My thanks to NetGalley and Headline for a copy of “ History “ for an honest review.

I’m an admirer of Miles Jupp and his wry comedy. he never fails to make me laugh ( especially when I hear him laughing ) , but with this book he’s nearly made me cry ,that’s not to say the book is without humour .
Wrong ,I know , but before I started reading this ,I’d read other negative reviews so I was expecting to be disappointed by the book.Luckily this wasn’t the case. I was hooked from the beginning, and felt real empathy for the character of Clive.He is at heart a good man, trying to do his best , but life keeps getting in the way..
I found this novel to be well written and have really interesting , believable characters.
I’d love to read what happens to Clive next !

The year is 1998 and Clive Hapgood is an overworked History teacher in a small public school in this debut novel from the talented comedian and actor, Miles Jupp.
Clive is 38, but looks older, his hair greying and a bald patch was developing after years of struggle to juggle the demands of a school which takes advantage of him and his home life dominated by his wife and two young daughters.
Jupp is a good writer and creates a vivid portrait of both the minutiae of Clive's desperately overburdened existence at Frampton School and the horrors of a family holiday in Nornandy.
Already a proven talent in other fields, Jupp proves his authorial credentials in a novel which contains some similarities to Kingsley Amis's Lucky Jim.

Clive is a history teacher in a private school in rural England. Zzzzz. He finds teaching dull, some of his colleagues irritating, and some of his pupils smug and entitled. A series of mishaps pile up the pressure he faces. As a result, he bristles with anger, which occasionally boils over, causing problems both at home and at work.

So far so dull. I tried and tried but could not find anything to engage me in this. The characters are dull people in a dull setting, and for long sections the plot is ponderously slow. At times, the dull mechanics of everyday life are spelled out at length; the intention is surely to show us Clive's boredom with life, but the effect is to weigh the narrative down with yet more dullness.

The only redeeming feature is Miles Jupp's wry humour, sprinkled liberally throughout. But fans of his work on radio and TV - among whom I include myself - won't find this nearly as funny as In and Out of the Kitchen, or his time as host of The News Quiz.

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Many thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for providing an advance review copy, in return for an honest review.

Clive Hapgood is feeling stuck. The private school he teaches at is consuming his life, no thanks to wretched headteacher Julian Crouch. The gentle country life Clive envisaged has stifled him and left his marriage on the brink. What he needs is a holiday - something to remind him and Helen what life used to be like. But when things don't go to plan, and an incident at school begins to weigh heavy on his head, Clive's life starts to unravel in front of him. Has he got it in him to turn things around, whatever the cost? After all, it's his own time he's wasting...Unfortunately, this didn’t really click with me! I found I had some issues with the pacing of this novel and I wasn’t really invested in the narrative or any of the characters. I still think it was enjoyable and easy to read and the use of the story within a story is clever, but it did leave me wanting.

This was an enjoyable read from Miles Jupp. It told the story of a teacher at a boarding school who realises that being a teacher, and life more widely, wasn't quite working out as he had hoped.

The main character, Clive, was a figure who at times I felt sympathy for, but at other times frustration. He often had good intentions but his inability to stand up for himself or his failure to communicate with his family often got in the way. If he were to write his own school report, Clive would probably say of himself "could do better". A readable book.

I am sorry to say that I didn't really find this novel fiendishly funny. For me it was quite a detailed portrayal of one man stuck in a life he hates and can't escape. If anything I would compare it to Death of a Salesman. If instead of a salesman, Willy was a private school history teacher.
If I'm honest it wasn't really my cup of tea and I have to admit that it dragged at times. Perhaps my age and gender are to blame as I'm not a middle aged man but I really couldn't warm to this story.

I liked the tone of this book. Also found it interesting because like Clive, the protagonist, I've been a teacher at both state and independent schools.
It was very, very detailed. Whilst I admired the amount of tiny, daily details that the author incorporated into this book, the scenes that go on for pages and pages but where really very little happens, I grew bored of this quite quickly. By 50% in, I was skimming rather than reading to be completely honest.
I liked Clive, could empathise with his dissatisfaction with life, but ultimately felt he was a bit passive in his own life. Less so by the end perhaps.
Also baffled as to why it was set in the 1990s. Other than the mention of the death of Princess Diana, this didn't seem to add a great deal.

I read this book in two long sittings as I was keen to see where the plot was leading .It is the late 1990sand Clive Hapgood our key protagonist is trapped in life working in a private school where values are focussed on judging each other by success in exam or sporting results and being part of “ the establishment” .Clive has taught in a state school but encouraged by his wife has moved to a small town and entered the world of private education. His wife is disappointed by his lack of professional upward mobility in an environment where his teaching skills are never fully recognised.When a school incident involving a pupil leads Clive into a period of doubt, despair and self reflection, he ultimately learns where the values lie within the school. Clive is one of those characters that you feel for but want him to get tough. This is a curious novel as it focuses on “ the underdog “ within the system of a private education and how his married life has become routine and tied to the workplace. The plot involves a lot of daily detail within school and a holiday in France. By the end of the book I was left feeling slightly melancholy and with the question as to why set the story in 1999? Isit to tell us nothing changes ( and with a dig at the picture of the political system in 2021) and ultimately it is the final pages that Clive does the right thing.... maybe it’s a message to all those people trapped in a life that disappoints and doesn’t recognise them that sometimes you just have to leap.... I was also left wondering , what next for Clive ? A sequel ?
It’s hard to define the genre of the book .. but ultimately it’s an exploration of a man dissatisfied with life and his eventual release ... I was still pondering this book some days later ( which is no bad thing )