The Alternative Hero
Published on 4. March 2010
Book
Paperback/Softback
400 pages
978-0-09-953178-4 (ISBN)
Description
By the time most people hit 30, they've managed to do one of the following things:
1. Grow up
2. Quit idolising rock stars
3. Move on a bit from the music they were obsessed with at the age of 17.
Clive Beresford has failed to do all three. But that's about to change.
One unremarkable Saturday morning Clive sees the biggest alternative-pop star of them all walking down the high street with his dry-cleaning: Lance Webster, disgraced ex-singer of Thieving Magpies ('the biggest British band to emerge from the late-eighties indie-boom' Rolling Stone). Clive hatches a ramshackle plan to befriend his idol and grab the scoop of a lifetime - why did Webster burn out? The ensuing chaos forces both men to revisit the sweat, feedback, T-shirts, stage-dives, hitch-hikes, snakebites and hangovers of British alternative rock at the start of the nineties; to quote Lance Webster himself, 'before Britpop came along and fucked everything up'...
1. Grow up
2. Quit idolising rock stars
3. Move on a bit from the music they were obsessed with at the age of 17.
Clive Beresford has failed to do all three. But that's about to change.
One unremarkable Saturday morning Clive sees the biggest alternative-pop star of them all walking down the high street with his dry-cleaning: Lance Webster, disgraced ex-singer of Thieving Magpies ('the biggest British band to emerge from the late-eighties indie-boom' Rolling Stone). Clive hatches a ramshackle plan to befriend his idol and grab the scoop of a lifetime - why did Webster burn out? The ensuing chaos forces both men to revisit the sweat, feedback, T-shirts, stage-dives, hitch-hikes, snakebites and hangovers of British alternative rock at the start of the nineties; to quote Lance Webster himself, 'before Britpop came along and fucked everything up'...
Reviews / Votes
Thornton explores the gentle complexities of this odd couple with wit and warmth * Independent * Tim Thornton's portrait of a pop culture obsession is so convincing that one can't help wishing that his fictional alt rock band actually existed, or suspecting that they did. The Alternative Hero is a weirdly compelling portrait of fanatic fandom which reads like High Fidelity at high volume -- Jay McInerney The indiest book of all time * Guardian * Brilliant depictions of the era...nails it so precisely -- Stuart Evers * The Word * With The Alternative Hero, Tim Thornton has gone through the looking glass of obsessive fandom and brought back a hilarious, memorable, and hard-rocking tale -- Madison Smartt Bell, author of 'All Souls' Rising' A deliciously bittersweet novel that will touch the heart of anybody who ever fell in love with rock and roll -- Mick Brown, author of 'Tearing Down the Wall of Sound' Sparkly and authentic -- Mark Hodkinson * The Times * It's the usual lad-lit comic romp ... but it's fresher, funnier and more amiable than most -- Brandon Robshaw * Independent on Sunday *More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Vintage Publishing
Product notice
Paperback (UK-B)
Dimensions
Height: 198 mm
Width: 129 mm
Thickness: 24 mm
Weight
477 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-09-953178-4 (9780099531784)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Tim Thornton
The Alternative Hero
E-Book
11/2009
1st Edition
Vintage Digital
€8.99
Available for download
Person
Tim Thornton was born in 1973. Despite a boarding-school education and a degree in drama, his adulthood has largely been spent playing the drums, most recently for indie/folk artist Fink. Along the way he has delivered daily newspapers in Copenhagen, changed light bulbs at Shepherd's Bush Empire, and pulled one of the first rickshaws in London. The Alternative Hero is his first novel.