“Dark, brooding and painfully funny.
NO MAJOR SPOILERS
The hero of Numan versus Numan is a complicated man. Holding onto the dreams (and the fashions) of his youth, Five is frozen in time and doesn’t seem to see the people around him too clearly. Even his dreams are small – he wants to keep his band at the number one slot among Gary Numan tribute acts. And then along comes the arrogant a-hole Ross – mouthy, confident and the figurehead of a better Numan tribute act.
After spending some time learning that Five’s day-to-day life is that of a carer and skivvy for his oddball family – who also happen to be his bandmates – we follow Five along an increasingly weird and hilarious route toward mayhem, alien infiltration conspiracy paranoia, romantic dysfunction and a climactic battle of the bands that ends with a brutal wallop.
But it doesn’t end there – the culmination of the drama leads all the way to the throne of the one-and-only Numan himself, and involves an out-of-control hearse in a gripping airfield tarmac chase that had me flipping the pages faster than my eyes would read.
I found the whole thing engrossing. I wasn’t sure whether I loved or loathed the characters – either way I wanted to find out what they would do and what outrageous thing they would say next. If you want a laugh-out-loud funny, entertaining read that will charm and shock you in equal measure, then this is the book for you!
Reviewed by:
Simon Tilbury
Added 21st February 2020
