Book - The Rotters Club by Jonathan Coe

Having read a couple of Coe books, I was leading up to The Rotters Club, his most well-known novel. Other than the surprising retelling of a Nazi occupation story, this is mostly a witty story from Birmingham’s 1970s suburbs. There are so many characters, it took me halfway through the book before I started to get an idea on who is who’s kid.

In the main, it centres around the huge Longbridge workforce in the early 1970s. There is more depth than the others, even if I did give up on keeping up with the characters. 

Who's mum is sleeping with their art teacher? 

Which one went to London thinking they were going to meet all their NME heroes and be put up at one of their houses? 

And which one had a sister who was in the pub when the bomb went off? Actually I know that one. 

It matters not though. There is so much going on there’s plenty to keep the pages turning, albeit after a simmering start. The last third, where we are completely removed from familiar Birmingham suburbs is worth waiting for,

I can see why there was a TV adaptation for this one as the large cast and many spin-off stories lend themselves so well to that medium.