Killing Joke, The

Inhoud

When Guy Fletcher protests at a feeble joke he overhears in his grotty local pub, he finds himself headbutted and struck by an idea in quick succession. Is it possible to trace a joke all the way back to its original source? So begins his quest: to follow this sorry joke back to its creator. It's a meandering trail across the UK that takes him from a humourless Hungarian dentist in Muswell Hill to a hyperactive troupe of Boy Scouts in St Albans, from a group of giggling grave-diggers in Saffron Walden to a pickpocket in Stoke-on-Trent. (Just how does he get Guy's watch?) And there are some pretty odd things happening along the way. Guy is sure he's being followed by a sinister Englishman, Irishman and Scotsman. He has an unfortunate accident on a banana skin. There's a fly in his soup. An army of nuns swamp his train. And then there's the exploding house in Cambridge. Just as Guy thinks he's getting close to uncovering the original source of the joke, the trail stops cold. Or rather, the last link in the chain is crushed by a falling grandfather clock. Guy is on the verge of discovering something very unpleasant. Making jokes is no laughing matter...

Bespreking

This book is a joke

How would you feel if you overheard a bloke in a bar telling a joke featuring your own mother? This is exactly what happens to Guy Fletcher when he visits his local pub. To be fair, the mother is the much loved actress Selina Moore and no-one actually knows that Guy is her son. Completely flabbergasted by the rudeness of the joke, Guy decides to track down its origin. Indeed, his life is already down the drain, so who cares what kind of silly things he gets up to. Not only will he fall in love during his quest, he will also find out that not all jokes are created just for fun. Yes, he will soon discover that there really exists an Englishman, Irishman and Scotsman.

Good ideas are not always guarantee to great stories and The Killing Joke sadly turns out to be one big proof of this rule. Although Antony Horowitz masterly succeeds in creating the perfect intro to a hilarious yarn, it does not take long before the story gets to a point where you’ve been before and starts repeating the same gimmicks. After a few chapters it is overly clear that the world of Guy has been turned into one big joke and the reader has no need in getting that obvious fact repeated over and over. The only reason why I kept reading on was that I still had some hope for a big conclusion, with –if allowed- a surprise ending. True, the denouement is rather surprising, but only in the way that it is in the race for most stupid and annoying ending of a novel ever. I would have fallen asleep, if it wasn’t for the annoyance I felt after finishing this book.

This book is a joke (no pun intended).