Audiobook9 hours
Love, Sex and Other Foreign Policy Goals
Written by Jesse Armstrong
Narrated by Chris Addison
Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars
2.5/5
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About this audiobook
It's 1994 and the former Yugoslavia is being torn apart. In England, a gang of good-hearted young people are about to set off in a Ford Transit van armed with several sacks of rice and a half-written play. A play which will light a beacon of peace across the Balkans and, very probably, stop the war. Andrew would love to stop the war. He has one of the most comprehensively developed personal foreign policies of anyone working on a building site in the Greater Manchester area. He feels everyone should have a foreign policy, really. What sort of person doesn't have a foreign policy? But what he'd like to do-maybe even more than stopping the war-is sleep with Penny. But does Penny like him? Or does she love Simon, his rival, an irritatingly authentic Geordie poet? Or Shannon, the fierce, inspiring American leader of the troupe? Who exactly loves who? And what's the safest way to make it out of a minefield should you accidentally wander into one? And what do you talk to a mercenary about? And is a bad thing really a bad thing if it maybe leads to a good thing? It could all take a while to work out, as the gang cross Europe and head into the war zone. #160;
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Reviews for Love, Sex and Other Foreign Policy Goals
Rating: 2.4500001 out of 5 stars
2.5/5
10 ratings2 reviews
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5The first time I heard of this book, it was from the First to Read program. However, it only gave me a month to finish it and I could not finish it for many reasons. I was expecting something humorous since the name of the title seem so. I hate to give up on ARC books that I promise to read and review; that was why I had to request an audio copy when I saw it being offer again on Audio Jukebox.
The narrator, Chris Addison, seemed to help with my situation. I could finally finish the book within a reasonable time-frame. Since the book is written by a British celebrity, the narration does have British accent. The pace was relaxing. He did not add much emotion but the book itself is boring. I was hoping Jesse Armstrong would have narrated his own book since he is somewhat known and authors reading their own books are usually better.
As for the story, I wish I have something nice to say. The group had no idea what they were doing or what was going on in the world. They just wanted to go in the war zone to spread peace. They had no idea how to get, how to spread the words, or anything at all. Most of the men just wanted to sleep with the women in the group and lied about everything. Even after the trip, they had not learned anything.
2 out of 5 stars
Received a free e-copy from First to Read and audio copy from Audio Jukebox in exchange for an honest review. - Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5In this first novel by Peep Show writer Jesse Armstrong, a group of activists decide to take a play to the former Yugoslavia at the height of the war. Their motives are varied and ambiguous (a certain amount of sexual longing, intellectual arrogance and ambition are in the mix) but overall they are motivated by a kind of benevolent woolliness. Andrew, the narrator, joins them, having refined his foreign policy while skiving at his job in a supermarket warehouse. He is insightful but a bit passive and manipulative, particularly in his infatuation with the writer of the play, Penny. Inevitably, travelling through a war zone turns out to be less straightforward than Andrew or the group had envisaged.I liked the premise of this novel. I felt nostalgic for the days when people like Andrew did crap jobs as a lifestyle choice, rather than because that’s all there is. The world of the group is immediately recognisable to anyone who’s ever been involved in direct action. But that is part of the problem with this book. There are some nice observations, the pages turn easily, and I did laugh out loud a few times, but I felt that nothing surprised me, in either the characters or the plot.I wonder if this book is something Armstrong had in a drawer and dusted off for publication. It doesn’t feel as technically accomplished as his TV work. It has a dogged ‘and then’ narration rather than a strong story arc. Its great strength is that reading it does feel exactly like going on a very long minibus journey with a gang of friends, with all the pleasures and pitfalls that entails. Sometimes they’re fun, sometimes they’re annoying, sometimes you wonder if you should have bothered. I think Armstrong has shied away from engaging with the full horrors of the war. There are some dark moments, but I did feel that the characters, the reader and the author all got off too lightly.This is surprising because the programmes he’s written – from Peep Show to The Thick of It to Babylon – are all ruthless in their depiction of people’s failings. It’s hard to find anyone likeable in any of them. And they’re also not afraid to push their characters to the limit just to see how they react. Like Andrew, this book seemed a little timid and a little too keen to be liked. -I received an ARC from the publisher via Netgalley.