Book review:

Luckily, the results - a rollicking look back at his racing career - are a lot more impressive than he enjoyed during his stint with the Andrea Moda Formula 1 team.

McCarthy has always been a good talker - how else could a guy from an Essex comprehensive school have made his way to the pinnacle of motorsport? - and he has managed to translate his speech into the written word to good effect.

Some of the stuff in this book is hilarious - my personal favourite is the tale of an IMSA Camel Lights win in 1990, when McCarthy's 16-stone team-mate Thomas Lopez makes a monumental cock-up of the driver change and 'Our Pel' is left gasping for breath with his seat pushed right forward and his nose up against the windscreen.

It's hard to tell whether this book is aimed just at the motorsport market or are looking to appeal to a wider field. There are a fair few clichés ('sexy lady' is a bit Swiss Tony in my book) along the way, but generally there is little wrong with the writing style - it's sometimes reminiscent of Kingsley Amis with Lucky Jim, particularly where, in his Formula 3 days, he imagines himself starring in a new game show called Suspension Failure.

But I would recommend this book to anyone with even a passing interest in the sport. There's an element of the old carcrash syndrome (yeah, a cliché I know) in Flat Out, Flat Broke, whereby you can't resist reading on to find out the next misfortune to befall our hero. It's great to see a few skeletons falling out of the cupboards of other well-known motorsport personalities too (Julian Bailey, can you spell 'King's Lynn' yet?).

Most of all, this has to be compulsory reading for any wannabe racing driver. There should be a lot of guys out there taking a long, hard look at themselves instead of waiting for a BRDC hand-out to plop through the letterbox.

A lesson in perseverance, and a bloody good laugh too.