by Rhona Cameron
Genre; Fiction/Contemporary
Publisher; Ebury Press/United Kingdom/2008
Pages; 368
ISBN; 9780091901844
Plot; Kerry has always drifted aimlessly through life. Rarely having plans of any kind, she gets drunk and things happen. At the age of 24, Kerry decides all this must change and that she is in need of a fresh start. Kerry leaves the grey skies of Edinburgh and takes up residence in the sunny streets of Sydney's Northern Beaches.
Soon broke, hungry and homeless, Kerry joins a mismatched band of fellow travellers who sell art door-to-door by day and party hard by night.
My Thoughts; As those of you who read my blog know, I am not a fan of "books about nothing", and this books fits nicely into that category.
If you are a fan of books depicting binge drinking, recreational drugs, casual sex, aimless wanderers and not much else, this title may fulfil your desires. For me, I found this book lacking.
The characters are not likable. This is not to say that you must love every character you meet in every book you read, but I feel that in order to enjoy a character you either need to like them, relate to them, or you need to be able to love to hate them. The characters in The Naked Drinking Club did not do this for me. Kerry, the leading lady (or should I say, annoying girl) is selfish and unappealing with a fellow band of equally unappealing characters.
As I read this book I kept wanting to throw it against the wall, but I hung on in the hope some great story would come into the pages at some point.
Unfortunately, it is as though Cameron plodded along with casual sex and pub-crawling and then reached a point, somewhere around the three quarters mark, and thought, "I should really include some kind of storyline here" and so comes the introduction of a long lost mother. I wished this had come along sooner, but as it isn't introduced until the final chapters of the book, it is weak and ill formed.
As for the title, I think it is merely used as an attention grabber. When I first saw The Naked Drinking Club, I thought this may refer to "naked truth", or something equally as meaningful and interesting. All this title really refers to is Kerry's one page visit to a bar were the patrons drink in the nude.
I wouldn't exactly recommend this book, but if you happen to have it on the shelf and you have no other books on your list, this title could make for a quick read while you decide on something better to tackle.
Happy Reading!
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