Has the same style as Douglas Adams in the Hitchhiker series, same brand of humour if you like it that way. The theme of environmental destruction is a tad too serious to be used for comedic purposes and to be treated lightly, I feel. Elton does bring up very thought provoking ideas in this grand conspiracry theory that both pro and anti environment forces are completely in cahoots, one could say its the ultimate cynic's view of reality. Whether we will eventually invent practical self-contained biospheres for everyone to escape to like in the novel, is another matter altogether, it somehow feels physically and ecologically impossible. And if its just a pipedream, then the alternative - nowhere to escape our dying planet, will be no joke indeed.

Didn't like this one. I found the story very silly and not very good, it seemed to stumble along rather than evolve and i thought it was very week. I quite liked some of the characters but found them to be caricatures and one dimensional. Some bits were funny but there were a lot of off the track explanations which got a bit tedious and reminded me of the authors satirical stand-up performances. The political message was also very unsubtle. I wouldn't recommend it.

Dark and deeply sarcastic look at hollywood celebrity, ecological issues and how blatant consumerism is pushing the world towards extinction. Ben writes with deft touch and full of hilarious one liners that are deeper than what you would think at first read.

The future of Earth looks bleak as environmental disasters continue to destroy the planet. Can Eco-Terrorism protect the planet or will mankind wash their hands of their environmental responsibilities and retreat to their self-sustainable, hermetically sealed ‘Claustrospheres’ and ride out the end of the world? 'This Other Eden' is a bit of nonsense with some good laughs along the way.

I thought this was one of his better ones - it didn't have that feeling of being rushed through the edit like some of them have. I wish he'd stop wandering off into lecture mode, though. Otherwise, I think he is very skilled in getting across things like character and beliefs and attitudes via examples, very show not tell (until he lectures).

Hilarious in many places. The gun fight in the orgy had me falling off my sun lounger and spilling my sangria.

I am a bit partial to Ben Elton so I loved this before I even picked it up. My only frustration was I struggled to determine just how futuristic it was meant to be (at times it didn't seem much at all) but then this was probably on purpose to remind us its not that unlikely a storyline...

A lot better than expected! Some untasteful things here and there due to it's age, but It was a lot of fun.

This was barely Ok, maybe it only deserved 1 star.

It seems that Ben Elton combined his stand up comic scripts into one script and thought they would make a good story. But then you needed a bit of narrative to join it all together. Take the comic ideas to the extreme and you have this book.

It just seemed to get side tracked and at times was a just a series of dissertation about different subjects half way through a story. It was distracting and annoying and made the reading more of a task than a pleasure.

It was OK. Not hilarious like some of his books.

Environmental soothsaying from Mr Elton. Quite well done, in a "don't frighten the horses kind of way". I very much doubt it will change a single person's mind about any of the issues it claims to address.

A relatively inoffensive offering from Mr Elton. His environmental themes from the early 90s make me sad today that nothing much has changed and this book is just as relevant today as it was back then (minus the whole VR obsession HA), and surprisingly his view on the modern world of the future was eerily accurate.

As the Earth is slowly dying, people are buying their own escape, with their own little Eden. This just happens to be killing Earth quicker. If yore tiring to hide the truth, is it best to hide it amongst a lot of ideals? A very satirical way, at looking how the Earth is being spoilt, by the very beings that both need and live on it. As well as how one individual, can manipulate everyone, to buy his product.