Watching Neighbours Twice A Day by Josh Widdicombe

5 Stars Sep 22, 2023

My review

5/5 stars

For anyone who grew up watching TV in the 90s, this book is a perfect hit of nostalgia. I listened to it over a few days as an audiobook and kept being hit by the swell of happiness that can only come from fond remembrance of your childhood.

The format was unique, in the sense that it was part exploration of pop culture for kids in the 90s, and part memoir about Josh Widdicombe's childhood - honestly, both parts were equally entertaining. The opening chapter about a local rabbit that wished kids happy birthday on TV (Gus Hunnybun) really set the tone for a very entertaining book.

I LOVED the interviews with TV stars from the 90s at the end of some of the chapters, Pat Sharp, Jet from Gladiators and Will from TFI Friday made me smile. I also remembered some TV shows that I'd forgotten about with childish glee and fondness. Alongside this, he also covered some of the more serious or questionable parts of TV at that time, including very sensitively and honestly covering Princess Diana's death - as he remarked in the closing interview, it would have been hard to do a book about 90s TV without talking about that.

My personal favourite chapter of the book was about the adverts from the 90s - I was listening along in the car as Josh spoke about an ad for a French car featuring a dad and daughter, and involuntarily found myself shouting "Niiiccccooollleee" behind the wheel of my car.

I honestly can't recommend this book enough for anyone who grew up watching 90s TV.

Book blurb

'This is a book about growing up in the '90s told through the thing that mattered most to me, the television programmes I watched. For my generation television was the one thing that united everyone. There were kids at my school who liked bands, kids who liked football and one weird kid who liked the French sport of petanque, however, we all loved Gladiators, Neighbours and Pebble Mill with Alan Titchmarsh (possibly not the third of these).'

In his first memoir, Josh Widdicombe tells the story of a strange rural childhood, the kind of childhood he only realised was weird when he left home and started telling people about it. From only having four people in his year at school, to living in a family home where they didn't just not bother to lock the front door, they didn't even have a key.

Using a different television show of the time as its starting point for each chapter Watching Neighbours Twice a Day... is part-childhood memoir, part-comic history of '90s television and culture. It will discuss everything from the BBC convincing him that Michael Parkinson had been possessed by a ghost, to Josh's belief that Mr Blobby is one of the great comic characters, to what it's like being the only vegetarian child west of Bristol.

It tells the story of the end of an era, the last time when watching television was a shared experience for the family and the nation, before the internet meant everyone watched different things at different times on different devices, headphones on to make absolutely sure no one else could watch it with them.