I often don't care much for books that are straight-up comedies. Generally, I don't find them as funny as books that have other, more serious stories, but are leavened with comedy along the way. Maybe it's just that generally, the quality of writing in comedies isn't really all that good, and so all that's left is the laughs. Generally, though, you don't get that many laughs out of the book, and so you just feel disappointed.

I feel pretty mixed about this book, then. It was well written stylistically, certainly. The book flowed nicely, there were some very good scenes, and the references were quite nice, as well. Still, the plot overall was forced in places, hard to follow, and didn't gel well, and the characterization beyond the main character wasn't great. It made me laugh a couple of times, which is actually not that bad, but the rest of it wasn't great.

I can't say that I really recommend this, but if you're inclined to comedies, you could certainly do worse. I'll probably not be leaping on to reading the rest of his books, though. ( )

This book is fantastic. It's everything one'd expect in a book from Stephen Fry, so I rightly enjoyed it. Fry's writing is really nothing like anything else you'll ever come across, and "The Liar" is certainly one of my favorite recent novels. ( )

A baffling & bewildering tale: This is the second of Stephen Fry's novels that i have read. The enormous
enjoyment i felt upon completing "The Stars Tennis Balls" is mirrored only in the colossal dissapointment i felt in this work.

The story jumped about, was confusing, appeared to make no logical sence whatsoever and upon completeing my only thought was "Huh, what was the point of this book." Nothing really seems to happen and Stephen's word choise and sentence structure can be a little intimadating.

Although a huge fan of the man himself, i would reccomend his other books over this one.

Of course this was witty and knee-slappingly funny and terribly pink and all the marvelous things that one would expect from the inimitable Stephen Fry, but ... well, I found something terribly affecting and sad about it as well, and went through much of it with a clenched heart. I have this problem with comedy writing sometimes of perhaps not being disaffected enough. Still, I loved the book. ( )

What can I say Stephen Fry is in a class of his own when it comes to wit and humour, I can't wait to read more. ( )