‘Tony Hogan bought me an Ice Cream Float before he Stole my Ma’ - Kerry Hudson

Today I’m talking about ‘Tony Hogan bought me an Ice Cream Float before he Stole my Ma’ by Kerry Hudson, which is one of the books on the Green Carnation Prize 2012 short list; the first UK based award for work by LGBT authors. I gathered together a group of bloggers interested in this prize, which was also created by a blogger (Simon of Savidge Reads) and over the past few days each of them has posted about one book that made the short list this year. Now it’s my turn!

I have been cavalierly promising that my contribution to this project would be a vlog review of Hudson’s novel, where you could see my face and everything (no, wait, that sounds…different than what I meant). Unfortunately I failed to put aside enough time to investigate the wonders of my laptops in-built video camera, which was a mistake as I am generally technically inept (secret - you don’t have to be technically advanced to market IT products). So instead of a vlog my contribution to the Green Carnation Prize reading group is a heap of bullet points about a book that keeps its tone as fun and frothy as the quirky zing of its lengthy title promises, while concentrating on character whose lives are hard.

( Let's begin )

All in all ‘Tony Hogan bought me an Ice Cream Float before he Stole my Ma’ is an interesting novel, which contains lots to things to think about. It’s a quick, entertaining read and it has a lot of heart. But is it a winner? Make sure to check the Green Carnation Prize blog on 12th Dec 2012 to find out which title has won.

You can see the full list of the reviews our reading group wrote about the books on the short list in the master post. After all this reviewing and discussion, which do you think will take the glory?