Book Musings: The Boy Who Kicked Pigs by Tom Baker

Rachie's Musings on: The Boy Who Kicked Pigs by Tom Baker

When I picked up The Boy Who Kicked Pigs in a bookshop, I didn’t particularly notice who the author was, I just liked the cover.  Apparently you shouldn’t judge a book by it’s cover, in this instance, I’m glad that I did.

Upon proper inspection I realised it was written by a man named Tom Baker, who just so happened to play the fourth incarnation of The Doctor in my favourite TV programme Doctor Who, so needless to say I was very excited to get stuck in.

The Boy Who Kicked Pigs focuses on a young boy named Robert Caligari, he’s a strange boy and his sister Nerys really gets on his nerves.  As an act of revenge towards Nerys, he kicks her piggy bank and unintentionally discovers a brand new hobby of kicking anything pig related, piggy banks, bacon, you name it – he’ll kick it.

Without ruining the story for anyone who hasn’t read it, the rest of the book continues to follow Robert on his pig kicking discovery and the discovery of his ultimate hatred of the human race, it’s an amusing and witty read that is full of complete and utter nonsense.

For me, whether intentionally or not, it taught me a valuable lesson.  There will be times when you despair of the human race and times when you want to seek revenge, but what starts out as a way to make yourself feel better can lead to something more sinister and have a negative effect on the person you become.

To quote The Cookie Monster “Today, me will live in the moment, unless it is unpleasant, in which case, me will eat a cookie.”

If there is a moment or a person that I find to be unpleasant, instead of plotting imaginary acts of revenge or waiting for karma to bite them on the backside, I’m going to let things go and eat a cookie! It’s a far better use of my time :-)