Human Punk

by John King

Book Overview

For fifteen-year-old Martin, growing up in Slough, the summer of 1977 means punk rock, reggae music, disco girls, stolen cars, social-club lager, cut-throat Teds and a job picking cherries with the gypsies. Life is sweet - until he is beaten up and thrown in the Grand Union Canal with his best mate Smiles.

Fast forward to 1988, and Joe is traveling home on the Trans-Siberian express after three years working in a Hong Kong bar, remembering...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0099283166
• ISBN13: 9780099283164
• Release Date: June 2001
• Publisher: Vintage Books USA
• Length: 340 Pages
• Weight: 0.56 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.1" x 7.8"

Customer Reviews

touching, funny and origional

This book touched me. the fact that it based on alot of punk rock music really got me into the book. this is easy to read and a lovely story to read following joes life as a teenager..listening 2 punk rock and chasing after girls. a typical guy thing.and the tragic parts really brought tears in to my eyes.i reccomend this to anyone whos looking for an easy to read story and interested in such music.

Youthful aggression, ageless compassion

Often when punk music and culture appear in print or on film, the effect or purpose is either to deride the scene altogether as an unruly mob of foolish and destructive delinquents, or alternately as a sad celebration of an ideal doomed to failure. British author John King's Human Punk, however, stands out as a more genuine coming-of-age story, prominently featuring the fictional Joe Martin's punk rock lifestyle without passing judgment on the phenomenon itself.For many teenagers growing up around the London suburbs in 1977, punk is a way of life. Joe and friends Chris, Dave and Smiles get off on listening to the Clash, stomping poseur fashion punks with steel-toed DMs, wooing bleach-blonde girls at the dance clubs, and joyriding into London to catch the best concerts. Told from Joe's perspective, the story follows the boys as they get into trouble with girls, drugs, the police, and elder punk rocker Gary Wells, who tosses Joe and Smiles in a canal with lasting and tragic consequences.Eleven years later, in 1988, Joe returns to England after years spent working in a Hong Kong bar when shocking news draws him back to hometown Slough. On the train ride through China, Russia, and Germany, he contemplates the injustices of human society in the context of reminiscences of fading childhood friendships. By the time Joe's story wraps up in the year 2000, Joe discovers that idle decisions affect legacies, and that some wrongs should not be forgiven.As a study of boot-boy counterculture, what makes Human Punk interesting is that it is not about punk at all. To be sure, the music and influence is there, but King's novel focuses on characterization, creating a believable band of friends who have the qualities of punk rockers but are by no means emblematic or representative of the movement as a whole. With an emphasis on the "human," King is able to portray with a natural continuity the chronicles of an anarchist, as Joe does not "turn establishment" as he ages but rather matures and develops within his punk rock mind frame.King's novel feels like an oral account, as if the reader is along with Chris, Dave, and Smiles to hear Joe's story. This approach certainly has its strengths and weaknesses. On the one hand, it allows a more intimate and first hand understanding of life in Slough as seen through the main character's eyes, and multi-page stream of consciousness passages give a sense of immediacy to the events describe. Unfortunately, these same stream of consciousness passages are sometimes difficult to follow from leap to quantum leap, and occasionally the chronology of events discussed in flashback are difficult to place.American readers will find an added obstacle in deciphering the numerous Anglicanisms, which when added to 1970s punk jargon can make Human Punk read a bit like A Clockwork Orange. This challenge can be surmounted relatively easily by paying attention to context, but remains somewhat distracting.John King's Human Punk provides a valuable

Human all right

Probably the most gripping book I've read. Stream-of-consciousness/narration of life as a street kid, and later as an intelligent but scarred man. Always the football fan, and has interesting taste in music, partly because some of it describes his life. His philosophy comes through his descriptions, and his thoughts are fascinating at times. I couldn't decide whether I would want to know this guy or not, but ultimately decided, you betcha. Big surprises in this book, don't read the back first!

Fire and Brimstone Punk novel

Joe Martin was a mid-teen punk in 1977, valuing the music and not the fashion unless it was a punkette in fishnets! We follow Joe and his friends through their growing pains and escapades, suffering and laughing with them as they struggle to make sense of the adult world. Joe and his best friend, Smiles, are involved in a pivotal incident during the Queen's Jubilee year which colours the middle third of the book (set in 1988) and the final third (2000).John King gets under the skin of his characters, making them believable. There is terrifying violence and the softest of love within these pages and the conflicting emotions are portrayed with pragmatism.It's a book especially compelling for someone who grew up in the same era as Joe Martin. King hits so many nails on the head it's like reading your own life story.