Tough, Tough Toys for Tough, Tough Boys

A Rock of Crack As Big As The Ritz, now there's social realism. Journalism may make you feel sorry for people, but Will Self makes you understand people. You understand their pain, their reasons, there failings, and their successes. The other stories in this collection are almost just as perfect as the first one. Read them all. Read them to your children. A lot of people don't like Will Self, but a lot of people like smoking cigarettes. A lot of people are stupid.Remember, reading Will Self makes you illustrious.

Will Self borrows a gimmick used by Kafka, Borges, and in one not-very-succesful story by Fitzgerald (A Diamond as Big as the Ritz) and, to some extent, used in all science fiction. An impossible or supernatural event is treated naturalistically, or accepted deadpan without comment by the characters.(Isaac Asimov Magazine stories do this well). Another trademark, reminiscent of the dirty Scottish shock-writers, is descriptions of drug and alcohol use from the point of view of the user. He also favors effects that used to be called Grand Guignol and are now called splatterpunk. These devices are used as the hinges of his plots and the entertainment values of his stories often depends on how compelling you find them. Apart from them he is a witty and perceptive satirist with some wonderful prose such as his description of the small Suffolk town "landlocked by the shifting dunes of social trends" where "the landlords of the three desultory pubs on the main street drew pints for themselves in the cool, brown, afternoon interiors of their establishments."

Well, this book is .... worth reading. These short stories are brilliant. Not all of them. I think it depends on ones taste about which of them are worth or not but there is at least ONE story that can make you loose your breath, or at least make you think about losing it.. The self titled story is amazingly tough sensitive and unique, no writer ever experiments with matters like these (some would say because they are trivial matters perhaps).He writes about derranged situations, but with perfect realism. He is a unique writer. He is probably one of the sharpest minds alive but still..... this book may not be good enough for you. No conservative thought is allowed in the world of Will Self and some of the readers are probably going to hate him for exposing their taboos... The manual about the VOLVO car is the best short story i have ever read. It will be cult after some decades until then only few people will have the privilege to read Will Self and enjoy.The majority will be talking about a lunatic who wanted to be writer or just a boring show off guy. We love him anyway...

Worth getting for the title story and The Nonce Prize. The rest can be disregarded. The title story is the best short story I've read: totally engaging and wonderfully disturbing and sensual in it's own unique way. The Nonce Prize is also classic, revelling in the prison-world/writer's- world of it's main protagonist and the word nonce, and not necessarily in that order. These 2 stories are so tasty and fulfilling, particularly the title story, that the 5 stars is not given lightly even though the rest of the offering seems to be mere filler.

The story, "Flytopia" is the standout entry in this collection. It's a wonderful miniature -- proportioned exquisitely, rhetorically balanced, a near-perfect short story. And yup, Self shares talents with Nicholson Baker: they both render griping dark fantasies, have a fine sense for physical detail, and fret over style. Baker writes more mechanically precise and tighter prose. Self has a darker outlook and uses a bit heavier, richer vocabulary (in part, because he throws British slang into the mix.) With the exception of a fatuous, painfully wiredrawn story about a German-speaking British baby ("A Story for Europe"), the tales in this anthology are very good. About half the book is taken up with a story and a novella that both concern the same two black British brothers. In these, you'll learn tons more than you need (or want) about crack smoking and British jails, but you'll love the characters and their predicaments. Self's stories and characters are not slick or especially predictable and that adds to their charm.