Cover of Pies and Prejudice: In Search of the North

Pies and Prejudice: In Search of the North

'My name is Stuart Maconie, and I am from the North Of England. Some time ago, I was standing in my kitchen, rustling up a Sunday brunch for some very hungover, very Northern mates who were "down" for the weekend. One of them was helping me out and, recipe book in hand, asked "where are the sun-dried tomatoes?" "They're behind the cappuccino maker," I replied. Silence fell. We slowly met each other's gaze. We did not say anything. We did not need to. Each read the other's unspoken thought: we had become those kinds of people, the kind of people who had sun-dried tomatoes and cappuccino makers, the kind of people who did Sunday brunch. In other words: southerners.'

Read more

A northerner in exile, stateless and confused, hearing rumours of Harvey Nichols in Leeds and Maseratis in Wilmslow, Stuart goes in search of The North. Delving into his own past, it is a riotously funny journey in search of where the cliches end and the truth begins. He travels from Wigan Pier to Blackpool Tower, the Bigg Market in Newcastle to the daffodil-laden Lake District in search of his own Northern Soul, encountering along the way an exotic cast of Scousers, Scallies, pie-eating Woolly-backs, topless Geordies, mad-for-it Mancs, Yorkshire nationalists and brothers in southern exile.

Genre
humor
Themes
music
Audience
adult
Length
medium · 352 pages

Click a tag to see books like this one that share it.

Read it? Sign in to help tag it.

Liked Pies and Prejudice: In Search of the North? Here’s where I’d start.

These suit anyone who liked Pies and Prejudice: In Search of the North. Sign in and mark a few books for picks shaped around your own taste.

  1. The Road to Little Dribbling: Adventures of an American in Britain Shares travel, nonfiction, humor
  2. You are Awful (But I Like You): Travels Around Unloved Britain Shares travel, nonfiction, humor
  3. Notes from a Small Island Shares travel, nonfiction, humor
  4. The Olivetti Chronicles Shares nonfiction, music, biography

“People who read Pies and Prejudice: In Search of the North tend to reach for these next.”

  1. The Tent, the Bucket and Me
  2. Bollocks to Alton Towers: Uncommonly British Days Out
  3. The Wrong Way Home
  4. Things Can Only Get Better: Eighteen Miserable Years in the Life of a Labour Supporter, 1979-1997

“If you want more of the same (travel about music), start with these.”

  1. Everything Is Going to Be Great: An Underfunded and Overexposed European Grand Tour
  2. Stephen Fry in America
  3. Traveling While Married
  4. Scary Monsters and Super Creeps: In Search of the World's Most Hideous Beasts

“If it was the humor that hooked you, try one of these.”

  1. The Lost Continent: Travels in Small Town America
  2. Neither Here nor There: Travels in Europe
  3. Naked in Dangerous Places: The Chronicles of a Hungry, Scared, Lost, Homesick, but Otherwise Perfectly Happy Traveler
  4. Gullible's Travels: The Adventures of a Bad Taste Tourist

“These start from a similar idea, even if they go somewhere else with it.”

  1. The New Cast Iron Skillet Cookbook: 150 Fresh Ideas for America's Favorite Pan
  2. Bubby's Brunch Cookbook: Recipes and Menus from New York's Favorite Comfort Food Restaurant
  3. Stocking Up: The Third Edition of America's Classic Preserving Guide
  4. The Bit In Between