Peculiar Memories of Thomas Penman Book

This debut (and only) novel from the actor and screenwriter begins as a scatological black comedy, the titular Thomas a tortured figure unable to stay his bowels in class and relentless in pursuit of his dying grandfather's porn stash. As the book meanders along the tone of smirking nihilism adapts to encompass Thomas's compassion for his grandfather and acquires a bulbously implausible first-love story of unapologetic purpleness, alongside the stuff about strapping rockets to crabs and launching them at the city centre. It soon unfurls as a warped riff on David Copperfield'namedropped several times'with Thomas filling in for Bruce Robinson as David did for Dickens. So a semi-authentic künstlerroman with Dickens parallels is the flavour. Like DC, TP is raised among gits (in his case rotten slobs and violent nutters) and finds solace in his plastic-perfect lover (Gwendolyn, filling in for Little Emily), and the novel ends with almost-dramatic parentage revelations (like in almost every other Dickens novel). An uneven but smart act of homage, memory, disturbing comedy and shameless sentiment.