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Odd Boy Out
Gyles Brandreth
'I am what my childhood made me'
But what is that exactly, Gyles?
Who are you? And why?
Odd Boy Out is an extraordinarily revealing account of growing up in an apparently well-to-do but always strapped-for-cash middle-class English family. But it is also far more than that.
It is about adventures - meeting princes and presidents, visiting Death Row in America, exploring the sex clubs of Copenhagen. It is a story of a boy blessed with wit, what he got up to, and the people he met growing up in the most wonderful city in all the world in those extraordinary years after the Second World War.
For Odd Boy Out is about more than Gyles and his exploits: it is also a kaleidoscopic portrait of Britain from the 1950s onwards, featuring a cast drawn from politics, the media, swinging London, stage and screen, from Laurence Olivier to Twiggy.
By turns hilarious and moving, and chock full of unforgettable stories, Odd Boy Out is the unexpected and candid autobiography of one of the country's most unlikely personalities.
Yet at root it is a powerful and passionate exploration of childhood - how our heritage, our parents and our upbringing make us who we are.
Odd Boy Out
Gyles Brandreth
'What are you up to?'
My wife popped her head around my study door. She never knocks. She likes to keep me on my toes.
'I'm writing a book,' I said.
'A book?' Her face fell. (She's reached the age when quite often she looks more severe than I think she means to - like the Queen who, when she isn't actively smiling, can look positively grumpy.) 'A book? Another one?'
'Yes'
'Oh, Gyles, does the world really need another book by you?'
'Well, er -'
LoveMyRead price:
£20
What the Critics are Saying
Hilarious, ribald, eye-popping, unforgettable, will make you laugh out loud.