Nobody Likes You by Marc Spitz.

In which a trio of adorable corporate punk misfits conquer the world, save the kids and try to make it clear they're for REAL. This slim volume, a kind of 'My First Rock Biography' for the youthful audience it is obviously aimed at, tells the story of Green Day's swift rise to pop fame in the early nineties amidst sell-out clamour from the hardcore punk community; their sales slump ten years later with the boom of grunge and punk's second return long gone; and their surprise career revival with the pertinent political conscience of 2004's American Idiot album. Spitz's upbeat text breezes along at a cracking pace and while little insight is offered, perhaps that is due to there being little to gain. As an "official" biography, no criticism of Green Day is broached. They are latterday saviours of punk, they only signed to a major label so as to more easily spread the word, they know about "alienation" and "isolation", etc, etc. Where the book triumphs is in the opening chapters dealing with the San Francisco punk scene which spawned them; which included some immortal band names such as Vomit Launch, Nasal Sex and I Am The Hamster. [Euan Andrews]