Review: Don't need the whole dog
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 04 30, 2013
Tony Slater - the idiot abroad from That Bear Ate My Pants is back, but this time mainly in the Welsh Valleys in Treorchy.This book is based on his exploits in a few different locations / situations, but as always, you can trust him to muck things up in funny and cringe-worthy ways.I had thought this book would be mainly set in Thailand, but more than half of it is about doing up the house his father bought in Treorchy whilst Tony, his mum and his sister were away in America. Tony, being actorly trained, wants to be on telly, so gets in contact with a TV company to film them during the project. It doesn't mention which TV programme it is, but with mention of a "heavily pregnant presenter" it is easy to work out which programme it is, and go on to find it on youtube. I resisted watching the programme until I'd finished that part of the book and it certainly gives another slant to the term "interactive book" hahaha.I wasn't too interested in the yachting part of the story, but the book got back into the swing of things when Tony gets to Thailand. I'm a shy, boring, rule-abiding person and Tony's skin of his teeth living would just terrify me.I keep mentioning Tony's name rather than refer to "the author" as after reading two of these books, I feel like I know more about him that anyone should ever want to.This is probably my favourite book of the year so far.