Reviews

Book: "Septic's Companion" by Chris Rae

Through reading his website blog, I became a fan of Mr Rae's writing before I touched this book. I was pleased to find the same tongue in cheek humor. Septic's Companion has two major features, the first being a short and sweet guide to British culture and then an A-Z dictionary of British terms. The features may not be 100% accurate but they are 110% entertaining. The book is written from the point of view of Brit living in Seattle, aimed at Americans.

Mr Rae gives a brief overview of the history of the United Kingdom (with an admission that it's a rubbish name), an explanation of the government system, the monarchy and their election process. "At General Elections, British citizens only get one vote, and that‘s for their local M.P. Their M.P. will most likely belong to a political party, and so Brits run the risk of electing a blithering moron to represent their region just because they belonged to the party they wanted to be in power." And regarding Cockney Rhyming Slang: "Cockney rhyming slang is talked about more often than it is actually used. Some phrases are in fairly common usage country-wide — you‘re quite likely to hear people saying ―butchers‖ to mean ―look,‖ or ―porkies‖ to mean ―lies‖ (pork pies), but you‘re unlikely to hear anyone talking about putting on their Aristotles. I've tried to put the most widely used ones into the dictionary. Whether I‘ve succeeded or not I'm not too bothered; you‘ve paid for it now so I couldn‘t care two hoots whether it turns out to be useful." No doubt the chapters about pub etiquette and driving basics will be very useful, but saving the best for last, the majority of the book is devoted to the British-American dictionary of commonly used British words. Parts of the dictionary are available on the website at no charge, however, if you enjoy what you read there, please buy a copy. This could make a great gift for family members or friends.

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