Adrian Mole has entered early middle age and is now 'the same age as Jesus was when he died' (33).

Father to the grammatically challenged Glenn, and William, who takes a 'Big Boy Arouser' condom to nursery school as his innocent contribution to a hot air balloon project, Adrian is a single parent who has an on/off relationship with his housing officer, Pamela Pigg.

Will she help him to move from the notorious Gaitskell estate before William joins the Mad Frankie Fraser fan club? In the meantime, Adrian continues to be scandalised by his irresponsible parents who are conducting a matrimonial square-dance with the Braithwaites the parents of the beautiful but unobtainable Pandora, who is ruthlessly pursuing her ambition to be New Labour's first woman P.M. and to confide in his diary. His current worries include: indestructible head-lice; his raging jealousy when his accomplished half-brother Brett arrives on his doorstep; moral decline in The Archers; his desperate attachment to two therapists; his mild addiction to Starburst (formerly Opal Fruits); a small earthquake in Leicester; and, perhaps most significantly, the dawn of a new millennium. - - About the Author: Sue Townsend is the creator of Britain's best loved and bestselling diarist, Adrian Mole. She was born in Leicester in 1946, is married and has four children and five grandchildren and still lives in Leicester. She left school at fifteen and was employed in series of unskilled jobs. By her 18th birthday she was married, and a year later had her first baby. She began working with children in an adventure playground on the estate where playwright Joe Orton grew up. While taking a canoeing course for playleaders, she met Colin Broadway and they now have a 21-year-old daughter. In 1978 she joined a Writers Group at the Phoenix Art Centre in Leicester and her career as an author and playwright took off from there. Her first play, Womberang, won its author a Thames Television Bursary as Writer in Residence.