Identity Crisis

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I thought I had a handle on his politics, but it's to his credit that he's managed to satirise our contemporary crazy world so it is not clear whether he is railing against the world-gone-mad political correctness, harking back to a simpler time, or embracing it.

Lots of people died but I didn’t really care about most of them because they were just stereotypes, and I know that was part of the discussion about identities, but if I only wanted satire and commentary, I wouldn’t read a novel. I recognize that reality TV shows are now here to stay and most of them frustrate me: but, perhaps I am tired of reading about the tricks and deceit behind the ‘reality’. I listened to this as an audiobook read by the author, and laughed aloud more than once walking along.

Instead we get what feels like a very strangely timed book, with a cast of some real, some fake, and some thinly veiled characters. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice. I felt like he was trying to explain mindsets and get his audience up to speed on the language and approaches rather than doing anything innovative with them. The racing wasn’t necessarily a reflection of pleasure so much as a) wanting to finish it so I could pick up my next book and b) not quitting so I could confirm my suspicions about whodunnit were right.

Identity Crisis is a 2019 satirical novel about Brexit, cancel culture, Love Island, Cambridge Analytica, Putin, MeToo, Harvey Weinstein, trans rights, gay rights, multiculturalism, Twitter, popular feminism, incels, and a bunch of other shit that I probably forgot about because this book was at least 100 pages longer than it needed to be. Enjoyable commentary on contemporary society and its over the top political correctness, and the ‘me’ generation with their social media obsession. It did give a look at how mad our society has become and how our outrage is manipulated by hashtags and how lots of us struggle to understand the changing way we identify gender. Despite there being a lot of hullaballoo in the text about all these people being killed by the same assassin (a guy in a Spurs shirt - apparently Russian budgets have been cut and their assassins can only afford one shirt), we never actually see the assassins. The world has changed around him and he simply hasn't kept up with it which plunges him like a tragic hero from one awkward situation to another.Detective Matlock and his two accomplices (a married lesbian, and a very not-gay [and he wants you to know it] right-winger) all work together to solve the murder of a transexual woman, Sammy Hill; whose murder, naturally, becomes an overnight sensation.

The police media liaison department are quick to make him issue an apology, and so the Pandora's Box titled "Political Correctness" is open for business. The book's less terrible than it would be if Elton was a full-on reactionary, but it's probably more boring.I have learnt so much about the current trends in social media that I didn’t fully know about (and I actually use social media).