About the Author
Andy Darby, would-be Viking, and lover of the bizarre. Mission – infest the world with his strange creations. He is the author of Me and The Monkey.
Son of a WW2 Commando, growing up in 1970s Birmingham, as a teenager Andy became a fan of heavy metal, fronting several metal bands over the years. His passion for martial arts also began in the 70s and has continued to the present. Competing as a bodybuilder and playing American Football for the Birmingham Bulls took up much of his 20s.
Following a mixed career involving working in a jewellery factory, spraying cars, and office work, he finally managed to follow his other passion, art, and began a career as a designer. A marketing department honed his skills, and he became aware of the world of designing for live events, joining a small production company, and eventually becoming creative director of their larger parent company. Moving to Cornwall he decided it was time to go freelance setting up his own business focusing on motion graphic design.
In the late 1990s he began to get the urge to write and his laptop drive is littered with the unformed creations that have popped into his head. Me and The Monkey is his first novel, coming to life as an experiment in having the discipline to write something every day during a period when he was travelling extensively for work. The story was written during train journeys, flights, backstage at events, 2am in hotel rooms, even during stops at motorway service stations, and was often written on his phone or iPad.
Andy lives on the north coast of Cornwall with his artist wife, teenage daughter, cat, two ponies, and constantly growing library. He still secretly thinks he could be a big wave surfer regardless of what reality tells him.
Follow @MeandTheMonkey0 on Twitter, on Facebook, on Instagram, Visit meandthemonkey.co.uk
About the book
Well there’s this talking monkey who won me in a game of Othello in a coffee shop in Amsterdam. He came back to Cornwall with me and has become a prolific reader and dabbler in magic. He also has past life flash backs – the most prominent of which are the Nam special forces ones. We have partially deceased girlfriends who apparently eat dead bodies.
The Monkey created a sort of black hole in the spare bedroom and now we have a team of nerds investigating it and trying to stop ‘things’ coming out of it. A bunch of Oriental hit men who appear to believe he is a god attempted to steal The Monkey’s magic lolly pop sticks, but he managed to blow them up in their caravan. We are off to Cambodia in search of a temple from which came a monkey faced pendant with glowing eyes and we seem to have upset an international cabal who are out to get us. Oh, and did I mention that The Monkey likes a cigar and we regularly get very drunk on Jack Daniels…
Review
What is the Monkey god though? Are we talking more on the lines of devil on the shoulder, subconscious, or a really detailed delusion? Or is this really a being with ancient power and very bad habits, who thinks nothing of diving in at the deep-end, whilst swigging whiskey and other vices.
Monkey also seems to be the voice that lacks any kind of empathy or thoughts for humankind. His go-to choice is always destructive, mischievous and seemingly intent on destruction. Bit by Bit of course. All in the name of a good time of course. Hmm let's flip the switch on that and assume he is representing the worst of our base instincts.
Conspiracy theories run galore and cause a wide ledge the sane can stand on to watch the insanity as it happens. It's a it like a frat party on hairy legs. The juxtaposition to that is the way the author relays the information in a calm way in diary or blog like entries.
To put this book into perspective, although whilst writing that I am aware that Monkey and Darby would have a scathing commentary about the fact it doesn't need any such thing, and the whole point is that it is anti-perspective and anti-fits in a particular genre. It is niche, alternative and a cult in the making, which is what Bad Ink stands for.
Personally I like the idea of a core essence or guilt manifesting itself in monkey god form, but perhaps that is too easy. Is it actually just us reacting without impulse control aka societal rules and purely on gut - instant gratification.
I just have to mention what a quality hardcover book it is. Very much a book you can leave on your coffee table or in your bookcase - it will certainly generate some interesting conversations.
Buy Me and the Monkey at Amazon Uk or go to Goodreads for any other retailer. Publisher : Bad Press Ink Limited pub date 10 July 2021. Buy at Amazon com.
Enter the Giveaway to Win a signed Hardback of Me and the Monkey, limited edition print and more (Open INT) a Rafflecopter giveaway
1st Prize - 1 x Hardback book – author signed and numbered (out of 250), 1 x spliff bookmark – author signed, 1 x promotional limited edition print – author and illustrator signed (out of 250), 1 x Monkey death from above T-shirt
9 x Runners up prize. - 1 x signed spliff bookmarks & 1 x signed and numbered promo print
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