Grace Dent

Shiraz Bailey Wood isn't really a chav - even if she wears trackies and loves hip hop and doesn't really care about exams. But she and her best friend Carrie go to a school frequently referred to as "Superchav Academy" and her mother seems put out by Shiraz' sister, Cava-Sue, who is attempting to better herself by pursuing A-levels at an arts college. Since Carrie has become infatuated with her new boyfriend, a terrible rapper, Shiraz has been spending all her time avoiding the lovebirds and show more hiding the fact that she's actually doing well in English. But when Cava Sue runs away from home and her parents refuse to get involved, Shiraz knows there's only one thing she can do: write a TV talk show in hopes that they can put her family back together. While at first Diary of a Chav seems like a hard knocks version of the Georgia Nicolson series, it's not long before Shiraz's unique voice comes out. Past the hijinx, jokes, and rants, this is a book about social class, stigma, and finding yourself despite the way everyone else wants to see you. Complete with an index of Shiraz' slang, you can be sure this isn't the last you'll hear from Miss Wood (if only because several sequels are already available in the UK). show less

I'm not sure some of the other reviewers on Amazon have been reading the same book as me. Two and a half stars as an average customer rating? Shocking! Hopefully I'll tip the balance a little bit in Dent's favour because I LOVED IT!

For me she absolutely nailed the Twitter experience on the head. At the very beginning, she writes about how you join Twitter: the vehement hatred and outright denial of the pre-Twitter individual, and how their curiosity eventually gets the better of them and show more they become hooked, just like everyone else. I DID THAT. She explores the kinds of people who inhabit the Twitter universe, the online personas, the different breeds of celebrity and how they interact with the masses, how people use it in everyday life, the conversations, the viral videos and links, and Twitter cliques. There is a glance at the social politics of following and unfollowing, and the etiquette of messaging other people without looking like an eejit. The good, the bad and the downright ugly, it's all here - and as far as my own Twitter wanderings go, it's absolutely spot-on.

Perhaps I enjoyed this book so much because I (unlike some of the other reviewers, it seems) adore Dent's snarky, pithy, perceptive and relentlessly barbed brand of humour. Sooooo, here's the deal: if you love writers/comedians/funny people like Caitlin Moran, Charlie Brooker, Chris Addison and Marcus Brigstocke, and are an actual bona-fide Twitter user, this might the book for you. If you despise social media or prefer your humour a little softer and more cuddly, you might want to give this one a miss. Hey, you can't win 'em all! show less

No. Just no. The title was intriguing. The book itself is 90% total rubbish. And no, I would NOT recommend it to people thinking about joining Twitter. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.

It basically involves Grace Dent slagging off most other Twitter users with a cringe-inducing level of arrogance and explaining how and why Twitter is a horrible place and that the majority of people on it are annoying/boring and nearly everything tweeted there sucks. And then admitting she's addicted show more anyway.

If this is comedy, her style is not at all amusing to me. I barely managed to plough through this, and was muttering to myself half the time about how crap the content was. Much like her apparent attitude to Twitter, which is also rather hypocritical since she complains constantly about people who use it yet still uses it herself.

Oh, and the "best" bit? In 199 numbered pages, only 13 are actually about "how to leave Twitter" - and, spoiler, the author ends up not leaving anyway. Despite how much she's apparently disgusted by the site and everyone on it.

I know it's meant to be satire, but it falls completely flat. It's rubbish. The only reason I'm going to give it even 1 star is for that last chapter, an occasional decent one-liner and a couple of the feminist points she made. As for "laugh out loud"... no. I didn't even get a chuckle from this book. Perhaps the odd ironic twist of the lip. But that's the most.

I felt I'd wasted my time reading this. (Valuable Tweeting time! ;) Or, you know, time in which I could have read a better book.) Don't bother - watching paint dry might be more entertaining, since you probably won't want to throw things doing that. show less

I do not mind admitting that until I saw this book, I had never heard of Grace Dent, but this is because I had never read any of her work or watched the television programmes that she has taken part in. However, I was very touched by her story and in the future I will be looking out for her.
One of the main reasons that I enjoyed her book was because it reminded me of my own youth. Although I am several years older than Grace, I can still identify with the lifestyle and food that was show more available to working class people during the seventies. I could also identify with the changes that people made to their diets during the 1980s when supermarkets became much bigger and offered more food at much cheaper prices. As stated in the book, many of these foods were to prove to be very bad for the nation`s health with the majority of people eating too much fat and sugar during this time.
Grace`s memoir is a true story of how a young working class woman worked (and played ) hard, to get where she is today. show less