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|title=Then We Came To The End

|author=Joshua Ferris

|date=January 2008

|isbn=978-0141027630

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This is a comedy of the workplace, with a lot we will recognise. There are four floors of offices in this tower block used by this company, and only one electric pencil sharpener among them, that no-one can locate and everyone wants to use. The email system is subject to daily abuse. There are too many meetings, and not enough seats in the canteen, so someone has to be the pariah of perching by the sink and passing out the condiments.

Elsewhere the writing does falter a little, with many chapters getting a quick resume of some of what has gone before, which is the only instance of dumbing down, and reminds us a little of an American sitcom. So, coming as I do to comparisons, this book was also notably different to a British take on the same subject - the characters use first names, the ad execs are notably drug-free (apart from one idiot taking someone else's prescription anti-depressants), and they slum it at lunch-time (TGI Friday's, MacDonalds in one memorable situation). I'll leave it to the reader to decide which approach might be more refreshing - the Chicago or the London setting.

There is nothing so out-and-out unsubtle as an authorial voice pointing out the ridiculousness of these callous, work-hardened dolts and dullards working on a lost cause, and there is a lot of the book that does branch away from the unlikeable subject of cancer - and away from the totem pole. I might be being too sensitive, as well, but I really did not enjoy the subject being used as it was here, and especially as I was reading from the hardback and was not forewarned.

There is a great future for this young debut novelist, if only he gets better ideas and/or advice about what is acceptable. I found a lot to admire in much of the writing, but never have I encountered a book I found so much to enjoy in, that was let down by one huge error of judgement. I am left with no idea as to whether I should recommend the book or not.

{{toptentext|list=Richard and Judy Shortlist 2008}}