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Had all gone to plan, this would be a review of Dave
Gorman's debut novel.
But, like just about everyone who works from home, the comic
was just too easily distracted to actually get down to the work
for which he'd been handsomely paid.
Unlike the rest of us, though, Gorman's displacement activities
went a bit further than cleaning the oven or cataloguing his
CD collection. Instead, he embarked on an adventure that took
him several times around the globe, running up a five-figure
bill in the process - and most definitely not getting that first
novel written.
As anyone who saw any of his sell-out stage shows knows, Gorman's
imagination was sparked by the online diversion of googlewhacking
- a usually harmless game in which you try to find combinations
of two legitimate words that throw up just one unique webpage
from the three billion or so online.
And so he is challenged to meet an unbroken chain of ten people
responsible such 'whacks. This book chronicles the result.
While offbeat 'reality travel' tomes like this have become
a staple of publishing - including, of course, Gorman's previous
quest to find 54 namesakes - here,
he perpetually protests his reluctance to participate in such
a trivial pursuit.
It is this which gives the book something of an edge over
the rest of the Round Slovenia With A Differential Gearing System
or Playing The Innuits At Twister genre. Gorman genuinely starts
doubting his own sanity as he abdicates all responsibility for
his life to the rules of a pointless game no one else knows.
But although this intriguing aspect emerges time and again,
the tone of the book usually tends more towards the 'I'm bonkers,
me' than the philosophical navel-gazing. After all, the point
of these books is to allow us to live our lives vicariously through
the exploits of the writer - and we don't want our performing
monkeys too introspective.
What we do get, then, is an entertaining collection of anecdotes
of his encounters with Googlewhacks around the world. And what
a diverse lot they turn out to be - from Welsh Mini fanatics
to creationist standard-bearers - but they all share a single
personality trait: passion.
Gorman has it, too (after all, before his quest started, he
himself was the Googlewhack 'francophile namesakes') and it's
his enthusiasm to meet strangers, as much as his own reckless
stupidity, that makes the book such an easy, entertaining read.
He hasn't lost his comedian's knack of bait and switch, stringing
an audience along before unexpectedly changing direction, and
he tells of his encounters with simplicity, wit and style.
The book naturally fills in some of the detail left out of
the entertaining stage
show - although his trip to China remains tantalisingly unexplored
- so even if you are already aware of the broad strokes of the
adventure, there's more to enjoy in print.
One criticism is that the quest's ridiculously lucky conclusion
seems a little too neatly contrived - although Gorman insists
every word is true. As he says, if he could make things up, he
would have written that novel. And in a tale filled with billions-to-one
coincidences, perhaps one more shouldn't come as any great surprise.
Steve Bennett
January 5, 2004
Dave Gorman's Googlewhack Adventure is published by Ebury
Press at £10.99
Click
here to buy from Amazon at £7.69
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