Wildlife by Joe Stretch

Wildlife by Joe Stretch
Buy Wildlife by Joe Stretch at Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com
Category: Humour
Reviewer: Eileen Shaw
Summary: There is a hole where the plot should be, and the novel veers from satire to toilet jokes in the time it takes to say crotch. You'll either love or hate this wallow in the blogosphere.
Buy? Maybe	Borrow? Maybe
Pages: 320	Date: March 2009
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 978-0099532071
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The word Twitter doesn't occur in Joe Stretch's vocabulary, but that's what his book is about. Life in the blogosphere, massively exaggerated, where people don't leave their desks but nevertheless come together (but never literally) in satisfying their deepest, darkest desires. If I've made it sound even faintly exciting, believe me, Joe Stretch is a fantasist with realist tendencies. What he is after is laughter; what he produces is a virtual simulacrum. Sniggery-pokery, jiggery-jokery, he tinkers with the twilight zone of a future-scenario where, for reasons beyond all understanding, some robotic and literal Dickhead (i.e. a man with a dick fixed to his forehead – I kid you not) decides to target a few selected humans for a make-over in his own image. Given that virtual worlds exist to pull in punters who don't like themselves in the real one, and their main purpose is to make money, one's only question must be: why?

It is both a bizarre idea and something of a turn-off. But Stretch burns to be cool. He segues the cultural references with nicely sharpened wit, then sends them down the toilet into overdrive with coprophagic inevitability. These mental muscles often trail their knuckles on the ground, going Gook, Gook.

Characters are signifiers: Anka Kodolski is anorexic, practically disappearing as she speaks; Life (she doesn't like the flat sound of her real name – Liv) is a living fantasy from the Faroe Isles, hired by Wild Life to manage the launch; Joe, poor sap, has been landed with a baby by a marketing man – but it's okay she doesn't shit and exudes black bubbles and everything will be all right as long as he doesn't go further south than Birmingham with her. Later, baby Sally coughs up a couple of miniature corpses in a taxi cab. Don't ask. It is nowhere explained.

The best character, however, is Roger Hart whose legs are gradually turning black because he no longer walks anywhere or speaks to anyone not electronically connected to his computer. Roger's blog is the funniest and most tragic thing in the book.

The characters meet up in Wow-Bang – the virtual world and have a good time trying on zebra penises and shooting one another, or whatever. Truly, this is a novel for the 'whatever' generation.

And what is Wild Life? It is a joke. The novel climaxes at a Chelsea football match when a bit of the sky falls on Frank Lampard just as he is about to score. But watch out, Wild Life may be coming to a computer near you some time soon.

I'd like to thank the publishers for sending a copy to The Bookbag.

Further reading suggestion: For another near-future scenario and one not entirely obsessed by toilets, try Doggone by Erik Ryman.

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You can read more book reviews or buy Wildlife by Joe Stretch at Amazon.co.uk Amazon currently charges £2.99 for standard delivery for orders under £20, over which delivery is free.
You can read more book reviews or buy Wildlife by Joe Stretch at Amazon.com.

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