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Success is tonto! Amis uses this word as a refrain, practically a mantra. It means loony, crazy, and cracked. It means this book is funny as all get out.

Structurally it’s not tonto at all. Rather, it’s a tightly wound double helix. Over the course of one year, each chapter representing a month, we follow two brothers, Terry Service and Gregory Riding. At an early age and after extreme familial circumstances, Terry was adopted into Gregory’s lavish household. Now the brothers live uncomfortably together in a London flat. Their sister Ursula occasionally stops by, and eventually moves in. It’s like a fucked up sitcom.

The characters are very much aware that we, the readers, are listening to them. They vie for our affection, accuse each other of making stuff up, and basically fight across the pages. The brothers are mirror images of one another. Terry doesn’t remember when he last had sex, while Gregory tells us women throw themselves at him. His green car is described as “powerful,� “ritzy,� “sleek,� “aggressive�, and “delicate.�

Gregory jokes that Terry’s legs are so short, he is amazed they reach the ground. Terry mostly makes fun of himself. “I got home at six-thirty,� he says. “Ursula and I had one of our quiet evenings together, me drinking and reading and going bald in my room, her knitting and muttering and going mad in hers, but the door between us ever-open.�

Amis writes a potent sentence, a gin and tonic with three limes, but he can do beautiful too. “I paued for two whole minutes to watch a high-flying, string-trailing jet, no more than a glinting crucifix in the deep blue above the thin salty clouds.� Ah, Success.