There’s a megalomaniac professor digging a hole outside his flat. His small stake in the amphetamine market in Brixton is being threatened by a mys...
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reviews
Feb 19, 2011
oriana
rated it: 
from the Powell's review:
Milk, Sulphate and Alby Starvation reads like a kind of ur- Trainspotting that was possible while the shadow of the Sex Pistols was still fresh. There is no phony nihilism and no political posturing, just the celebration of fleeting opportunities for happiness in the squalor of punk bohemia.
***
Eh, this was fine and fun, but not nearly as crazy or cool as I'd hoped. Very slapsticky, and very funny, in that sarcastic silly British way. Here is More...
Milk, Sulphate and Alby Starvation reads like a kind of ur- Trainspotting that was possible while the shadow of the Sex Pistols was still fresh. There is no phony nihilism and no political posturing, just the celebration of fleeting opportunities for happiness in the squalor of punk bohemia.
***
Eh, this was fine and fun, but not nearly as crazy or cool as I'd hoped. Very slapsticky, and very funny, in that sarcastic silly British way. Here is More...
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Jun 02, 2008
Katy-Del
rated it:
Alby is a punk in London who has been very sick. When he went to the doctor, the doctor told him the problem was nerves and gave him sedatives, even though he was vomiting and bleeding randomly. He thought he would die, until a friend suggested adding food slowly into his diet to see if he was allergic to anything. He improved until he drank milk. When other people heard his story, they did elimination diets and found they were allergic to milk. Soon, Alby found himself at the center of a
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Jan 29, 2012
Matthew
rated it: 
Martin Millar writes like Kurt Vonnegut, if Vonnegut had read more classical Greek comedies and watched a ton of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Which is to say, while the tone and simplicity of the writing style is very similar, but the tone is less "we are all destined for doom and only civility can make it somewhat less unpleasant" and more "I am destined for doom... ooh, Buffy is on."
Anyway... this is the first of Millar's books that I read. I picked it up during a More...
Anyway... this is the first of Millar's books that I read. I picked it up during a More...
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Feb 25, 2011
Hiidenuhma
rated it:
After greatly enjoying Millar's Lonely Werewolf Girl, I wanted to check out what else he had written. Since this is the only one of his books that has been translated to Finnish (under the name of Alby Nälkäkurjen maitosota), I picked it up from the library and gave it a go.
It was okay, made me laugh a good few times and even as a translation, Millar's great writing style came across nicely. But as a story, it felt incomplete and somewhat unsatisfying. The ending fell flat and some More...
It was okay, made me laugh a good few times and even as a translation, Millar's great writing style came across nicely. But as a story, it felt incomplete and somewhat unsatisfying. The ending fell flat and some More...
Mar 29, 2010
Heide
rated it: 
I was dissapointed by this book. It took me months to get through it, I kept putting it down and reading something else. I really enjoyed two of his other books i've read. It had somewhat interesting "story" lines and once they started geting closer together it got better. It was felt like it was written by someone on speed so maybe he was just doing to much research. The end sorta fizzeled out right in the middle if what could probably be considered the climax. Unless the Kung Fu in
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May 30, 2009
Karen
rated it:
Woody Allen meets Pulp Fiction. Alby, a punk and minor drug dealer in his mid-20s, is very sick and discovers the cause of it to be milk. After being featured in a newspaper article, Alby becomes an inadvertent campaigner against milk.
When milk sales drop, the Milk Marketing Board wants to put an end to him. He'd go on the run, but he can't quite bring himself to leave his extensive comic collection behind.
The chapters are divided into short scenes which depict the inte More...
When milk sales drop, the Milk Marketing Board wants to put an end to him. He'd go on the run, but he can't quite bring himself to leave his extensive comic collection behind.
The chapters are divided into short scenes which depict the inte More...
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Aug 05, 2011
Colin N.
rated it:
What an absurd and funny book!
The plot essentially revolves around Alby Starvation, a young, small-time amphetamine dealer in Brixton and the crazy people around him - an assassin from the Milk Marketing Board out to kill him, a Chinese druglord searching for him, a crazy professor digging up the street searching for an ancient crown, and a myriad of other characters whose lives intersect in unexpected ways. If it sounds silly and bizarre that is because it is. Yet somehow it works, and the st More...
The plot essentially revolves around Alby Starvation, a young, small-time amphetamine dealer in Brixton and the crazy people around him - an assassin from the Milk Marketing Board out to kill him, a Chinese druglord searching for him, a crazy professor digging up the street searching for an ancient crown, and a myriad of other characters whose lives intersect in unexpected ways. If it sounds silly and bizarre that is because it is. Yet somehow it works, and the st More...
Jul 02, 2009
Sean
rated it:
An exercise in the unreliable narrator becomes a sort of quick-cut magical realist comic book about a speed dealing slacker paranoiac. Does that make sense? No? Well, it mirrors the book. But in a good way. This is like reading bar notes on napkins. It has a great offhanded way about it that also makes it feel pretty thin in parts. And repetitive. But I enjoyed it. It's the ultimate attention deficit novelette. Beware the Milk Council. And the Brazilian hit woman. And Ethelbert The Unready's mag
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Dec 04, 2009
Mk100
rated it:
I enjoyed the book modestly, but there seemed to me to be too much of the college essayist on Dexedrine, hammering the keyboard with his sunglasses on against the glare of a small desk lamp at 3:00 a.m. There could be a graphic novel version of this story, as it is cartoonish in nature.
Jul 19, 2011
thegift
rated it:
Funny. I do not know if this is a comic sub genre, but it is a fast, easy read, and even or especially with the first person a complete... well maybe not complete, dork, as his character is too impossible to imagine complete at anything, this is deadpan, very dark, humor.
Jul 30, 2011
Phil
rated it:
Always loved this book - not my favourite of his: that accolade belongs to Lux the Poet or Good Fairies of New York (it would be Ruby and the Stone Age Diet, if not for the downbeat ending). Glad that I've started re-reading all Mr Millar's books from first to latest.
Aug 31, 2010
AB
rated it:
Great characters and turn of phrase "Look what I've got for you, says Fran, and gives him a biscuit, he takes it enthusiastically and stuffs it into the vast pouches on either side of his mouth, you wouldn't believe how much this hamster can put into these pouches, something to do with another dimension, I think."
Jan 20, 2010
Joseph
rated it:
As Martin Millar wrote a number of my favorite reads last year. I decided to have this be my first book of 2010. Not quite as clever as The Good Fairies or Lonely Werewolf Girl, but an enjoyable distraction
Aug 03, 2010
Blair
rated it:
A stew of eclectic characters thrown together to make one tasty novel. Paranoid drug dealers, videogame-playing henchmen and Zen masters and punk-wastoid females. Come sit a spell and let Mr. Millar dazzle with his British wit and whole bunch of slang.
May 15, 2009
Will
rated it:
Great fun! A story-story that doesn't waste time with over-complicated psychology of characters and just keeps the action going putting them in harms way. Quite humorous.
Jun 03, 2009
Justin
rated it:
Crazy fun. Drug dealing comicbook collector on the run from a Brazillian hitwoman and a pair of Chinese videogame addicts, while a college professor secretly searches the streets of Brixton for the mythic crown of Ethelred the Unready.
Feb 01, 2010
Beth
rated it:
A silly, fast read and lots of fun. The kind of book Kurt Vonnegut might have written in one of his lighter moods, if he'd been a British punk.
Sep 28, 2009
Lisamarie
rated it:
I didn't think I was going to care about Alby, then right around the part where he explains what's really going on with the Milk Marketing Board it all just kind of clicked. I think I have a new favorite author!
Dec 04, 2010
Dominic
rated it:
Super cool, written in the 80's, multiple pov. funny relationship between the hero and his pet hamster.
Jul 29, 2010
Bendow
rated it:
Hm… strange. Although the POV kept switching, I thought it was an interesting read.
Dec 07, 2009
Godzilla
rated it:
I'd forgotten how completely hatstand this book is in places. It fairly crackles along though, with an interesting narrative technique leading you along the way.
Bizarre conspiracy theories clash with wonderfully drawn characters and big doses of black humour to provide a rollercoaster tale of chance and whimsy.
Some of Alby's observations would cause any reader to nod along in agreement. Despite some obvious defects, he's such a warm character that you can't help but be dr More...
Bizarre conspiracy theories clash with wonderfully drawn characters and big doses of black humour to provide a rollercoaster tale of chance and whimsy.
Some of Alby's observations would cause any reader to nod along in agreement. Despite some obvious defects, he's such a warm character that you can't help but be dr More...
Aug 14, 2011
Malcolm
rated it:
Millar's first is a novel for Tank Girl fans, and others who have lived in the weird world the urban, intellectual, slightly odd-ball. Very funny, but a little too much like a documentary of a house I once lived in.
Nov 03, 2009
Spencer
rated it: 
There is a tone in almost all Martin Millar books that I just love. This book seems like it shouldn't work but completely does. I felt like the way it switched between 1st and 3rd person. It was clear and not-at-all gimmicky. There are ideas that are fleshed out a bit more in the brilliant Lonely Werewolf Girl but they work in this story as well.
Aug 26, 2011
Simon
rated it:
A little dated now, it has to be said but off the wall and sporadically hilarious. The short paragraph structure makes it a little hard to get into but once it gets going this is an original and greatly entertaining read. Perhaps a bit too clunkily PC for its own good in places but still a tonic in these depressing times.
