Coe seldom disappoints; nor does he this time around. If it doesn't scale the same height as What A Carve Up!, it's never less than enjoyable.

This is a captivating and enthralling read.
A well written book.
It is a good coming of age story.
A delightful thought provoking read

Mr Wilder and Me by Jonathan Coe

A reasonably well written book about a film director and his waning career.

It has taken a bit of time to get into but waa very informative. Although I didn’t know it was going to be a sort of biography.

Furthermore I didn’t enjoy the later style of the book in the scrip format. Ok read. Not what I expected the story to be.

Mr Wilder and Me is a story told by Calista, a Greek composer who now lives in London. One of her grown-up daughters is about to leave for Australia, the other who was due to go to university but is pregnant and considering an abortion. Her English husband is a perfectly decent man, but Calista feels he’s a tad unhelpful, and Calista feels that neither of her ‘two talents ... two things that give me a reason to go on living ... is required any more’. The two things are ‘writing music and bringing up children’.

As Calista watches her daughter depart for Australia, she thinks of her own young self flying out from Greece to America for a Greyhound tour of the country on her own.
Between the present-day London of the first and last chapters we find ourselves in the Los Angeles, Greece, Munich and Paris of 1976-77.

It’s July 1976, and Calista has just turned 21. Waiting for the bus in Springfield, America she runs into an Englishwoman her age named Gill, and they decide to travel together to California. Gill’s father is a friend of a famous director, who invites them to dinner one night in Beverly Hills. By that point Gill is less interested in staying long at the meal as she has meet a guy and is more interested in going to meet up with him, so it’s Calista who stays till the end and makes an impression on the great Billy Wilder and friends. The next day he asks her to read a script of his new movie, “Fedora.”
There’s a phone call months later to Calista, who is a Greek speaker, where she is asked to help with “Fedora”; the movie is being shot partly in Corfu and the crew needs an interpreter.
Much of the novel is taken up with the making of this film, about a washed-up Hollywood producer who tracks a famous but reclusive star to her home on the island, in order to persuade her to come out of retirement. Calista ends up working as a personal assistant to Wilder’s long time scriptwriter and collaborator, Mr Diamond, and follows the production to Munich (which allows us to witness Wilder’s complicated relationship to his Austrian roots), and then to Paris.
Wilder complains about the “kids with beards,” the Spielbergs and Coppolas who have taken over Hollywood and have made it harder and harder for him to attract funding. That’s why he turns to German producers for “Fedora,” and why he says at a news conference in Munich (one of the many lines in the novel borrowed from real life — there’s a useful index at the end): “If it’s a huge success, it’s my revenge on Hollywood. If it’s a flop, it’s my revenge for Auschwitz.”
After that we return to the present-day, where it emerges that Calista’s real worries have less to do with the daughter flying to Australia than with her other daughter, who was set to go to Oxford until she got pregnant.

In its own quiet way, the book is as quirky as the movie it describes: part Hollywood biopic, part Holocaust memoir, part domestic drama. What holds it together is the threads of historical fact at its core. Wilder and Diamond did make such a movie, as their careers tailed off. Fading relevance is perhaps the major theme of the book — from that producer trying to get his Kingsley Amis adaptation off the ground, to Calista herself, whose TV and film commissions have begun to dry up as she gets older.
This for me was a lovely mixture of fiction and fact the could have been a dream you mixed yourself to produce a pleasing story. Such a charming book.

I liked the sweep of Europe and travel vibe of this enjoyable novel set in 1977, as the young naive Calista stumbles into the world of film director Billy Wilder. He’s filming his latest film in Europe. She started working for him on the film set in Greece, but follows the production to Munich when he captures the final scenes. He has had to use German money to complete the film and he fears that his influence is waning. Another darker aspect is his family history, which comes into play as they work in Munich. This was an interesting insight into a filmmaker at work and I enjoyed the contrast with Calista’s youth and innocence as she takes her first steps into the movie world. It’s an insight into the man as well, someone I didn’t know a lot about, but it was Calista who kept me reading.

I really enjoyed this book, and thought it was a lovely way of writing a 'biography' of sorts.

Although I have heard of and seen many of the films of Billy Wilder I know nothing about him but felt this book offered an insight into a director reaching the end of his career. I don't know how accurate the depiction of Wilder was, but for me it didn't matter as it was written so well.

The story is narrated by the translator on the film Fedora, Calista, from the modern period, as she recalls the time on the movie.

I felt it was a great insight into the world of filmmaking, but also a coming of age story of Calista, as she is introduced into a completely different world for her.

I fully recommend this book.

I thought this book was outstanding. I am not a cineaste and didn't know much about Billy WIlder apart from Some Like It Hot, but really enjoyed finding out about him. There have been some reviews saying that it goes nowhere and that's true to some extent, but seeing how Cal grows through the time spent on the Fedora set is really well done. The sense of time and place is brilliant. The scene where Billy takes down the young Holocaust denier was stunning and should be required reading for anyone who thinks along those twisted lines.

I loved this book for well over the first half, became slightly disinterested in the part that was written as a script and then fell back in love with it by the end. The central character felt incredibly real and, of course, several of the others actually were! It was a really engaging depiction of 20th century Hollywood throughout.
Without giving too much away, I felt a real flutter of excitement towards the end when I thought Calista may actually have composed my favourite film score ever, but that turned out to be a bit or a red herring. Nonetheless, this book is unique and will remain in my memory for quite some time.

I love Jonathan Coe’s works, I have read all of his other books. I did find this one slightly harder to engage with, perhaps because I was unfamiliar with the work of Billy Wilder. The book is nevertheless well written and quite interesting and I have definitely learned something about a person in history, which is always a good thing. Not my favourite work by Jonathan Coe but will definitely not stop
me recommending his books to anyone I talk to about great fiction! Thank you NetGalley for allowing me a copy of this book to review.

Thanks to Netgalley for chance to read this ARC. It was an okay read but I struggled to get interested in the characters. It was a bit sad to read about a fading career.

Another classic Coe. I can’t describe how much I love his books. His characters are just so interesting and this takes you on a real, very deep journey. I can only say 5/5 and go and buy this beautiful and unforgettable book.

A strange tale - well told. It might help to know a little more about ‘Mr Wilder and his films before reading this book but I enjoyed it nonetheless. It is biographical in a sense but turned into a story about a peripheral character. Worth reading.

A quick read at just under 250 pages, this book transports you to many exotic locations and shows you the glamor (and hardships) involved in filmmaking. I enjoyed these aspects of the book, especially all the travel. Other than that, I didn't quite connect with any of the characters nor did I find the writing to be exactly to my liking. I found often that I just didn't quite 'get it' and missed some of the references.

Set in Crete in 1977 this satirical novel explores the waning star of hollywood director Billy Wilder. The main protagonist Calista finds herself listening to the stories of Wilders past and the nostalgic spin he puts on it. It is both the coming of age story of Calista and the end of Wilders story.

I so enjoyed this book - it had a touch of whimsy about it but it was not lightweight. I was immersed in the atmosphere of Hollywood and the relationship between Billy Wilder and Calista - the Greek girl who eventually works for him. I think it was beautifully written and I am going to recommend it to my book reading group and friends. Thank you Net Galley for giving me the opportunity of reading it.

An enjoyable read about a world which is unfamilair to me. Memorable characters and very evocative of a past time.

Was really surprised by how much I loved this book. I have seen some Billy Wilder films and, although this was fiction, i felt it gave an insight into his film-making and film-making in general.

I knew nothing about Billy Wilder and although a work of fiction it gave a glimpse into the world of movies and how change happened from the old school to the new 'bearded' directors. I enjoyed the story and has made me want to go and watch some of his movies.

This was such an enjoyable read and I didn't expect to like it so much.
What appealed to me at first was the setting of old Hollywood and Europe but then after a few pages I became lost in the character of Calista and just wanted to read her story.
Calista is a fictional character who meets the famous Director Billy Wilder and ends up working with him as an interpreter across Europe. The mix of fact and fiction worked so well and although I don't know much about Billy Wilder it didn't impact my enjoyment of the book. The story is told mostly in flashbacks and hearing Billy's memories from World War II era brings depth and meaning to the book .
This was my first Coe book but have since bought Middle England as I enjoyed this so much.
Thank you Netgalley for this E copy

I didn't particularly enjoy reading this book. I wasn't keen to hear about accidentally falls into success or indeed a formerly successful white man trying to hold on in a changing world where success no longer just fell in his lap. There was a glimmer of what this narrative was trying to do but it just made me angry at the self-centredness and laziness of blind nostalgia. This was neither pleasant escapism, anything new or socially relevant. I'd sum it up as weak.