Adrian is a single father, bringing up his sons on one of the worst council estates in Leicester, against the background of Millennium hysteria and 9/11.

Now Adrian has attained the age of 32, but is his usual neurotic self.

These diaries were formerly confiscated by the police when Adrian was apparently suspected of being a terrorist, but now they have been returned to him.

Adrian’s two boys, William and Glenn, are 7 and 13, respectively.

“William has worked out on the computer at nursery school that it would take Father Christmas 15 trillion hours to visit every child in the world.” Should Adrian “continue the charade that the toys are made in Greenland by elves, or should (he) confess that the plastic rubbish (William) craves is shipped from Taiwan, then brought to Toys ‘R’ Us by container lorry?”

William thinks that the Blairs’ baby will be the new Messiah, which he deduces from the coverage of it on the TV news. Adrian and Glenn laugh and laugh, but then Adrian finds out Glenn has actually never heard of the Messiah.

Adrian is still enamoured of Pandora, now an MP. His father has recently married Tania, Pandora’s mother, while his mother has married Pandora’s father, Ivan.

It is the start of the new Millennium. Two of his New Year Resolutions, or life goals, are: 1) “Find soul-mate with huge intellect, large earning power and substantial breasts” and 2) “Insist on meeting with head of BBC Drama and refuse to leave his office until he has bought --- my comedy about a serial killer.”

Adrian’s mother has been admitted to hospital with pneumonia. He would have sent her some flowers until he found out the minimum price was £15, not counting the delivery charge of £2.50.

He has applied for a council house, and “ticked the gay box” in order to get a few more points; despite her name, he falls in love with the lady dealing with the applications, Ms Pamela Pigg.

Sue Townsend provides lots of covert social criticism in this book, as in all the Mole books; talking of the local mini-supermarket, Adrian informs us “There were two aisles of cakes and biscuits, and one aisle devoted entirely to crisps and fizzy drinks.” – “I may write to the manager and point out that he should widen his customer base.”

Adrian and his boys are now living in the council estate he least wanted to move to “among what sociologists call ‘the underclass’ and what Adrian’s father calls ‘Satan’s spawn’”. On Sunday, Adrian tries to get a copy of the Observer from his local newsagent’s, but they only ever have one copy, and the vicar has bought it. The newsagent says they have plenty more newspapers, the News of the World, the People, and Sunday sport, but these are of course not to Adrian’s taste; he asks him to order two copies of the Observer in future.

Adrian meets an old friend at the newsagent’s and asks her whether she lives on the estate. She says, “God, no, do I look socially excluded?”

Pamela Pigg starts to “hound” Adrian with sexually explicit text messages.

The book continues along these lines.

In short, this book is just as entertaining and uproarious as the other Adrian Mole books, and I highly recommend that you read it. ( )

Adrian Mole's exploits take a decidedly messy (or even messier) turn as he wades into his thrities, but the humor remains. There's no doubt that I'll finish the series (and read any more forthcoming). On to A.M. and the Weapons of Mass Destruction...Long live Adrian Mole! ( )

I had to giggle during the reading because Adrian Mole is such a hopeless schlemiel. In his diary he tells his daily life as a single parent with crazy parents as well as friends or neighbours and his disturbed sex and love life. Sometimes I've got the feeling the only normal humans in this story are his two sons. He depends on social service and is living in a council house. He feels that he is responsible for everything and everybody but it looks like nobody is doing the same for him. ( )

Brief Description: Think of this book as a male version of Bridget Jones’s Diary … only more British and less funny. This is the eighth book in a series, and, in this particular outing, Mr. Mole is a middle-aged single parent dealing with dating, children, and housing issues.

My Thoughts: I read the first few books of this series (The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 3/4 and The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole) years ago and remember them as being funny. Either the series hasn’t aged well or I haven’t as I wasn’t terribly amused this time around. Of course, it could be that it was “too British” for me to get all the jokes. It wasn’t a horrible read, but I was looking forward to catching up with good old Adrian and found him disappointing. It was kind of like finding an old boyfriend on Facebook and thinking “Oh. Why did I like him????“ ( )