Suburbia : A Far From Ordinary Place

The suburbs – long sneered at for being dreary and stultifying – have always been far livelier and more entertaining than they're given credit for. In this witty and sharply observed account of what it was like to grow up in one in the 1950s and '60s, David Randall gives the other side of suburbia: full of absurdities and happiness, scandals and follies, and inhabitants both sage and silly. Here, at last, is the truth about what life was really like behind the often-closed (but not always net) curtains of our semi-detacheds. This is that rare book: a most unmiserable memoir.

You don't get to choose where you grow up, and for more than 80 per cent of the population, the boring, unadventurous and thoroughly unfashionable suburbs serve as their childhood stomping grounds. Much derided in literature and popular culture, acclaimed author David Randall turns his eagle eye and sharp wit on growing up in Suburbia - and his own childhood through the 1950s, '60s and '70s.

From the predictable naming conventions to the unambitious juvenile crime, and from the social misfits to the snobs in the detached houses, Randall recounts it all in this funny and often poignant anecdote-filled book. Exploring such vital questions as why milkmen were the only daytime callers to be suspected of charming housewives, and just how to hide the New Car (more out of concern for the neighbours than anything to do with crime), no stone is left unturned (although each is placed neatly back onto its manicured lawn). Most important, were the suburbs so extraordinarily cliche as they are portrayed to be? Well, yes, probably. But so what?


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