expected a good read. Read more
Published on 5 April 2007 by Hazel

4.0 out of 5 stars BEDROOM OPERA
Picture the scene - the bedroom of a down-at-heel apartment where two lovers from 16 years ago are unexpectedly reunited. Read more
Published on 9 Nov 2006 by DAVID BRYSON

4.0 out of 5 stars good.
One of the first books i read by Ben Elton. Its good! Plenty of twists to the story. I was shocked at the ending, but then its so typical of Ben Elton! Read more
Published on 5 Sep 2004 by Mayumiwinn

2.0 out of 5 stars An acceptable read, but not great.
Having previously read Dead Famous and High Society, I was expecting more of the same. Unfortunately, BFTP is not in that league and left me a little disappointed. Read more
Published on 14 Aug 2004 by C. Sperry

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