What is it about pigs that makes us want to tell stories about them? There was Babe (otherwise known as The Sheep-pig), there was Wilbur from Charlotte's Web, and there was, er, Harry Hill's tale of Buster, his pet pig, from his Harry Hill - First Class Scamp DVD?
Well now add to the list this, the memoirs of Toby the pig. He was born in the 18th century. If you can get past the antiquated language and the antiquated typeface too then there is something here worth reading, although the story for me seemed to run out of steam towards the end.
The tale follows Toby's escape from becoming sausages, his first period of learning, his subsequent tour showcasing his talents, his adventures along the way, his second escape from possibly becoming sausages, more touring, more learning (you can see why I thought the book ran out of steam after a while), a trip to London, a farewell tour, more learning and finally his settling down once and for all.
Russell Potter says at the beginning that he is simply the editor of this book, not the author, with the memoirs being real and taken from the first editions that were published all that time back. However at the end Toby the pig talks about the success of his memoirs so this was either a mistake or the end chapter must not have been from the first editions as stated.
There is also an appendix giving biographies of the characters and places in the book. Perhaps this was there to add authenticity to the book but for me it held little interest although it did have the translations for several Latin phrases that were used in the latter half of the memoirs. If only I'd known that whilst I was reading them.
So a great start but fading out at the end.
(Book was received through Amazon Vine and is available here)
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