Product Description

"Crap Towns" is a humerous guide to the 50 worst towns in Britain. From inner city poverty to self-satisfied middle England, from the dull and the lifeless to the ugly and the depressing, no concrete monstrosity or phoney heritage centre will be left untouched. This title will prove that Britain isn't just the place of warm beer, cosy bed and breakfasts and amiable old gits that some travel books would have us believe. With burnt out cars, shell suits, cheap shoe shops and housing estates patrolled by rabid dogs and feral kids, Britain can be every bit as challenging a destination as the places gap year students and "serious" travellers' usually go for their poverty and misery kick. "Crap Towns" started life on the website of "The Idler" magazine when readers were asked to write short pieces on awful places they knew and despised. The idea captured imaginations throughout the internet community, receiving countless word-of-mouth recommendations from websites, chat rooms and weblogs. It is now a regular feature of "The Idler" and consists of statistics, anecdotes, history and other bits of info sent in by readers.The book selects the top 50 crap towns in Britain and reveals them in

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #33289 in Books
• Published on: 2003-10-03
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 154 pages

Review
'I wish I could think of just one thing I could tell you about Hull, oh yes...it's very nice and flat for cycling.' Philip Larkin

Synopsis
"Crap Towns" is a humerous guide to the 50 worst towns in Britain. From inner city poverty to self-satisfied middle England, from the dull and the lifeless to the ugly and the depressing, no concrete monstrosity or phoney heritage centre will be left untouched. This title will prove that Britain isn't just the place of warm beer, cosy bed and breakfasts and amiable old gits that some travel books would have us believe. With burnt out cars, shell suits, cheap shoe shops and housing estates patrolled by rabid dogs and feral kids, Britain can be every bit as challenging a destination as the places gap year students and "serious" travellers' usually go for their poverty and misery kick. "Crap Towns" started life on the website of "The Idler" magazine when readers were asked to write short pieces on awful places they knew and despised. The idea captured imaginations throughout the internet community, receiving countless word-of-mouth recommendations from websites, chat rooms and weblogs. It is now a regular feature of "The Idler" and consists of statistics, anecdotes, history and other bits of info sent in by readers.The book selects the top 50 crap towns in Britain and reveals them in

Customer Reviews

nice 1
reading the reviews by "jordi ab" and "a reader" has made me want to buy this book! if miserable snobs who obviouly dont have a sense of humour dont like it then i definately will and anyways why did you buy the book when you knew what it was gonna b about but decided to moan about it anyway?? learn to laugh people.

Funny the first time round
This book was hilarious the first time around. However, it seems it has offended some people who are obviously proud of the towns in which they reside.

To be honest this is no work of a genious, it is based on opinion and it takes about 5 minutes to flick through. But you have to admit that the people that wrote this book do have a point about the grotty places they wrote about. Some of them you wouldn't send your worst enemy to, I know because I've been to most of them!

The only thing that offended me about it was that it didn't include my home town which I would've have thought would score quite highly!

If you are easily offended and patriotic about your home town perhaps it isn't the book for you.

The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth
I got this book as a Christmas present last year and although I read it in about half an hour it's a book that I find myself going back to time and time again. It's hilarious in its wry observations but it's also shocking in its revelations. And it's provocative, after reading it you can't help but think what a dump this country really is. Maybe, just maybe some places got their act together after being 'named and shamed'.
So if, like me, you're coming to terms with the fact that you live in a crap town then this is something that will help you sleep at night, knowing that you are not alone.