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Spoonbenders: A BBC Radio 2 Book Club Choice - the perfect summer read!
As seen:
By Daryl Gregory
avg rating
2 reviews
- The BBC Radio 2 Book Club choice *
- Bought for TV by Paramount *
‘Funny and charming . . . tailor-made for summer . . . magical’ New York Times Book Review
‘Hilarious, freewheeling’ Guardian
‘Gloriously imaginative’ Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney
They were the Amazing Telemachus Family, who in the mid-1970s achieved widespread fame for their magic and mind reading act. That is, until the magic decided to disappear one night, live on national television.
We encounter this long-forgotten family two decades on, when grandson Matty, born long after the public fall from grace, discovers powers in himself and realises his hugely deflated, heavily indebted family truly are amazing.
Spoonbenders is the legacy and legend of a dysfunctional, normal, entirely unique family across three generations of big personalities and socially inept recluses – each cursed with the potential of being something special.
TweetReviews
This book provoked a majority of negative responses with the exception of one member who loved it. For that person it was a slow starter but once the characters and story were established they found it really interesting and engaging.
More of us did not get past the first 50-100 pages however and it was generally agreed even by those who did finish the book that it was a confusing and disjointed read, moving backwards and forwards from character to character and backwards and forwards in time too.
On the whole we agreed that Buddy was probably the only likeable character but he could not make up for the deficiencies of the book as a whole.
A very disappointing read as the cover “blurb” made it sound interesting and different – it was certainly the latter but not necessarily in a good way!
We gave it a score of 4.5 out of 10.
I loved this book - funny, clever, and heart-breaking. Impossible to do it justice, just do yourself a favour and try it!
