Britains got talent, but has Piers Morgan? (God Bless America: Misadventures of a Big Mouth Brit - Piers Morgan)

Member Name: thedevilinme

Product:	God Bless America: Misadventures of a Big Mouth Brit - Piers Morgan
Date:	04/09/09 (83 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Page turning fun

Disadvantages: Regurge

"America...just a nation of used car salesman with all the money we need to buy guns and no qualms about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable about that"

(Hunter S Thompson)

I like Piers Morgan. I don't know why but I do. I'm sure he would have no time for me but I love the way he exposes vacuous celebrities for what they are and then tries to shamelessly be one, so when they have ago at him for his tabloid comments and exposes through books like this they are effectively having ago at themselves.

It's always pretty cheeky stuff with him and makes for great reads, all three Morgan books about the cross-over between celebrity, politics and the media being very entertaining, 'The Insider', his first effort, was particularly good and worthy of awards if you ask me. According to a survey that particular book is the most likely to be left in hotel rooms, just ahead of Jordan's weighty tomes, guilty pleasures in all social classes that are not prepared to be owned up to. I'm proud to say I enjoy Piers TV work and books because he smart, observant and very well connected, on everyone's speed dial, from Amanda Holden to the Prime Minster himself. When you edit a tabloid in celebrity obsessed Britain you are a big political player here. He has certainly exploited that experience and access in his career after The News of the World and The Mirror editorship, Britain's youngest ever newspaper editor in his day no less. You have to take the guy seriously whether you want to or not, his admirable, if ego led stance on the war that cost him his job a rare piece of gallantry in this often sheep like feeble country.

-The book-

Whereas as his previous books were politics meets celebrity, this is Piers shameless walk across the floor from the media to that celebrity, never looking back. His previous book was about making it in the U.K with shows like Britain's Got Talent and various domestic and quiz shows; this is about making it in the US of A, culminating in being part of America's number one show, 'Americas Got Talent', alongside the irrepressible Simon Colwell and David 'The Hoff' Hasslehoff! It pays to have important friends when it comes to easy jobs being handed out to average people, the irony being a man with no discernible talent gets to judge likewise on Britain's Got Talent.

He's still not recognised everywhere he goes in America, much to his agent's disappointment, Piers insisting he's bigger than Obama now, his agent insisting, 'yes, bigger by two stone'. After Piers successful run on the show he is still only known as the cliché nasty Englishman over the pond, the rap we always seem to earn in America.

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"Simon Cowell is so vain his condoms are ribbed on the inside"
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In Hollywood there was talk of a film being made of the British version of Britain's Got Talent, the story of Paul Potts. Piers asked his agent in the book to see who will be playing him, suggesting George Clooney, his agent emailing back; 'Clooney booked - Steven Hawking available'.

If Morgan's honest he hasn't really done lots in the US to justify another book so crams this one with full lots of other stuff to fluff it out, drifting off the books remit, stretching his success on the US Celebrity Apprentice with Donald Trump to two whole chapters. He did win it though and it is entertaining reading on that section but the book is 500 pages long, this filibustering purely about the hard back £14.99 price tag. On his team that produced 14 victories in Celebrity Apprentice was our very own Lennox Lewis, who is not only a great boxer but beat Piers 33 games to 1 at chess, a boxer with a genuine brain, Piers no mug at the game and a school champion no less.

As the book is about America there's plenty of room for politics and some more Bushwhacking from Morgan, the book covering Obama's coronation and all that it stands for, and a look at the demise of America as the world's foremost super power. They no longer have the world's tallest building, or the most traded stock or the biggest investment funds. The longest bridge is elsewhere and Bollywood is bigger than Hollywood, the Indians and China now funding the American dream. America will soon be the Great Britain of today and we will be tomorrows Belgium. It's all very depressing. The Americans even call our 'Britain's Got Talent', 'Britain's Got Special Needs!'

There's loose comment on America as there is well informed, the crazy gun culture and the religious zealots there making for interesting quirky reading. Did you know half of the worlds hand guns are in the United States now and there are eight firearms for every one of its 300 million population? 90% of those heavily armed Americans claim to have been to church, temple or the mosque at least once a year, one evangelical Pastor running up a personal £100 million future from a rather susceptible mid-west congregation.

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"There's a gullible side to Americans. They are easily led, religion the best Devil to lead them".
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There's more stuff to continue the bulking out of the book to stretch it to those 500 pages from his return trips to England, his enjoyable one-to-one chat show 'You Cant Fire Me I'm Famous', as an example of. As the title suggests, Morgan interviews people who were fired from important jobs, Morgan famously so, hence the gig. Piers, because he could, on one show interviewed Peter Fincham, the guy who fired him at The Mirror over the faked Iraqi abuse photos scandal, only to be fired himself over the 'Crowngate' scandal, the one where the Queen was shown in a bad light over the photo shoot with Annie Liebowistz.
Other sections of the book include Piers interviews in GQ magazine that revealed, amongst other things, that the Liberal Democrat leader had sex with no more than 30 women (finally a straight liberal MP!) and that Arnold Schwarzenegger thinks marijuana isn't a drug but a 'leaf'.


-The Conclusion-

There's no doubt this book is perhaps one too far on the same irreverent topic and author but its still a good read, a continuation of the previous book, 'Don't You Know Who I am', and even repeating bits from it through Morgan's trademark audacity. Piers made a few quid out of the first two so why not bang out another one at.

If you liked the previous two books you will be used to this and get into it quickly, hitting the ground running with his usual insider and revelatory info on the great, the good and the odious, pure name dropping from page one to page 500. I'm not one for celebrity lifestyle magazines in general and not interested in what Kerry Katona is ramming into her fat mouth, but Morgan, through his books, some how make that appealing. His fiends and acquaintances are more A-List and so his particular inside look is perhaps more relevant and interesting but its still tabloid stuff, whether he's 'bigging up' Gordon Brown to the point of toadyism to get back at Blair or that name dropping in America. But the book is funny and very well written, like Jeremy Clarkson, Morgan an excellent tabloid journalist who has transferred that talent to TV. People that don't like Morgan probably don't know why as he's that sort of guy. Even Clarkson, who famously punched Morgan three times in the face on a transatlantic flight, admits to liken him in a small way, why Morgan won't go away.

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"Robbie Williams is reportedly been hanging out with David Icke.
Poor old Icke, has it really come to this..."
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Summary: Celebrity gossip...