I just finished reading a book called Expo 58 by the popular British author Jonathan Coe, released in 2013.

It was difficult to buy the book here in Canada, I found it on Amazon Canada for CAD77.00 which I thought was outrageous.  However, I did find it on the Blackwell’s website, a British book store, and the total price was just over CAD20.00 including delivery. It didn’t take much time to reach me here despite coinciding with the Canada Post strike.

I first found out about Expo 58 from the BBC radio play of the same name, it was a dramatization of the book. I could only find the first episode of the series but heard it was somewhat about the Central Office of Information, that is a British government quango that I used to work at many years ago. I didn’t really pay much attention to the story of the book prior to purchasing, I was just intrigued someone would right about the department where I used to work.

Without giving too much away, it is basically about a bloke who works at the COI being sent to Brussels to partly manage the British Pavilions pub at Expo 58. While there he becomes involved in some intrigue relating to the people he meets that are associated with his job or visit the pub.

This isn’t the type of book I would normally read but I did find it easy going. The chapters were divided into short sections which took as long to read as it does a comic book, 15-20 minutes at a comfortable pace. I think I was expecting a little bit more from the store. The story wasn’t “funny”, maybe just a little humorous a couple of times.

I didn’t fact check the Central Office of Information details provided in the book but in 1958 the department did move locations, I don’t recall that ever mentioned. The COI did have an Exhibitions department who did the work that was described in the book.

It is worth the read, it shouldn’t take long to get through it. For me, it was good that someone remembered the COI. I will give it the score of 3/5.

There is an entry on Library Thing about the book, including reviews.