Cause Celeb by Helen Fielding

Bridget Jones' Diary was hilarious and made me really cheerful, so I thought I'd better nab any other Helen Fielding material out there. Cause Celeb turns out to be her first novel, the book before the diary one, which was a little disappointing because the wit is present, but not quite as all-encompassing. Instead we have a poignant juxtaposition between a tempestuous relationship with a celebrity - this is a really scathing portrayal, good fun - and the heroine's experience as an aid worker in an African refugee camp. This is the inside scoop on those starving African info-mericals we all flip past on our t.v. screens so cynically.

So we have here tragi-comedy. Helen Fielding's bio blurb says she has worked for Comic Relief in Ethiopia, the Sudan and Mozambique, so I did keep wondering how much of it was autobiographical. Not that it matters, but the book is heartfelt and sincere, hmm, it also says here Fielding is a journalist too, and so you can't help worrying from time to time and thinking, ouch, this isn't all that funny since it is probably real ... ah well, comedy and social critique have never been incompatible. I recommend it for tackling an ambitious, complex subject with humour, even if it makes one feel a tad guilt for smiling too often.

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