My Booky Wook

My Booky Wook  

Cover of the hardback edition
Author(s) Russell Brand
Country United Kingdom
Language English
Genre(s) Memoir
Publisher Hodder & Stoughton
Publication date 15 November 2007 (hardback)
10 July 2008 (paperback)
Media type Print (hardcover, paperback)
Pages 352
ISBN ISBN 978-0340936153 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-0340936177 (paperback)
OCLC Number 302057286
Followed by Booky Wook 2: This Time It's Personal

My Booky Wook is a memoir, written by English comedian and actor Russell Brand, published in 2007 by Hodder & Stoughton. It was released in North America and Australia in 2009 by HarperCollins Publishers.

Contents

Summary

This "warts and all" account of Brand's life follows, in vivid detail, the star's life from his troubled childhood in Gray's End Close, Essex to his first taste for fame in Stage School up to his turbulent drug addiction and his triumphant rise to fame from RE:Brand to Big Brother's Big Mouth to Hollywood.

Chapters

My Booky Wook is divided into four sections. The title itself is in the style of the fictional Nadsat language from A Clockwork Orange; Brand explained the reference during his appearance on Have I Got News For You in December 2007.

Part I

  1. April Fool
  2. Umbilical Noose
  3. Shame Innit?
  4. Fledgling Hospice
  5. "Diddle-Di-Diddle-Di"
  6. How Christmas Should Feel
  7. One McAvennie
  8. I've Got a Bone to Pick with You
  9. Teacher's Whiskey
  10. "Boobaloo"
  11. Say Hello to the Bad Guy

Part II

  1. The Eternal Dilemma
  2. Body Mist
  3. Ying Yang
  4. Click, Clack, Click, Clack
  5. 'Wop Out a Bit of Acting'
  6. The Stranger
  7. Is This a Cash Card I See Before Me?
  8. 'Do You Want Drama?'

Part III

  1. Dagenham Is Not Damascus
  2. Don't Die of Ignorance
  3. Firing Minors
  4. Down Among the Have-Nots
  5. First-Class Twit
  6. Let's Not Tell Our Mums
  7. You're a Diamond
  8. Call Me Ishmael. Or Isimir. Or Something...

Part IV

  1. Mustafa Skagfix
  2. A Gentleman with a Bike
  3. Out of the Game
  4. Hare Krishna Morrissey
  5. And Then Three Come at Once

Critical reception

The book garnered mostly positive reviews. The Sun called it "candid, funny and moving." The Observer claimed it was "better written and more entertaining than any number of the celebrity autobiographies that clog the shelves of bookshops." The book won the Biography of the year at the 2008 British Book Awards[1] and the Outstanding Literary Achievement at the 2009 Spike Guys' Choice Awards.

Film adaptation

Brand planned to star as himself in a film adaptation of the book, originally scheduled to be filmed by British director Michael Winterbottom at the end of 2008 or early in 2009.[2] The project has since been shelved by Brand, who did not want American audiences to learn of his "chequered past" without reading the book first.[3]

Sales

The book has sold over 600,000 copies since it was released.[4]

References

  1. ^ 2008 best biography
  2. ^ Brand turns 'Booky Wook' into film
  3. ^ Hilton, Beth (2008-05-31). "Brand scraps "Booky Wook" film". Digital Spy. http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/movies/a97128/brand-scraps-booky-wook-film.html. Retrieved 2008-05-31. 
  4. ^ Source for Booky Wook sales

External links

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Filmography
Voice acting
Radio
Literature
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