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A much talked-about debut novel with strong reviews, which captures a family and a society to funny and painful effect, in the tradition of Jonathan Coe's "What A Carve Up!". Spanning several decades from the heyday of the British film industry after the war to the cut-throat world of LA show business, it is the riveting tale of the unexpected effects of sudden fame and fortune.
Synopsis
When the author of The Hayseed Chronicles, Arthur Hayman, is mown down by a concrete truck in Soho, his legacy passes to his widow, Martha, and her children - the fragile Rachel, and Luke, reluctantly immortalised as Luke Hayseed, the central character of his father's books. But others want their share, particularly Laurie.
Book Details
Publisher:
PENGUIN GROUP
Publication Date:
30-Apr-2009
ISBN:
9780141038001
Guardian review
Mr Toppit
James Smart the guardian Fri 03 July 2009
The woods around the Hayman family's Dorset home stretch for 300 acres, taking in caves, clearings and a bowl-like quarry. They are a fine landscape for the imagination, and the genial Arthur spins yarns around them, centred on a boy named Luke, the mysterious Mr Toppit and the foreboding Darkwood. When Arthur is hit by a cement truck in central London, a strange series of events sweeps his books to global success. Soon Mr Toppit's name is on the lips of punning politicians, book-lovers are crawling all over Arthur's forest and the Hayman family are struggling to negotiate a world that desperately wants a piece of them. Elton's neat debut allows the former literary agent to parody the publishing world, the puffed-up British film industry and entourage-packed LA. Not all of his characters are perfectly realised, but Mr Toppit builds into something special nonetheless, as Arthur's son Luke deals with school, crosses the Atlantic and uncovers the sad secrets that underpin his family and their cash-spewing franchise.