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81st out of 113 books
—
119 voters
Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Sausages (J. W. Wells & Co. #7)
by
Tom Holt
Polly is a real estate solicitor. She is also losing her mind. Someone keeps drinking her coffee. And talking to her clients. And doing her job. And when she goes to the dry cleaner's to pick up her dress for the party, it's not there. Not the dress - the dry cleaner's.
And then there are the chickens who think they are people. Something strange is definitely going on - and...more
And then there are the chickens who think they are people. Something strange is definitely going on - and...more
Paperback, 378 pages
Published
February 21st 2011
by Orbit
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Jul 22, 2011
Alan
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
People for whom "I don't bloody know!" is a mantra, maybe?
Recommended to Alan by:
Previous work
It's simple, really. You start with a perfectly ordinary British Everyman (or -woman, as the case may be) and throw him (or her, in this case, at least to start with) into a situation where Something Untoward is happening, whether it be a law firm full of werewolves (Barking) or a UFO piloted by frogs (Falling Sideways). Hilarity then duly ensues. So this one starts with a pig—a brood sow, to be specific—musing on the existential question of where her piglets go after they're taken away by the m...more
My Thoughts:
A book that will surely beloved by science enthusiasts. And a story that is unusual and comical. At first I thought that I wouldn’t finish this book because I’m not into this kind of story. But when I started reading it I got curious on where the story will gets, that I realized it’s a page-turner book for me. Bizarre things started when Polly off to pick up her dress on the dry cleaners, that the dry cleaners was the one which is missing. Then to her brother and even on her work, th...more
A book that will surely beloved by science enthusiasts. And a story that is unusual and comical. At first I thought that I wouldn’t finish this book because I’m not into this kind of story. But when I started reading it I got curious on where the story will gets, that I realized it’s a page-turner book for me. Bizarre things started when Polly off to pick up her dress on the dry cleaners, that the dry cleaners was the one which is missing. Then to her brother and even on her work, th...more
A sow that has figured out how to achieve teleportation, a dry cleaners that magically moves lock, stock and barrel every forty-eight hours, a slice of medieval world within a loo, battling knights, chickens who believe they’re human, and disappearing housing estates. Just a typical day in the world Tom Holt has created in LIFE, LIBERTY AND THE PURSUIT OF SAUSAGES.
I’m a big Tom Holt fan and was excited to see LIFE, LIBERTY AND THE PURSUIT OF SAUSAGES. It took me longer to get into this than any...more
I’m a big Tom Holt fan and was excited to see LIFE, LIBERTY AND THE PURSUIT OF SAUSAGES. It took me longer to get into this than any...more
If you're familiar with Tom Holt, all I have to say is, Have fun! If not, I should say a bit more than that. For those who are new to Holt's work, be prepared for a wild ride.
Something odd is happening in the offices of Blue Remembered Hills Development, and Polly Mayer doesn't like it. Someone is drinking her coffee. She's getting phone calls complaining about her failure to follow up on conversations she knows didn't happen. She's finding notes in her work diary that she didn't write, and work...more
Something odd is happening in the offices of Blue Remembered Hills Development, and Polly Mayer doesn't like it. Someone is drinking her coffee. She's getting phone calls complaining about her failure to follow up on conversations she knows didn't happen. She's finding notes in her work diary that she didn't write, and work...more
Charming, geeky fun: A character's "voice stopped working, a failure so abrupt and total it was hard to believe Microsoft didn't have anything to do with it" (231). Another faces a challenge confidently, knowing "he'd stood up to bigger bullies before. He'd used Windows Vista" (328).
Goes down easy, won't leave a taste in your brain afterwards. Full of cute little turns of phrases that describe the conflict (or at least the "transdimensional tomfoolery" full of unintended consequences which drive...more
Goes down easy, won't leave a taste in your brain afterwards. Full of cute little turns of phrases that describe the conflict (or at least the "transdimensional tomfoolery" full of unintended consequences which drive...more
"What came first, the chicken or the egg?" This is key to this insane story by Tom Holt. It starts with a sow in a barnyard, who is quite brilliant, but unfortunately no one realizes it, because pigs don't speak human languages. It continues with an object that causes multi-dimensional events to happen simultaneously.
You have a dry cleaners which changes physical locations every few days, but they still deliver on time. A songwriter, actually jingle writer, who gets an object from the dry cleane...more
You have a dry cleaners which changes physical locations every few days, but they still deliver on time. A songwriter, actually jingle writer, who gets an object from the dry cleane...more
Note: Free review copy received from NetGalley.
Holt's absurd adventure is even more absurd thanks to the fairly mundane setting and characters. While this makes for a great anticipation of what will happen next, it also makes it awfully difficult to develop any sort of attachment or even interest in the characters. And unfortunately as far as plot goes, it's your fairly standard "things have gone haywire and all we want is for things to be normal again. So as long as you don't mind things starti...more
Holt's absurd adventure is even more absurd thanks to the fairly mundane setting and characters. While this makes for a great anticipation of what will happen next, it also makes it awfully difficult to develop any sort of attachment or even interest in the characters. And unfortunately as far as plot goes, it's your fairly standard "things have gone haywire and all we want is for things to be normal again. So as long as you don't mind things starti...more
Equal parts Tom Robbins, Christopher Moore and Jasper Fforde, Tom Holt’s Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Sausages, is an insanely imaginative and hilarious read. There’s no point telling you what this book’s about, it wouldn’t make any sense. But, I’ve got to give you something.
There’s a pig who figures out the secret to transdimensional travel, a guitarist who gets turned into a rooster, a flock of chickens who learn that they’re really human lawyers, and a real estate boss who has no personal...more
There’s a pig who figures out the secret to transdimensional travel, a guitarist who gets turned into a rooster, a flock of chickens who learn that they’re really human lawyers, and a real estate boss who has no personal...more
This book was an absolutely ridiculous, immensely fun (and funny) look at what happens when time and space go awry for some otherwise perfectly ordinary people. And a pig.
The humor is similar in style to Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett-- no matter how bizarre the situation, the characters and the author continue to do their best to keep going. Whether it is cups of coffee that mysteriously empty, a dry cleaners that appears in a different spot each day, or a pig mentally debating cause, effect...more
The humor is similar in style to Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett-- no matter how bizarre the situation, the characters and the author continue to do their best to keep going. Whether it is cups of coffee that mysteriously empty, a dry cleaners that appears in a different spot each day, or a pig mentally debating cause, effect...more
"When I saw the following snippet for Tom Holt's Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Sausages on NetGalley last month, I requested a copy for my Kindle. I read it over the weekend, and while at times I flashed to Norton Juster's The Phantom Tollbooth, Christopher Moore's Fluke, and the claymation movie Chicken Run - all of which allowed me as an adult to re-experience sheer child-like wonderment - at other times I got lost in a book that featured one too many sub-threads and one moment in the narr...more
I think this deserves 3 1/2 stars really, there is nothing *wrong* with it as such, but it is a bit meandering without enough of the funny to be able to pull it off right. The problem is that there are a heck of a lot of clichés and metaphors in it.
It's knowing but it lacks the original way someone like Adams or Pratchett can bend language to make them work as well as they could. They may have needed to be there for the benefit of the story but the language just missed a certain spark. - For som...more
It's knowing but it lacks the original way someone like Adams or Pratchett can bend language to make them work as well as they could. They may have needed to be there for the benefit of the story but the language just missed a certain spark. - For som...more
A very nice read from Tom Holt yet again. Even nicer is that he has foregone his usual antagonists structure and created a more original set of main characters. I was disappointed by the ending pages, which explained all the weird goings-on in a wall of text and that was that. I did feel a bit cheated as I as a reader wasn't privy to all the facts that lead to the conclusion, and one of the mysteries wasn't properly explained (where did the tech for the competition come from, way was it there, a...more
Before I read this book, I’d never heard of Tom Holt. I read this book for one reason: this blurb by my beloved Christopher Moore, which appeared in the NetGalley write-up:
“Tom Holt may be the most imaginative satirist to land on our shores since Douglas Adams.” — Christopher Moore
Funny that Moore (who Tom Holt kind of reminds me of) mentions Douglas Adams (who Tom Holt kind of reminds me of) because this book is in the same genre as Adam’s The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, with the differe...more
“Tom Holt may be the most imaginative satirist to land on our shores since Douglas Adams.” — Christopher Moore
Funny that Moore (who Tom Holt kind of reminds me of) mentions Douglas Adams (who Tom Holt kind of reminds me of) because this book is in the same genre as Adam’s The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, with the differe...more
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I'm only on pg 5, and already my brain's funny bone is twitching in a sweet pleasurable manner! The very idea of a SOW being so intellectual (yeah, I know pigs are smarter than dogs ;) ), enough that she's "worked out the maths" of the theory of multi-dimensional space AND has figured out how to "beam" her piglets to one of those other planes of existence, well, that's just too preposterous NOT to entertain!
I see this author has written 22 books (minimum); how the heck have I missed any of his w...more
I see this author has written 22 books (minimum); how the heck have I missed any of his w...more
Tom Holt rarely disappoints, and this book is far and away one of his finest. Wonderfully creative, steadily funny with just the right amount of taking the piss out of everyday life, to use a perfectly apt British phrase. Pursuit of Sausages starts with what I can only characterize as "field interference" between parallel universes and devolves from there. One of my favorite of Holt's writing quirks is his fondness for setting up an increasingly obvious Deus ex Machina, only to blow the entire t...more
Polly, a fundamentally average lawyer, and her brother, a profoundly lazy musician, are embroiled in a catalogue of transdimentional cock-ups, which begin with a missing pig and escalate into perpetual time loops, teleporting dry-cleaners and a group of chickens with a serious identity crisis. But it’ll all be fine, provided nobody mentions the ‘M’ word. A chaotic plot where the emphasis of jokes leans towards quantity not quality evolves into a cleverly ridiculous piece of good fun writing. Hol...more
What would happen if Franz Kafka and Douglas Adams had a love child? They would produce Tony Holt and his novel Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Sausages! I adored this book, with its surreal characters and absurd plot lines. The pace was fantastic, I raced through the chapters waiting to see what in the world could happen next. It is an excellent blend of existentialist thoughts and droll British wit, with a dash of magic and mystery and an ending that will knock your socks off, if they are in...more
A brilliant laugh-out-loud-in-the-underground-tube is how I will describe Tom Holts book. It starts with an early morning with an innocuous dissapearance of a cup of coffee, and brings the beginning of the end for the increasingly befuddled employees at Blue Remembered Hills Developments. Holt's mixing of the mundane with completely bonkers is hilarious, enjoyably mad. Pigs contemplate complex teleportation theories while rummaging for turnips; and perhaps the most completely bonkers one is of a...more
The one where someone at the office is drinking Polly's coffee, and there's something very strange about the dry-cleaners.
This had funny moments, especially in the beginning, and I found Don to be a delightful character from start to finish -- but the setup was worlds better than the payoff. It began to feel like the author had set a lot of things in motion that he really couldn't think of a good use for, so in the end any objection a reader could come up with would be countered by "It must have...more
This had funny moments, especially in the beginning, and I found Don to be a delightful character from start to finish -- but the setup was worlds better than the payoff. It began to feel like the author had set a lot of things in motion that he really couldn't think of a good use for, so in the end any objection a reader could come up with would be countered by "It must have...more
I've been disappointed by my last two Holts; they seemed carelessly done. Not this one. It's been very carefully crafted indeed, for all the apparent silliness.
Folks, I am not going to summarize the plot. Dozens have already done so. Life's too short.
Let's just say that Holt piles up the odd occurrences, while his characters TRY to behave rationally. It gets to the point where you have to wonder how he's going to explain it all, and then with a more or less straight face he tells you what's be...more
Folks, I am not going to summarize the plot. Dozens have already done so. Life's too short.
Let's just say that Holt piles up the odd occurrences, while his characters TRY to behave rationally. It gets to the point where you have to wonder how he's going to explain it all, and then with a more or less straight face he tells you what's be...more
This is the first Tom Holt book I've read, but I feel that it won't be the last. I find it similar to the works of Christopher Moore and A. Lee Martinez (two of my favorite authors). Lightly comic modern fantasy.
Masterfully mixing the mundane and arcane, it involves a randomly appearing dry-cleaners, a real estate agency that defies the laws of physics and a very smart pig.
The characters were engaging, the writing crisp and refreshing. I look forward to seeing what his other books are like.
Masterfully mixing the mundane and arcane, it involves a randomly appearing dry-cleaners, a real estate agency that defies the laws of physics and a very smart pig.
The characters were engaging, the writing crisp and refreshing. I look forward to seeing what his other books are like.
Polly is a real estate solicitor. She is also losing her mind. Someone keeps drinking her coffee. And talking to her clients. And doing her job. And when she goes to the dry cleaner's to pick up her dress for the party, it's not there. Not the dress - the dry cleaner's. Don is Polly's brother who dedicate his life in making tunes and work as little as possible. And now he has to find Polly's dress or Polly wont let him live in peace. But when he found it, he also found other things as well, and...more
Tom Holt is just amazing.
The second paragraph of this novel contains the observation that: "Pigs are highly intelligent creatures, with enquiring, analytical minds...The only reason you don't get more pigs at Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard and the Sorbonne is that they're notoriously picky about the company they keep."
If that doesn't convince you that this novel is great fun and occasionally absolutely accurate, there is nothing that I can say that will convince you otherwise.
The second paragraph of this novel contains the observation that: "Pigs are highly intelligent creatures, with enquiring, analytical minds...The only reason you don't get more pigs at Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard and the Sorbonne is that they're notoriously picky about the company they keep."
If that doesn't convince you that this novel is great fun and occasionally absolutely accurate, there is nothing that I can say that will convince you otherwise.
Look when you get Christopher Moore to write your cover blurb, I'm in.
Tom Holt is the English equivalent of Mr. Moore. The big difference is that Mr. Moore puts setup/punchline sets in his chapters, while Mr. Holt is much more subtle and restrained. Douglas Adams is an apt and accurate comparison. Where they are alike is that they both are not shy about setting up outrageous situations but then living within the constraints set up. They also are both very very funny and well worth reading.
Tom Holt is the English equivalent of Mr. Moore. The big difference is that Mr. Moore puts setup/punchline sets in his chapters, while Mr. Holt is much more subtle and restrained. Douglas Adams is an apt and accurate comparison. Where they are alike is that they both are not shy about setting up outrageous situations but then living within the constraints set up. They also are both very very funny and well worth reading.
A funny book that was a great read for a bit of escapism. Intelligent and well written, it kept me wanting to read to find out what on earth was going on and the neding didn't dissapoint, although I couldn't work out if the diplomats were still people or whether they were all pigs?!
I'd never read anything by Tom Holt before but I will definitely look out for his books in future.
I'd never read anything by Tom Holt before but I will definitely look out for his books in future.
Humor is damned hard right and in a book that blatantly states it is comedic genius, not finding much of it is normally a death knell. However, transdimensionalism being the flavor of this particular book, it is still interesting enough to keep one reading the story. Sure, things don't always make sense and my chuckles were few and far between but it;s a decent enough tale.
just don't go in comparing it to Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
just don't go in comparing it to Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
Hands down one of the funniest books I have ever read. The book has some sci-fi/fantasy elements but even if you don't like those genres it's still a great read. If you like making fun of attorneys, enjoy talking farm animals, or just like to read zany adventure novels, I highly recommend this book.
Not a bad story; perhaps if I had read it at precisely the right time for me, I would have loved it. As it is, I was mildly amused, but not enough to get through this relatively simple read in a decent amount of time. The plot is madcap, the characters are likable, the situation is zany; there isn't very much to it, honestly. All in all, pretty fair.
I read this last week--it is my first Holt novel. I was not too sure about it to begin with--but after awhile, it got more interesting. The creative thinking and the simultaneous use of the same space using different time continuums gets a wee bit strange--but I actually ended up liking this novel.
I found this book a bit difficult to get into. If you can get to the third chapter, you"ll not want to put it down. There is a great deal of technical jargon, and at times I just wanted to skip whole pages. But all in all I did enjoy it. It was a fun read once you got past all the technical stuff.
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Tom Holt (Thomas Charles Louis Holt; born September 13, 1961) is a British novelist.
He was born in London, the son of novelist Hazel Holt, and was educated at Westminster School, Wadham College, Oxford, and The College of Law, London.
Holt's works include mythopoeic novels which parody or take as their theme various aspects of mythology, history or literature and develop them in new and often humor...more
More about Tom Holt...
He was born in London, the son of novelist Hazel Holt, and was educated at Westminster School, Wadham College, Oxford, and The College of Law, London.
Holt's works include mythopoeic novels which parody or take as their theme various aspects of mythology, history or literature and develop them in new and often humor...more
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