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I, Fatty

Genre: Literary Fiction
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 9780749082130
Rights: UK & Commonwealth ex Canada/US
Pub. Date: 1st February 2006

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Price: £7.99

Format: Paperback

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`Life`s a pie-fight and then you die`

Abandoned as a boy in Kansas, Fatty Arbuckle found adulation in Hollywood in the early days of cinema. During his heyday he was more popular than Charlie Chaplin and became the first screen actor to make a million dollars a year. But in 1921 Fatty was accused of the rape and murder of an actress he had met in San Francisco. Although he was later acquitted, the virulent press speculation Arbuckle received destroyed his career.

I, Fatty imagines Arbuckle taking centre stage to recount his life story - from humble beginnings to dramatic downfall, and the result is an utterly compelling, highly original and beautifully written novel which deserves the widest possible audience.

‘Finally, the true skinny on Fatty… Jerry Stahl brilliantly gives life, voice, truth, and respect to Roscoe Arbuckle, redeeming the unjustly tarnished memory of a wildly great talent and a great wild man. I LOVE THIS BOOK!’Johnny Depp

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‘An absolute triumph… Stahl knows his film history impeccably and makes a story of universal significance’Scotland on Sunday

‘Absolutely excellent’Loaded

‘Utterly fascinating’ (5 stars)Heat

‘Highly entertaining… there are few more vivid places to spend time than inside the mind of Fatty-cum-Jerry’GQ

‘A fascinating story of the first-ever case of movie-star mayhem – the case that set the benchmark for Hollywood gossip and gave rise to the entire industry of celebrity-obsessed journalism that we take for granted today’Front

‘An absolute triumph’Scotland on Sunday

‘Apart from its obvious virtues as biographical writing and recreating a lost era, Stahl’s book makes an important point in identifying hysteria as a recurring driving force in the American psyche’Guardian

‘Wise-cracking, poignant and frequently hilarious, the voice never cracks…it’s without equal’Independent

‘Everything about this novel is of massive proportions – not just the central character’s frame but the extremes of personal fortune it manages to cover, and ultimately, how good it is… Stahl’s tight, snappy writing ensures you feel the noose of the puritanical, middle-America of the early 19th century tightening around your collar’Big Issue

‘This will break your heart in untold ways; a remarkable, pulpy, archival joy from this occasionally startling American writer’The List

‘A wonderful book…one of America’s greatest writers…this is his most impressive. If you haven’t read him to date, you are in for a treat’The Sunday Tribune

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