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Adrian Mole: The Cappuccino Years

Sue Townsend

Summary

The “wickedly satirical, mad, ferociously farcical [and] subversive” angsty Brit of secret diary fame careens into his thirties (Daily Mail).  I expect that by tomorrow I will have embellished the story and given myself a heroic status I do not deserve . . .   Right now the truth is harrowing enough for aging, impotent intellectual Adrian Mole: He’s soon to be divorced; he hasn’t a clue what to do with his semi-stardom as a celebrity chef; his parents have become swingers (with whom is too shocking to go into now); his epic novel is still unpublished; his ex-flame Pandora is running for political office; and his younger sister has rebelled in the most distressingly common ways. But there’s one upside: Adrian’s son has inherited his mother’s unblemished skin.   Is it any wonder that at 34¾ Adrian is still punishingly self-aware and willfully deluded about what he’s endured and what he’s yet to achieve? Struggling somewhere between breakthrough and breakdown, he’s telling his diary everything. The result? Adrian’s fifth Book of Revelation—and it’s “quite possibly, a classic” (Daily Mirror).

Available since: 01/02/2018.

Print length: 390 pages.

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About the author

Sue Townsend

Sue Townsend was born in Leicester, England, in 1946. Despite not learning to read until the age of eight, leaving school at fifteen with no qualifications, and having three children by the time...

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The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole

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British adolescent angst has never been so “laugh-out-loud funny” as in this first encounter with a sharp-witted, pining, and achingly honest underdog (The New York Times).  Perhaps when I am famous and my diary is discovered, people will understand the torment of being a 13¾-year-old undiscovered intellectual.   Adrian Mole is approaching fourteen, and like all radical intellectuals he must amass his grievances: His acne vulgaris is grotesque; his crush, Pandora, received seventeen Valentine’s Day cards; his PE teacher is a sadist; he fears his parents’ marriage is over since they no longer smoke together; his dog has gone AWOL; no one appreciates his poetry; and Animal Farm has set him off pork for good. If everyone were as appalled as Adrian Mole, it would be a better world.   Introducing “one of literature’s most endearing figures”: a luckless adolescent of great expectations and dwindling patience who knows all—or believes he does—and tells all (The Observer). First published in 1982, Adrian’s chronicle of angst has sold more than twenty million copies worldwide, spawned seven sequels, and been adapted for television and staged as a musical. Here’s where it all began.

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“Townsend’s wit is razor sharp” as her self-proclaimed intellectual adolescent hero continues his hilarious angst-filled secret diary (TheMirror).  I can’t wait until I am fully mature and can make urban conversation with intellectuals.   Growing up among inferiors in Great Britain isn’t easy for a sensitive fifteen-year-old “poet of the Midlands” like Adrian Mole, considering everything in the world is conspiring to scar him for life: His hormones are in a maelstrom; his mother is pregnant (at her age!); his girlfriend, Pandora, is in shutdown; radio stardom isn’t panning out; he’s become allergic to non-precious metals; and passing his exams is as dire a crisis as the Falkland Islands.   From weathering a profound but shaky romance with the love of his life to negotiating his parents’ reconciliation to writing his poetry on restroom walls (why on earth did he sign his name?), “Adrian Mole is as engaging as ever” (Time Out). The sequel to the beloved TheSecret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13¾ continues Adrian’s chronicle of angst, which has sold more than twenty million copies worldwide, and been adapted for television and staged as a musical. Adrian Mole is truly “a phenomenon” (The Washington Post).

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