The Life and Times of Algernon Swift

Description

Our young and earnest hero, Algernon Swift, returns from his travels abroad and must once more face the trials of life, love and the English language. Back at home, Algernon tries to cope with the exorbitant passion of the exquisite Mavis (a woman with X on her mind) and his elderly uncle, Reverend Hawker, and his exasperating inability to mean one thing at a time. Well-meaning in a world of double meanings, can Algernon avoid becoming another of Mavis's Xs or, at least, plunging into an existential crisis of his own? Amidst perpetual solicitude, can Algernon find both solace and solitude? Punning on subjects as diverse as Henry VIII's wives, Pre-Raphaelite painters, mathematics and fairy tales, we are taken on a hilarious and punishing journey of jokes - both high-brow and homespun - as Algernon attempts to make sense of, and even delight in, the world of word-play. Written and illustrated by Bill Jones, The Life and Times of Algernon Swift contains some of the best - or indeed worst - puns and jokes you will ever read.

Bill Jones is a writer, illustrator and performer. Since 2009 he has written a regular blog of jokes and cartoons. He also performs stand-up as Miserable Malcolm, a depressed poet. He lives in Gloucestershire. www.hawkerspot.com.

Highly amusing... an absolute gem... Full of awful puns and delivered with Jones's particular brand of dry sardonic humour, this is quite brilliant' * Cotswold Life * Lavishly illustrated * Good On Paper * As a hater of puns, this collection of comic tiny tales and illustrations revelling in smart wordplay should by rights be anathema to me. Instead I find myself laughing out loud page after page at the brio in its unashamedly silly (and simultaneously very clever) humour... Rich with delightful references to high and popular culture, from Shakespeare and Schopenhauer to the Rolling Stones. It is, I am loath to admit, a complete joy' * Big Issue * Readers of a delicate disposition need to be aware of the dangers. I hurt myself reading this book - my sides, mostly * Druid Life * The discerning many will come to this pleasantly racing-green volume for the gimmick of it, and stay for Jones's sheer relentless glee and his charming drawings of the bespectacled Algernon and the rest * TLS *