Product Description

As a teenager Jane Bell had dreamt of playing in the casinos of Monte Carlo in the company of James Bond, but in her punk phase she'd got herself pregnant and by the time she reaches forty-six she's a grandmother, her dreams as dry as the dust her Dyson sucks up from her hall carpet every day. Then her son Ross, a researcher working for an arms manufacturer in Switzerland, is forced to disappear before some characters cut from the same cloth as Blofeld persuade him to part with the secrets of his research. But they are not the only ones desperate to locate him. A team of security experts is hired by Ross's firm: headed by the enigmatic Bett, his staff have little in common apart from total professionalism and a thorough disregard for the law. Bett believes the key to Ross's whereabouts is his mother, and in one respect he is right, but even he is taken aback by the verve underlying her determination to secure her son's safety as she learns the black arts of quiet subterfuge and violent attack. The teenage dreams of fast cars, high-tech firepower and extreme action had always promised to be fun and games, but in real life it's likely someone is going to lose an eye ...Visit the author's website at www. brookmyre.co.uk

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #27644 in Books
• Published on: 2006-04-20
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 416 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
All Fun and Games Until Somebody Loses An Eye belongs to the half of Brookmyre's work less concerned with the state of the Scottish nation and more with what happens when iconically ordinary Scots are dumped into the middle of Hollywood plots. Here, we have, on the one hand, an international trouble-shooting organization most of whose agents are on the run from some sort of trouble themselves, and, on the other, a forty-something grandmother aware that life has passed her by and was not meant to. When someone tries to kidnap her grand-daughter, she responds with inventive viciousness; told to save her family by making a South of France rendezvous, she steals passports, cars and tickets as if she has always been doing it. Recruited merely as an expert on a missing boffin who happens to be her son, Jane demonstrates that the quiet desperation of ordinary life is the best training a super agent could have...This is Brookmyre at his most slyly subversive and viscerally exciting, a daydream which never quite becomes preposterous. --Roz Kaveney

Review
'A sharp, memorable and occasionally surprisingly touching book.' Euan Ferguson, Observer 'Funny, electric and captivating.' Marcel Berlins, THE TIMES 'Memorably funny lines.' DAILY TELEGRAPH 'The usual rip-roaring narrative but with a vividly adult, sensitive edge.' GLASGOW HERALD 'Exotic locations, fast-moving storyline, snappy dialogue, a raunchy grandmother, espionage, violence, humour and a mad scientist- Brookmyre certainly knows how to pack a crime novel... definitely in a league of his own.' DAILY MIRROR 'As ever, Brookmyre can do madcap escapism which cocks a snook at the cliches of your average thriller while never letting up on the adrenaline, completely sucking you into the world of his devious imagination.' DAILY EXPRESS 'Very funny.' HEAT 'All Fun and Games Until Somebody Loses An Eye belongs to the half of Brookmyre's work less concerned with the state of the Scottish nation and more with what happens when iconically ordinary Scots are dumped into the middle of Hollywood plots. Here, we have, on the one hand, an international trouble-shooting organization most of whose agents are on the run from some sort of trouble themselves, and, on the other, a forty-something grandmother aware that life has passed her by and was not meant to. When someone tries to kidnap her grand-daughter, she responds with inventive viciousness; told to save her family by making a South of France rendezvous, she steals passports, cars and tickets as if she has always been doing it. Recruited merely as an expert on a missing boffin who happens to be her son, Jane demonstrates that the quiet desperation of ordinary life is the best training a super agent could have...This is Brookmyre at his most slyly subversive and viscerally exciting, a daydream which never quite becomes preposterous.' Roz Kaveney, AMAZON.CO.UK REVIEW

Daily Telegraph
'Memorably funny lines'

Customer Reviews

Good plot, decent characters, very enjoyable
I've read this three times it was such fun. Making the heroine of an action novel a middle aged grandmother who is fed up with her life was a great idea. Charactarisations are pretty good. As usual Brookmyre sticks in some information along with the plot so it will appeal to men who like to learn as they read. What's more, unlike some other action novels, the protagonists ae not superhuman, are not always right and have flaws which ae not plot devices. (So no blind, deaf or amnesiac detectives here!)The story moves along very nicely. Worth the money.

I shouldn't have read the other reviews so early :O)
I had read all of Christopher Brookmyre's other books before this was realeased, and was waiting for its publish date, then after publication I came and read some other reviews which slated it as an underwhelming read ... so I went on to read something else instead.
Well, I've just finished "All Fun and Games" and found it thoroughly enjoyable ... sure it isn't full of the gut wrenching, stomach churning humour of the other books ... but once I was started on it and the story got going ... I still couldn't put it down until I'd finished it.

If you've read, and enjoyed, his other books ... have a read of this one, and don't be put off by the more critical reviews.

Very pleasantly surprised
I was actually looking for some realistic, breath-stopping thrillers on my last Amazon spending spree, so when this one appeared on my screen and I read the synopsis and reviews, I initially discarded it. However, as an ex-pat Scot, the idea of a book set in my home town, with a heroine my own age, meant I somehow kept coming back to it and eventually, although not without misgivings, added it to my basket as a final item before going to check-out. Where books are concerned, I don't overly subscribe to the idea of saving the best till last and, as I was still having doubts about the wisdom of my puchase, I read all the other books in my parcel first. I finally picked it up on a Friday evening and the rather slow start mentioned by other reviewers was starting to convince me I'd made a dud choice. However, since the only other thing I had to read at the time was the local sports paper, I persevered and I am delighted that I did. It picked up after maybe half a dozen or so pages to the extent that I begrudged putting it down to see to the evening meal. I had finished it before lunch the next day. It gave me a few nostalgic moments when I came across some turns of phrase I'd not used or heard since I was a kid, but most of all, it was just great fun to read. This was my first Christopher Brookmyre book, but it certainly won't be my last.