Contacts: From the award-winning comedian, the most heartwarming, touching and funny fiction book

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The way the flashbacks were incorporated in the present-day action worked well and the pacing - much like the train James was on - chugged steadily along. The book switches between James rooting about in his memories and the characters receiving the text. Watson says that he was trying to show how technology can bring people together, but for me the message I got was more along the lines of "is there anyone in my life who I can forgive? There is his mother Jean, ex girlfriend now living in Germany Michaela, his flat mate Steffi, best friend Karl and his estranged sister Sal, who is living in Melbourne. A few from his contacts are given a jolt - like his busy estranged sister, his out of touch mom, his repentent ex and his friend who cheated him.

We realise that everyone is struggling one way or another, and even when we get to dive into the brains of the minor characters here, we get to see the struggles going on behind their eyes. In January he'd received just two texts in an entire week, and one of them was to offer him two-for one pizzas if he replied with the word PEPPERONI. And yes, it's great that James changed his mind in the end, or had it changed for him by circumstances, but he didn't really change his mind in the sense that he doesn't acknowledge how much of an ass he was and that he hasn't ruled out getting back to his plan in the future. For that reason alone, I probably wouldn't have read this book if it hadn't been our latest book club pick.Obviously, writing a book where the main character spends the whole time wanting to die is incredibly… brave? I was emotionally invested in the outcome, and found the prose very readable, despite some minor head hopping.

With the deed done, his message flying off into the ether, James switches his phone to flight mode to avoid any unwanted replies and begins to mentally prepare himself for his last hours on this planet. It will not turn you into a blubbering mess; instead you’ll find yourself chuckling along with these characters as they account for the significant roles they’ve played in this man’s life. I don't mean that I wasn't concerned about his fate, it's just that I was more concerned about those trying to help him. I would have liked if Mark Watson focused on the present with all the messages, rather than focusing on the past.I did appreciate Watson's choice to make it not one huge catastrophic event that had made James' make this decision, instead everything that had happened recently just seemed a bit too much, life itself seemed a bit too much, and I think that's something that a worrying proportion of the population can identify with. James Chiltern boards the 23:50 sleeper train from London to Edinburgh with two pork pies, six beers and a packet of chocolate digestives. Or maybe that doesn't even really make it less terrible because the memory of that night and the possibility of it getting to this point again will always be there for everyone involved.

The irony is that in this storyline mobile phone technology can be instrumental and invaluable in connecting both loved ones and strangers, across continents, uniting them in a common cause, whilst James himself feels disconnected from his fellow human beings. The book did a pretty good job drawing the various characters, switching between following our suicidal main character and some of the recipients of his middle-of-the-night text. One aspect of Contacts that I enjoyed was the use of technology as a force for good; building a safety net around James even as he travels north completely unaware of what is unfolding across the globe from Berlin to Melbourne. It would have been cool to have each person he texted have a seperate chapter (yes, I know there were 157 or so texts so maybe grouping the 50 or so people that didn't responded into one chapter, as well as the 20 or so people who's numbers were disconnected into another, etc). The question of who takes responsibility for James’ predicament, who decides to do something proactive and who excuses themselves from the responsibility, all this is masterfully explored by Watson.His friendship with fellow techie turned taxi entrepreneur Karl has ended, his girlfriend Michaela has dumped him in favour of Berlin gallery owner Phillip and his once close relationship with sister Sally has long since expired.

I think it was about an hour too long, At 11 hours and 5 minutes it is on the long side and it could do with a bit more of a ruthless edit. I found it to be poorly written, you think the paragraph is going one way then it meanders off somewhere else. Imagine what your first thought would be when your phone lights up with a new message, and you read the words that someone is saying goodbye to you.The main characters were all people with their good and bad points, and despite the subject matter there was some quite good humour. And I was surprised that despite my anger at the main character, the further I got into the book the more it managed to also make me feel sympathetic towards him and put aside my anger. The misery of it, the physical ache in his muscles that had come from failing, over and over again – those were a few hours away from being over, for good. I detest the idea that people contemplating suicide might think they too could have their friends panicked and desperately trying to save them ‘in time’.