The Curious Education Of Epitome Quirkstandard
This peculiar comic novel concerns two men and a woman and looks at how they came to be where they were when they met and the effect that meeting had upon them.
One man is Epitome Quirkstandard, a benighted aristocrat in the Wodehousian tradition whose staff have abandoned him to go and fight in the First World War and who discovers the taste for learning – especially when he attempts to make his own breakfast.
The other man is Mr. Crepuscular, a man who has written a multitude of educative pamphlets that he kindly rents out to Quirkstandard. As an illiterate scamp he ran away to join the circus, but through a series of unlikely adventures he ends up as a wise quasi-Buddhist who understands that sometimes the circus just isn’t the right place to be.
And the woman is Quirkstandard’s aunt, Penelope Penultimate, a beautiful but severe lady of mature years who spent the majority of her life abroad taking parties of teenage girls on adventure holidays, with no insurance.
The story comes to a head when she issues an invitation to the men to come to her cottage in the country for the weekend. When they do so all manner of storylines come together, leading to unexpected revelations, arguments, jealousies, tensions, parlour games, picnics and nudity. Oh, it’s so exciting.
Along the way the book is filled with historical and biographical asides as it covers the broad sweep of life from the sawdust circuses of the 1860s, through the Amazon Basin of the 1890s, right up to the ultra-modern trench-warfare of the 1910s. It is discursive and meandering in a way that makes it a particularly diminutive descendant of Tristram Shandy or Three Men In A Boat or something akin to Douglas Adams without the science-fiction. Some people like this sort of thing.
The author, A.F. Harrold, is a prize-winning performance poet, comedian and Englishman. More can be discovered at
www.afharrold.co.uk.
March 25th, 2006 at 2:53 pm
This is a briliant story – every nice to listen to. I was truely sorry that the story had to end. Please write a follow – up to this. Please. Really – everyone – giver this book a listen.
April 17th, 2006 at 3:40 pm
Hi there sir or madam, thanks for the kind comments – I’m in the process of recording the second book almost sort of kinda right now-ish – patience and I’ll eventually finish sitting by myself in that dark room muttering into the microphone… I promise. Perhaps. AFH.
April 25th, 2006 at 4:24 pm
I really enjoyed this book! It was a total and very pleasant suprise, and I look forward to more from Mr. Harrold. I downloaded the entire book onto my iPod and listened to it on a roadtrip from North Texas to Central New Mexico, and laughed hysterically all the way there. I’ve recommended this one to everyone I have been able to think of, and thoroughly recommend it to anyone who reads this posting. Mr. Harrold’s comic timing is perfect, and the narration and editing were superb. The arrival and education of Mr. Crepuscular at the monastery in Nepal was hilarious, as was his eternal nudity. I wish Mr. Harrold all the best in his future endeavors (sorry, endeavOUrs), and can’t wait to hear his next!
Thanks,
-George
June 5th, 2006 at 6:21 am
This book was a great deal of fun. Light and quirky, the story moves along with a collection of interesting characters and situations. A.F.Harrolds narration is very pleasant, as well.
June 10th, 2006 at 7:07 am
Incredible! How can such a brilliant book not have been published yet? This guy is at least as good as Scott Sigler, only much, much funnier. And there’s much less blood. This is very very good comedy. Part Monty Python, part Douglas Adams, part Spike Milligan, and completely original, this story has managed to become my favourite of 2006. I would love to be able to write this well.
Not only is the story original, but the production of this audio version is one of the best I’ve heard. the music is suitable , funny, and unobtrusive. The authors reading is wonderful – he has great timing (and makes me think he may have performed comedy at some point) and can do many sorts of male british voices (female, or non-british voices not so well).
I can’t praise this story enough. I’ll buy it as soon as it’s in the stores. Get it now.
PS: I am not the author in disguise and I am not recieving kickbacks.
June 30th, 2006 at 4:22 pm
This was a really fun book and I enjoyed it a great deal… up until the final three episodes. I don’t know, it just seemed to take a mean turn. There was still some humor in it, and I suppose it was supposed to be dark humor, but given how relatively light and fun the rest of the book was I can’t fathom why this change in mood happened.
Overall, as I said, I enjoyed this a great deal. I just wish it had sayed true to itself right to the end.
September 26th, 2006 at 7:01 pm
Amusing story with good narration, reminded me a bit of Monty Python and Douglas Adams, though not quite as zany.
May 9th, 2007 at 10:24 pm
An aglet bush! Of course. It’s the small things that really determine the course of history. This is why I read historical fiction: the history books themselves never seem to get to these small but vital points.
I’m only on episode 11. But I’m loving it.
–jeff, the almost wholly biodegradable former academic (wait, wrong book)
May 22nd, 2007 at 10:27 pm
I finished the book tonight. It’s quite humorous, but if we focus entirely on the humor we’ve missed a good part of the book: it is, in the end, wise. A particularly amazing moment for me was the death of the guru, finally recounted in episode 22. I don’t want to give anything away, but it seems to me that the disappearance of the guru…a disappearance convincing even to him until right at the last little bit of a moment…is a metaphor for the entire novel.
Or, one might say, a metaphor even for the experience of the novel. We gambol through the absurd, we live through the characters’ worst moments, we delight in the insane coincidences that only a writer of this magnitude can pull off, we laugh at our favorite phrases: “A Penultimate Aglet Will Never Be Your Last.” But when the book is done, all the characters walk off the stage (some are dragged off), the stream of words entering our ears dribbles away to nothing, and in that final moment all that is left is the light pouring out of what we once thought of as solid. And then it’s over.
December 22nd, 2007 at 2:18 am
Bravo A.F Harrold!! The Curious Education of Epitome Quirkstandard is a triumph. Your story and characters are fresh and alive, not stereotypical and contrived like so much of what passes for writing these days. I have enjoyed this book more than any other I have read this year. I can’t wait for the release of Penelope Penultimate and the Pyramids of Perplexity.
January 13th, 2008 at 12:59 pm
I really enjoyed this, and the Irregular Miscellany. Thank you for all your work on this. I highly recommend the book to others – it’s funny, quirky, and touching.
January 24th, 2008 at 1:30 pm
This has been one of my favorite podiobooks ever. I usually lean toward the darker stuff, but I kept finding myself smiling and I felt a great fondness for the characters as their stories unfolded. Thank you so much for sharing, I look forward to more adventures from this author!
March 19th, 2008 at 7:35 am
Thanks… I really liked this, and am looking forward to hearing more from the author.
August 17th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
I enjoyed your story, your characters and your reading of it. I found your characters very original. Your images were very creative. Of course my favorite was Spigot. I am glad you gave him a heros end.
May 23rd, 2009 at 3:06 am
At first, I felt the story was brilliant. Reminded me of Jeeves and Wooster, and in a good sense too. This really transcended that TV-series’ setting-imposed story-limitations. But I’m affraid that this high standard wasn’t maintained throughout the story. I must it it all got a bit complicated when the storylines started weaving through time and place and this cost the story dearly (I should learn to focus more on the story I’m listening to, instead of doing other things, like I normally can do that quite easily, maybe that’d help. I guess I’ll have to erelisten to the MP3s of the first parts of the story.
June 3rd, 2009 at 5:32 pm
Amazing, wonderful, brilliant, captivating… I do not know enough positive adjectives to describe this book. I loved the different story lines, the jumps in time and most importantly, the characters and their lives.
I will say one “bad” thing. I felt robbed by the ending. I thought Epitome’s fate was a cheap blow to readers/listeners who had devoted so much time to the story. I am actually having a hard time recommending this book to my friends/family because I haven’t come to terms with what happened at the end.