A Review By Zoe Boulton

 Ben Elton’s novels are usually highly topical, and having previously dealt with reality shows in “Dead Famous” and “Chart Throb”, the war on drugs in “High Society” and religious intolerance in “Blind Faith” he now tackles the financial crisis in “Meltdown”. A group of University friends from the 1990s stay in touch over the years and all enjoy incredibly bright careers; Henry is a Labour MP, Rupert is head of a bank, David is an architect of ground-breaking-political-statement-making buildings, Robbo is the genial husband of entrepreneur Lizzie, and Jimmy (the main character) is the son of a high street bank manager, and is a highly successful investment banker. Life goes very well for the group until the global recession begins, whereupon all sorts of unpleasant problems occur and lives are changed.

This was a good enough read, although I was expecting it to have a little more bite. I read it all on a day off (it has very short chapters). I didn’t particularly warm to any of the characters, they were rather cartoonish (although perhaps this was intentional?), and I found the morally bankrupt,  right wing know-all character the most interesting, so I don’t know what that says about me. The premise of this book was a very good idea, but the characters let it down for me. It’s still a good piece of satire on a continuing event though and does make for an entertaining read.