Product Description

Jack Spratt is a policeman on the door of Number Ten. When the Prime Minister decides that the only way to get closer to the men and women on the street is to travel around the country incognito and find out what they really think, he enlists Jack's help. Leaving his high-powered, ambitious wife to hold the fort, he and Jack set out. But neither can foresee how their extraordinary odyssey will impact on world affairs. Or their own lives.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #522298 in Books
• Published on: 2002-10-31
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 336 pages

Review
Each new Townsend novel is something of an event, although she is unlikely to achieve again the success her Adrian Mole books gleaned. Nevertheless, this is her most imaginative and entertaining outing in some time: what marks it out is clear change of pace, and despite the humour every page of the book speaks of a very personal involvement. Jack Spratt is a policeman on the door of Number 10 Downing Street. When the Prime Minister decides to travel incognito around the country to find out what people really think, he enlists Jack's aid. And the odyssey of the two very different men will change both their lives. The concept here is highly unusual, and Townsend brings to it all the energy and humour that have long been her hallmarks. Her fascination with the Prime Minister and his family (the thinly disguised character in Number Ten doesn't take too long to pin down) shines through on every page, and there's a sense that Townsend would dearly like life to imitate art in this fashion. It won't - but it's fun to follow this fascinating byway. (Kirkus UK)

About the Author
Sue Townsend became Britain's bestselling author of the 1980s with her books THE SECRET DIARY OF ADRIAN MOLE AGED 13 3/4 and THE GROWING PAINS OF ADRIAN MOLE. She is the author of seven other novels, including THE QUEEN AND I, and her collected journalism, THE PUBLIC CONFESSIONS OF A MIDDLE-AGED WOMAN (AGED 55 3/4), was published in 2001. She is well known as a playwright and lives in Leicester.

Customer Reviews

It's topical, it's satirical, you'll love it
I've just read Number 10 by Sue Townsend. It was brilliant.
The PM, Edward Clare (not much concealment here) has lost touch with the people. He decides to go walkabout, incognito, in Britain, with that famous cop-at-the-front-of-number-10, who's called Jack. It's set in 2002. You'd think Sue Townsend was a mind reader: the book is well up to date even two years later, except that she thought He wouldn't invade Iraq. (She misjudged him.)

Clare and PC Jack go around Britain queing for buses and taxis, getting ripped off, visiting care homes, sink housing estates, and meeting deranged people of all descriptions.

Meanwhile, at Downing Street, Mrs Clare, the cleverest woman in Europe, goes mad without her husband and suggests that warts and amputated body parts deserve christian burial.

Also at Downing Street, Alex McPherson, Press Officer, is running news management and damage limitation and monitoring the PM's every move. Oh, and the PM is dressed as a woman and at once stage lands the lead part in an anti-establishment satirical play about a PM who's lost all his principles. .

Also at Downing Street, the Chancellor is helping the PM's son with his homework project - about Socialism.

Mrs Townsend does not like what New Labour has become, and you would soon know it. But it's laugh aloud funny.

My favourite bit: the PM's sister runs Kennels, £100 per dog per night. Being shown around, the visitors get to the dogs' quarters: Jack "..was astonished to find cubicles, carpets and soft lighting. Each dog had an outside run and a colour television; a few of them were watching Crossroads."

If your taste is for a bleak look at what New Labour has done (or not done) for Britain, this is your tome.

Another comic gem........
This the latest from the pen of Sue Townsend deals with the adventure that Jack Sprat the white sheep of a family of criminals who ends up guarding the door at 10 Downing Street.

When the PM is embarrassed at PMQ's he decides he needs to be seen as a man of the people and decides to take on a visit around the UK-the only problem is he decides to do it in drag so Edward Clare -the PM becomes Edwina St Clare actress and Jack is dragged along for the ride.The characters including an ambitious Chancellor of the Exchequer the all powerful media fixer and a Mandelsonesque 'best friend' are all drawn probably too near the knuckle for some but in this the fun is guessing who is being described,my favourite being the PM's wife the 'cleverest woman in the world'

The tour which takes in Edinburgh via Leeds to the Cotswolds and ends up at Jacks mothers house in Leicester which has been turned into a crack den is a another winner the characters including some that would be very easy to recognise for anyone with a smidge of political knowledge are written well and Townsends unique comic insight and a healthy dose of left wing politics makes the book another winner in my book,the inadequicies of modern Britain are dealt with in an intelligent way and there are some genuine funny moments along with a touch or two of pathos .

All in all another page turner that well deserves some of your time.

Non-Fictional Poltical Fiction
If, during the course of the last few years you've turned on the radio / tv - once - and caught a political headline, you'll be able to relate it to a, somewhat more highly amusing event or series of within this book. I loved it. I don't generally tend to read fiction which; again is why I loved this book - I just chuckled, sniggered and thought. The book is fantastic, if I tried to describe to story line I'm afraid I'd have to re-write the book without being vauge ; this is just non-stop, increadibly intelligent, well thought out work. Bravo Sue Townsend!