The write up this book had in my book club was encouraging, so I bought it.
The story is all in first person, as if it is Philip's diary, (the main character.) Philip is only 11 year old and the punctuation and some spellings are a little odd. This book however is not a teenage book, as such.
Philip retells the events from the date of his father's death in an accident, to the date of his father's birthday, around two months later. The events are pretty bizarre at times, but the again, Philip is only doing as the ghost asks him.
Throughout, I was questioning myself, is Philip just so upset about his father's death that he imagines his father's ghost? It is never quite resolved, but as he and his father were close before the death, and the death sudden, it is possible, or, I could take the story at face value and believe in the ghost.
It was a very entertaining read, and once I realised it was written in a 11 year old's voice, reading was easy.
The bumph mentions Shakespeare's Hamlet, I have only read a synopsis of Hamlet, but from what I read I think it is right.
Philip Noble is an eleven year old in crisis. His pub landlord father has died in a road accident, and his mother is succumbing to the greasy charms of her dead husband's brother, Uncle Alan. The remaining certainties of Philip's life crumble away when his father's ghost appears in the pub and declares Uncle Alan murdered him.
Arming himself with weapons from the school chemistry cupboard, Philip vows to carry out the ghost's relentless demands for revenge. But will Leah, the gorgeous daughter of Uncle Alan's God-fearing business partner, Mr Fairview, prove too much of a distraction? And can the words of a ghost be trusted any more than the lies of the living? Philip makes his decision and when the moment comes to act, he finds himself hurtling towards disaster.
Just as Matt Haig's acclaimed and best selling first novel, "The Last Family in England" was a brilliant reworking of "Henry IV, Part I", with dogs in the major roles, so "the Dead Fathers Club" gives more than a nod towards "Hamlet". Hilariously funny, it is full of poignant insights into the strange workings of the world through the eyes of a child.