Customer Reviews: Read 7 more reviews...
 Essential reading for anyone approaching the Big Three O... August 25, 2008
L. Fleming (Hampshire, UK)
Danny Wallace, writer and TV presenter, is heading towards his 30th birthday and having an identity crisis. His friends all seem to be moving on and as he looks around his grown up house at his grown up display cushions, he starts to panic. One day he opens an old box of paraphernalia from his childhood and finds an address book. Realising he's lost touch with all his old childhood friends; he sets about tracking them down...
Friends Like These is a warm, funny, honest, heartwarming book about rekindling lost friendships and making the transition from being a twenty-something to a thirty-something. As someone who is only a year off doing just that, I could really relate to Danny's feelings. We all wonder what old friends are doing, and we now have the likes of Facebook and MySpace to keep us connected...but Wallace takes it a step further. He actually meets up with them all in person. Now he doesn't have your average group of friends to start with. He's godfather to Jamie Oliver's daughters; one of his best friends is the bass guitarist in a rock band and his girlfriend works on Big Brother! However, he came from ordinary beginnings and wonders if he will find that all his old friends have ended up working in IT! He wonders if they too are nervous about the impending milestone, and would like to make the transition easier by sharing it with friends who have had an impact on his life.
Friends Like These is very easy to read. Danny Wallace started his career as a journalist, so the style is punchy and witty, with nice bite-size sub-chapters. His observations on childhood, on growing up and on friendships really made me smile and the ending is quite poignant. This is one of those books that will make you sigh with satisfaction when you've turned the last page, and maybe feel a little warm inside too!
 Ever wondered "whatever happened to..?". Then read this book. August 3, 2008
Mr. Stuart Bruce (Bristol, UK)
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
Are you a man around the age of 29? Are you having a strange urge to find out what your old friends from school are up to, and are you worried that it's the beginning of turning 30-something? Well, me too. But now there's no need- you can just read this book instead. Danny Wallace has already done all that, in 2007, and his story is much better than yours, or mine.
Danny goes in search of friends, mainly from primary school, with a very loose premise of 'updating his address book', an address book he's found in a box of old school stuff his Mum kept, though this is just an excuse for a trip down memory lane.
He ends up in L.A., in Japan, in Germany, and around many places in the UK doing all the tracking-down and catching-up that you and I would be doing if we had the time and money.
As well as being laugh-out-loud funny in parts it really is very, very touching, and not nearly as superficial as the premise might have you believe- the book deals with the death of old friends, and explores the need to try and re-contact people and why many people feel that need but some people don't.
This book really will make you want to get onto Facebook or Friends Reunited and track down all your old buddies. I did and I have.
My favourite book of the year so far.
I'd Like a Friend Like This August 3, 2008
L. J. Williams (Derbyshire, U.K.)
You cannot fault the unfailing optimism that coats the stories told by this guy. They just make you feel that little bit better.
Outrageously positive, thoughtful and very, very, funny, Danny Wallace decides to track down the twelve names he discovers in his old school address book. His journey's take him from Berlin to Loughborough to L.A. and every tale is told with such a lightness of heart that you feel that you are right there with him.
The theme is not disimilar to Wallace's last book, 'Yes Man', but it is a formula that works- he obviously believes that if it aint broke, don't fix it: hilarious anecdotes about hope over varying degrees of adversity will always make for a great read.
This book might not change your life, but it will certainly warm your cockles for at least a little while.
Great Book July 21, 2008
Toots (Wakefield, West Yorkshire, England)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I have just finished Friends Like This. I loved it, I laughed out loud, chuckled to myself and cried. It's the first book of Danny's I have read. I will certainly be reading more.
So funny, so true. July 15, 2008
B. Cooper (england)
Having been a fan of Wallace's writing since reading 'Are You Dave Gorman?' (of which he wrote half) I planned to buy this book before hearing what it was about.
When I found out it was about a man facing up to the inevitability of his 30th birthday it just seemed even more right to buy it - I will face that challenge myself in a few months.
Unlike Wallace's previous (excellent) books this story of looking up old friends is a more relateble tale we can all see ourselves reflected in - anyone who ever went on Facebook etc has done it - Wallace just does it with style!
I wont spell out the specifics of his journey, suffice to say that I laughed out loud several times but was also moved by the more serious heart-felt passages.
And in what I think is the ultimate example of the impact of the books message, when I'd finished it I got on Facebook and started contacting old friends.
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