Dishonesty Is the Second-Best Policy

If you like DM’s dry, often cynical, witty take on the absurdities of modern life, interspersed with historical or political commentary, you will enjoy this immensely.

My 93 year old grandfather couldn’t stop laughing when he read it. I haven’t seen him laugh that much in years!

Brexit talk! Finally. The only thing wrong with this collection of columns from David Mitchell was that I had now exhausted all of writings of David Mitchell... I guess in a couple of years they’ll be one about COVID-19, bring it on.

I adore reading David Mitchell. It’s not too often that a book makes you laugh out loud but this book succeeds on several occasions. And it is often a book that makes you think much harder about things you thought you had your opinion all settled on. Five stars.

A collection of humorous articles from the Guardian. Clever and funny, but lacks teeth, and plays it safe. -Making it perfectly pleasant and fine for a day at the beach.

Great Gift

I love a good David Mitchell moan and/or rant. His frustrations often echo my own (though he expresses them better than I could). Also, he's just funny. I'm glad I did the audiobook as I don't know if I'd laugh as much if it wasn't him reading the book to me (okay, fine, he's just reading the book, but I've paid for it, so it is to me as far as I'm concerned). rather than me reading it. If you like his rants on Would I Lie to You?, 8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown, or any other panel show, this book will be a treat for you.

Let's start with what I loved - this was a clever and funny collection of opinions from the author. I listened to the audiobook, read by the author, and think this was probably the best way to absorb this book. The author is extremely witty, has interesting perspectives on things and many times I laughed out loud. What I didn't like was that it was collection of newspaper columns so it didn't really go anywhere, there was no story, no cohesive arc or point to it all. Also, it was VERY British so a lot of references to British news, celebrities or politics just went over my head. Overall, recommended as a light distraction from these dark times.

I've always admired David Mitchell, and when he started plugging this book on social media I was interested enough to preorder it for my Kindle, even though the plugging was excessive. I was therefore disappointed to say the least when I realised it was nothing new, but a collection of old newspaper articles. I shan't bother again.

I ought to have used the more popular version of the spelling, i.e. definately, although I prefer defiantly, as it has the certainty-that-I-got-that-one right appeal to it. But seriously, this is a splendid follow-up read to Dave Cameron’s For The Record. If you are still not sure about parting with your hard-earned pennies, then my own review might sway you.I don’t want to spoil it for those who haven’t read it yet, but my highlights not necessarily in order of preference are: scampi, the 1% who don’t use plates and Tipp-ex. It also has an Index, hooray! I am so glad that editors are listening at last: we need more Indexes/Indices.

It’s a collection of clever, dry, witty and yet, in a sense, an uplifting philosophical examination of the world in which we live.“ Britain in 2019 is not a terrible place, historically speaking, to live. But if it is a place that is getting worse, and was recently a place that was getting better, that is a bit of a shame. Moral and economic decline isn’t the end of the world (though of course it could lead to it): roughly half the people who have ever lived have done so in declining civilisations, and this one is declining from quite a high point, with freedom of speech, public order and lots of hot and cold running water. But this shift from improvement to deterioration is going to have a marked psychological impact on the community. It’s really depressing, basically. Things getting inexorably worse, even if they’re not by any objective historical measure that bad, is liable to make existence itself feel a bit pointless.”

I suspect that David Mitchell is a bit 'Marmite' in that you either like him or you don't. I do. When appearing on chat shows, quiz shows etc, which seems to be his forte these days, he's on that panel precisely to give him an opportunity to launch into one of his unique monologues, ranting but also using the English language as a weapon of excess. What he says is almost immaterial compared to how he says it. And he does have a distinctive voice.As with his previous book, 'Dishonesty ...' is a collation of a number of the newspaper articles he has written for his column in The Observer over a number of years. As such, some are quite dated and quite a few have lost any topicality. Yet they have, clearly, been selected for their ability to stand the test the time so the fact that they aren't up-to-the minute doesn't get in the way of enjoyment of thee words. Crucially, as these words, although actually carefully crafted and polished, are set down almost as a transcript on the spoken rant. the result is that, while reading these, I really did hear the genuine voice of David Mitchell in my head.Although I read his previous book by dipping into it every now and again, this time, I read the whole thing like a novel; in one go from start to finish. Surprisingly, that didn't get boring and, at the end, I was left still wanting more. I thoroughly enjoyed this book of chortles and it merely reinforced my admiration for Mr Mitchell.

I bought this as a daily deal offering for 99p, having enjoyed another, earlier Mitchell book. I love David Mitchell's sense of humour on Would I Lie to You and quite enjoyed his other book but I'm afraid that I gave up on this after a few chapters. For me this came across as a vehicle for Mitchell to just show the reader how clever he is. He simply writes superciliously about random topics in order to give the reader the benefit of his intellect. Not remotely funny.