A Letdown at Blandings

A Pelican at Blandings by P.G. Wodehouse
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

A Pelican at Blandings, the 11th book in the Blandings Castle series, was a big disappointment for me. I always expect P.G. Wodehouse to buck me up with his humor, but this one lacked the funny.

It's typically Wodehousian in its convoluted plot, but the writing feels dull. I have a tendency to blame the author's mounting years, after all he was about 88 when he wrote this, however he did go on to write another half dozen or so novels, and the one or two I've read were much better than this.

No, the problem is that this feels more like one of his early works where romance tended to trump comedy. The plot is fine, but the comedic edge is missing. There's too much exposition all together, but also redundant explanations, especially in the dialogue, which in other books Wodehouse was smart to gloss over. Sure it's important to keep your readers abreast of the action, but at some point you need to be aware not to beat them over the head with it.

Ah well, I still have about 40 or 50 more Wodehouses to read. I'm sure I'll better another good one in there somewhere!

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Spade Tells a More Than Almost Interesting Story

Almost Interesting by David Spade
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I'm a sucker for a comedian's autobiography. I figure, even if their life turns out to be uninteresting, at least there's a good chance I'll get a laugh or two out of the book. David Spade hasn't lived the most exciting life and he may not be the funniest dude in the world, but that didn't stop him from making this a fairly enjoyable book.

I read this on the tails of Tobias Wolff's excellent This Boy's Life and they're both similar in that each memoir contains estranged fathers and strange stepfather's. But that's pretty much where the similarities end. David Spade is funny, imo, but he's no writer. He lacks Wolff's eloquence, but hey, so do most people!

With that being said, I listened to him read his own book and can tell you, the man can perform. He outshined Amy Schumer's disappointing autobio, which I listened to a few months back. It wasn't so much that the content was necessarily better, rather it was the delivery. He's able to sell his stories and enliven his bits with a punch of inflection and energy in just the right place. That's important, because otherwise his snarky attitude and slacker's voice could've sunk this book.

Almost Interesting breaks no new ground in the memoir genre. It starts at the beginning. however, Spade is smart to quickly rush through his early years, picking out only the most poignant episodes of his childhood. Then he dwells on his formative adolescence for a bit longer. But this is the thing that kills me...Almost immediately he starts in about "chicks" and "getting laid". While he is quite self-aware and not a total creeper, this becomes a recurring topic from the pages regarding childhood right up to the end of the book.

I'm not surprised by the above. I happen to have first-hand knowledge of Spade's attempts with "the ladies". Late one night at a Taco Bell in Beverly Hills round about '97 or '98, my buddy and I were getting our taco fix on when in walked David Spade. He had a baseball cap pulled way down over his eyes in an attempt not to be noticed...as celebrities do, and thus get noticed. The huge bodyguard shadowing him didn't help his covert operation. I noticed him right off, but didn't bother him. In fact, nobody did even though a few were pointing and nodding, so he probably would've got in and out with no fuss like he seemed to wish to, except that decided to make a play on this gorgeous, 6 foot, all dolled up woman over at the hot sauce island. She barely looked at him before taking off. The bodyguard's demeanor never changed through out, so either he was a true professional or he'd seen this scene played out a few times already. Ah, poor David...you sinner. (Yes, that's a light Tommy Boy reference.)

Speaking of Tommy Boy. It's one of my guilty-pleasure favorites. Joe Dirt, too! Yes, they're "stupid" brain candy, but man, there some genuinely funny moments in both. So, part of my desire to read this bio was to hear a little backstory on both movies, not to mention his time on SNL. Spade delivers with some solid anecdotes here. I thought he might dwell on Chris Farley's tragic death and its affect on him, but Spade proves to be above playing for sympathy on that account. The book makes clear the deep impact Farley's friendship had on him, but he draws the line at revealing too much emotionally personal info.

If you're not a fan of Spade's personae, this won't change your opinion and you might as well steer clear. For all other's, I can recommend Almost Interesting and suggest listening to this surprisingly fun audiobook.

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A Surprising Letdown

The Girl with the Lower Back Tattoo by Amy Schumer
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I expected laughs coming out of my butt and instead I got a relative dud. I did not see that coming!

I am a fan of Amy Schumer, yes warts and all*, and so I expected to love this book. Her show is hilarious, her stand-up is good stuff, and I really enjoyed her movie Trainwreck...or A Girl Without Complexes as it is known in Russia. This book, however, does not meet expectations.

The subject matter is hit and miss. I really enjoyed when she got on the topic of her show or movie. There was some snort-laugh-worthy material in her dating stories. I wasn't so interested in her stuffed animals, though, and didn't feel like they needed a full chapter of their own. There is a lot of time spent on her mom and dad, who are honestly more interesting people than Amy comes off as in this book.

She's just not a truly wild and crazy gal. While it didn't make for an exciting read, it was interesting to find out that she's actually an introvert of sorts who forces herself to perform. She'd be more at home spending most nights, well, at home. She's a movie-on-the-couch-in-PJs-with-a-bowl-of-brownie-mix kind of date night girl. And I don't hate on that! Hell, that sounds like heaven to me. Problem is, when you're writing an autobiography and that's the kind of a material you're working with, the book ain't gonna thrill ya.

Amy is also not a terribly dynamic reader. There isn't a lot of life in her reading voice. I chose to listen to this in audiobook format, because I feel like you should always read a comedian's book that way. They're writing about themselves, they're natural performers, this is right up their alley! Well, looks like I have to amend my "always" when it comes to comedians' audiobook narration. Schumer sounded like she was on valium a third of the time, bored to death during another third, and on top of things and engaged for the third third.

Now, I've bagged on this book for most of this review, but in fairness, it's not horrible. Yes, it did take more than a month to get through seven cds, which is an astronomical amount of time for such a short book. However, I have read worse and this doesn't come close. As a Schumer fan, let's just say I was let down. I expected a laugh-riot and was surprised when I didn't get it. That doesn't mean there isn't merit herein. It just means I set the bar too high.


* Mostly I'm talking about the few a-holes that have dug up her past and tried to throw it in her face. Others claim she's stealing jokes. I've looked into it, and to me this just sounds like jealousy and sour grapes. The rumors and accusations I've seen have all been from dudes and the ax they're grinding stinks of fear, as if they're afraid vaginas have invaded and will one day rule the world if dudes don't whip out their penises and beat them back!

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The Witty Silliness Continues

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe by Douglas Adams
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Had I read this? I couldn't recall. I knew I'd seen the old tv version, but I wasn't sure I'd actually read the book, so I read it. And why not? It's a hell of a good book, and I'd do it again!

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe is kind of the continuing adventures of Arthur Dent. Honestly, while he's a focal point of book one, he doesn't factor into the sequel as much. This is more about Zaphod Beeblebrox and Ford Perfect, as well as the kitchen sink's worth of whatever zany ideas Douglas Adams wanted to throw into the works.

I say "zany ideas" as if they are a haphazard, careless collection of ramblings, but Adams does actually stay on topic for much of the time. That topic is humanity's futility. We're a go-nowhere race going nowhere fast. Adams basically says we've been given two million years worth of time to do something with ourselves before it's all over, and frankly we will fuck it up. Oh well!

While not as sharp as the first book, this is a worthy successor and I plan to continue reading the remaining books in the series, which I'm pretty sure I haven't read yet.

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A Long Wait For Nothing

Unusual Uses for Olive Oil by Alexander McCall Smith
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

After a near ten-year hiatus, the long-awaited (well, by me at any rate) fourth book in Alexander McCall Smith's comedic Portuguese Irregular Verbs series finally arrived!

I enjoyed the heck out of book number one. Then the following two became a little Candide-like or Monty Python-esque in their wackiness as our hero Professor Dr. Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld became embroiled in far flung adventures. This fourth book, Unusual Uses for Olive Oil is a return to the sedate wordsmithing of the first book, and perhaps I really didn't want what I'd been wishing for.

This book is boring. There's no too ways about it. It's lacking in a sense of fun. Oh yes, there's plenty of wordplay and that's all very well and good, but poking fun at Germans and how they take everything literally, as well as the pedantic nature of language professors only goes so far before it becomes tiresome.

I can and do recommend this for word-lovers and those looking for some light academic japery. If you like reading satire on the foibles of the learned, have at it! I got a chuckle or two between the covers of this one and you may, too!



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An Adventure in Satire

Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

So much more than just a fantastical tale of a man journeying to mystical lands. This is thinly veiled satire...super thin.

A seafaring Englishman ends up in four fairytale worlds where people are small, gigantic, smarties in the maths, and where people are horses. By the second journey you'd think he'd be done with all this, but in the end he's done with humans and has trouble living amongst his own kind.

Written in the old style where listing off occurrences constituted an adventure and a perfectly well constructed story, Gulliver's Travels can be at times a tedious read. It's filled with a laundry list of actions ("I did this and then I did this"), and when you think some tension or conflict is a brewin' you get simple expedients flatly stated ("I was faced with an obstacle and so I overcame it by doing this.") After a time it all becomes trying and uninspiring, making the turning of pages ever more difficult.

However, if you've come to this book looking for condemnation of the human race's worst foibles, you've come to the right place. Swift dispatches venom towards the leeches of humanity. Lawyers, for instance, get blasted left, right and center. I'm one of those people that feels we're not much better, and sometimes not any better, than base animals, so I was okay with the author's bashing of my fellow man. Those who don't understand anything beyond "Humans! We're #1!" aren't going to like this.

Regardless of its faults, I'm glad I finally got around to reading the original, full-length version. In school I read an abridged and sanitized version, which left out all the mentions of genitalia and bodily functions. This is much better with all the pee and tits included!


PS: Check out my video review of Gulliver's Travels here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKpYD...

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Dirty Ol' Bryson

Neither Here nor There: Travels in Europe by Bill Bryson
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Huh. Turns out Bryson is a dirty ol' bugger!

This travel-across-Europe journal is fun, educational and entertaining. I love travel and I like learning about far-off places. Europe has been done and overdone, yet I still find it fascinating.

Bryson's recollections are from when he wrote the book in the '90s as well as from a previous trip he and his friend Katz took. Regardless of when the reminisces come from, details ring true from the experiences I've had of the same places, such Paris and parts of Italy. Apparently some things never change. However, it was cool to get his take on the place.

At times he gets a little grumpy, but overall this is lighthearted and goodnatured. He has a adequate store of patience and his take-it-as-it-comes attitude keeps most of this from sinking into endless gripes.

Fun as this was, it's not my favorite of the six or so of Bryon's works I've read to this point. I haven't found this in his later books, but earlier on his writing seems to show a distracting obsession with sex. That's fine. I mean, I'm a dirty bird too, but I really don't want to know about the fetishes of a mid-aged man. I am one and it's not pretty. Hey, I'm sure that's someone's bag. Somewhere out there some sad sod is thinking, "I wonder what gets boring, bald and wrinkled old Phil from accounting off?" But that's not me...not yet anyhow. Who knows maybe someday my sexuality will warp in an unexpected way.

Oh, who am I kidding...*zip*

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Plus-Sized Laughs

Dad Is Fat by Jim Gaffigan
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

After recently reading Jim Gaffigan's gastronomically good read Food: A Love Story, I decided to go on a mini Gaffigan binge.

As you might guess from the title, Dad Is Fat is about Gaffigan's home life and the travails of becoming a parent. It follows chronologically from him and his wife as a free-and-easy, no-kids couple to having five children all crammed into a tiny apartment.

I related to the no-kids couple, I laughed at some of the parenthood ridiculousness and I enjoyed every part of this book. I just didn't love it. I hoped for hilarity, but got more subtle ha-has instead.

Here's a sampling:


“Whenever one of my children says, 'Goodnight, Daddy,' I always think to myself, 'You don't mean that.”

“I used to wonder why I had hair on my legs, but now I know it's for my toddler sons and daughters to pull themselves up off the ground with as I scream in pain.”

“Look, you lost a tooth. Congratulations. Enjoy looking like a hillbilly. Here’s a dollar...”

“I don't know what's more exhausting about parenting: the getting up early, or acting like you know what you're doing.”

Yeah, there are a lot of one-liners. He is a stand-up comedian after all. However, Gaffigan does a nice job of setting up and exploring his topic, at least a little better than just tossing off zingers. No, this won't replace the What To Expect... series for folks looking to bone up on childrearing, but did you really think that's what you'd find between the pages of a book with this title?

Rating: 3.5

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Something to Chew On

Food: A Love Story by Jim Gaffigan
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

If aliens studied Earth, they would come to the conclusion that the United States is somehow consuming food on behalf of other countries.

And so begins Comedian Jim Gaiffigan's Food: A Love Story. Actually, that's not how it begins. I just thought the quote sounded almost philosophical, plus I wanted to use the grandiose "And so begins...." I could have just as well started with...

I’m convinced that anyone who doesn’t like Mexican food is a psychopath.

...because that, my friend, is fact!

Gaffigan loves food. If you've ever watched one of his comedy specials this will soon become apparent. Food usually makes its way into his routine sooner or later, and his skewering of Hot Pockets has become legendary. No doubt the big success of his previous book pushed him into doing a second book, and so why not do one solely about food?

Gaffigan's a casual eater, not a connoisseur. He's not even obese, he's merely overweight. So why should we care what he has to say about food? Because he's funny, that's why. Disagree with me? Then you can just get out! Go on, this review ain't big enough for the two of us!

Food: A Love Story is not knock-you-over-the-head funny from start to finish. It's got a conversational tone, especially if you listen to the audiobook, which I always suggest when reading a comedian's book. Yeah, you may know their voice, but inflection is of paramount importance and you're not as clever in that regard as you think you are. But anyway, my point was, if you came purely for the punchlines you will be disappointed. The book isn't joke after joke, it's more like this:

It would be embarrassing trying to explain what an appetizer is to someone from a starving country. “Yeah, the appetizer—that’s the food we eat before we have our food. No, no, you’re thinking of dessert—that’s food we have after we have our food. We eat tons of food. Sometimes there’s so much we just stick it in a bag and bring it home. Then we throw it out the next day. Maybe give it to the dog."

Of course this book isn't as funny as his stand-up. Comedians work really hard to come up with an hour's worth of material, which they tour with for often a year. Here we have six hours of material written for this book. I doubt he wrote it with the idea that he'd do a six year tour with it.

Gaffigan isn't a particularly healthy eater. Junk food fills these pages like it fills our guts and the deepest, darkest places of our empty souls...

You ever talk to an old person? I mean a really, really old person. They always have this exhausted look on their face that says, I can’t believe I’m still here! I would’ve eaten so much more ice cream. Why did I ever consume kale?

His road-touring life has forced him given him the golden opportunity to pretend he has no choice but to eat poorly, thus bringing him into close and constant contact with what passes for restaurant food here in America. Fast food joints come in for a good, solid de-pantsing as he does a virtual tour around the States listing his "favorite" chains, and then breaking it down to the regional chains like WaffleHouse and Whataburger. Regional foods (I almost said cuisine, ha!) are reminisced, such as Chicago's deep-dish pizza, Seattle's coffee, NY bagels and the South's maternal love for bbq.

After reading this, I had to clear my head of Gaffigan's intentional food nonsense by reading Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma. You're just not going to find deep, scientific insight in Food. This is for the laughs. Although, there are some borderline poignant passages:

Nobody believes in racial profiling until they get a red-haired sushi chef with a southern accent.

I think everyone is aware how disgusting snails are, and that’s why they are served in a bowl of wine and butter and called “escargots,” which is a French word loosely translated as “denial.”

Often on the menu, oysters will be listed as “oysters on the half shell.” As opposed to what? “In a Kleenex?” Even the way you are supposed to eat an oyster indicates something counterintuitive. “Squeeze some lemon on it, a dab of hot sauce, throw the oyster down the back of your throat, take a shot of vodka, and try to forget you just ate snot from a rock.” That is not how you eat something. That is how you overdose on sleeping pills.

Okay, so those weren't poignant at all, but they did give me a chuckle and that's all I truly expected from this book.

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The Ghost of Oscar Wilde

The Canterville Ghost by Oscar Wilde
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Almost witless. By which I mean this is nearly free of wit.

That's a problem for Oscar Wilde, a writer whose career was based on his rapier wit. But I'm sorry fans, I just don't see it in The Canterville Ghost.

In this story we have your typical set up where Americans come to the UK, buy up a castle, ghost-included, and then proceed to dash away hundreds of years of well-cultivated English tedium. (And I like their tedium, so that was a drag...)

Wilde's commentary on stuffy Brits and cocky Americans is broad and soon played out. All that's left is a sappy love story.

Well, that and a ghost story that's used for some good comic effect. The only problem with this part of the story is that recently it's been done a bajillion times. That's no fault of Wilde's, mind you! I don't blame him. But the fact it, these days the old put-one-over-on-the-scary-ghost bit has been done ad nauseam. If only we'd all read this book before being inundated by recent tv and movies...

Still and all, this is an Oscar Wilde book and as such it's still good reading even with all of its faults. Yes, I've bashed it good here, but look up there at those shiny three stars. That's a solid thumbs-tepidly-up if I ever saw one!

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Down At The Old Bailey

Rumpole and the Reign of Terror by John Mortimer
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Every time I finish a Rumpole book, I figure "Well, that must be the last of them..." and then I find another! Having just taken the time to look over John Mortimer's list of Rumpole's, I see I've got about 9 or 10 more to go. Huzzah!

I love reading about the British legal system and viewing it through the eyes of that most lovable of curmudgeons, Horace Rumpole, a defense lawyer who believes a man is innocent until proven guilty. He's a hero for the oppressed, put-upon and wrongfully accused.

Granted, these Rumpole stories do get a bit cartoonish, what with the overly cruel judges and daft prosecutors, and then usually somewhere towards the end there's a Scooby Doo-like reveal ("I would've gotten away with it, if it weren't for you meddling kids!") as you'll often find in so many mysteries wherein the villain admits to the crime and gives himself away. At least Mortimer usually waits to use this story expedient until after the criminal is absolutely cornered, so it's not too annoying a tactic.

Rumpole and the Reign of Terror is a most interesting new addition to a series that started in the '70s. The subject matter has shifted with the times and now takes in the terrorism topic. London in the early 2000s was a target for terrorist activities and knee-jerk reactions were to be expected. Mortimer uses the tension, stress and terror of the general populous as a talking-point topic in order to produce yet another of his entertaining tales of the legal system at work.

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The Joy of Hate

Greg Gutfeld
Crown Publishing
Reviewed by Nancy
4 out of 5 stars

Summary

From the irreverent star of Fox News’s Red Eye and The Five, hilarious observations on the manufactured outrage of an oversensitive, wussified culture.

Greg Gutfeld hates artificial tolerance. At the root of every single major political conflict is the annoying coddling Americans must endure of these harebrained liberal hypocrisies. In fact, most of the time liberals uses the mantle of tolerance as a guise for their pathetic intolerance. And what we really need is smart intolerance, or as Gutfeld reminds us, what we used to call common sense.

The Joy of Hate tackles this conundrum head on--replacing the idiocy of open-mindness with a shrewd judgmentalism that rejects stupid ideas, notions, and people. With countless examples grabbed from the headlines, Gutfeld provides readers with the enormous tally of what pisses us all off. For example:
- The double standard: You can make fun of Christians, but God forbid Muslims. It's okay to call a woman any name imaginable, as long as she's a Republican. And no problem if you're a bigot, as long as you're politically correct about it.
- The demonizing of the Tea Party and romanticizing of the Occupy Wall Streeters.
- The media who are always offended (see MSNBC lineup)
- How critics of Obamacare or illegal immigration are somehow immediately labeled racists.
- The endless debate over the Ground Zero Mosque (which Gutfeld planned to open a Muslim gay bar next to).
- As well as pretentious music criticism, slow-moving ceiling fans, and snotty restaurant hostesses.

Funny and sarcastic to the point of being mean (but in a nice way), The Joy of Hate points out the true jerks in this society and tells them all off.

My Review

I don’t watch much TV, unless it’s a series that I can get hooked on or a movie. I generally stay away from talk shows, reality shows, comedies, and news/opinion shows. So I’ve never heard of Greg Gutfeld.

I’m so glad I came across Mike's review and gave him a chance.

His essays are proof positive that the left does not have a monopoly on intelligence, humor, or sarcasm.

Just last week, I was going to pull into a parking spot at Market Basket when this woman comes flying out from in between cars and beats me to the spot while fixing me with a nasty glare. Her shabby car was festooned with bumper stickers. After her appalling behavior, this was the one that stood out the most:



If she were truly tolerant, she would have let the old woman with the bad foot (and better car) take the spot closer to the entrance.

I’m sure Greg Gutfeld would have a good laugh over that one. I know I did. This is the kind of artificial tolerance that he talks about.

Though I tend to think these essays would be more appealing to those who lean to the right on the political spectrum, independent thinkers who don’t blindly accept one worldview and those who tolerate others with different views may get something out of it too.

I laughed even while he was dissing one of my favorite bands:

“The idea of tolerance – a seemingly innocuous concept – has now become something else entirely: a way to bludgeon people into shutting up, piping down, and apologizing, when the attacked are often the ones who hold the key to common sense. They speak an unspeakable truth, and they get clobbered by the Truncheon of Tolerance. Tolerance has turned normal people into sheep/parrot hybrids, followers in word and deed – bloating and squawking at everyone in a psychological torment not experienced since Dave Matthews picked up a guitar.”

He covers immigration, climate change, birth control, religion, feminism, media bias, Occupy Wall Street, celebrities, second-hand smoke, parades, etc.

Some of my favorites were:

- My Big Fat Gay Muslim Bar
- A Really Bad Day at the Office
- To Obama, Borders Was Nothing But a Bookstore
- A Pack of Lies
- Stalin Grads

While I don’t agree with everything he says, reading these essays was fun, refreshing, thought-provoking, and a perfect way to spend time on the beach.

One of these days I’ll check out his show.

Jeeves Gets Medieval

Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit by P.G. Wodehouse
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Another deeelightful romp in the Wodehouse world! Romp-tiddly-romp, I say, what?! What, what?!

Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, aka What Ho, Jeeves, is a bit different from others in the Wooster/Jeeves line in that it reads like a play. In my case, it listens like a play, because I ingested this audiobook-style. So, in place of Wodehouse's wonderful narration via Bertie's inner monologue, we get awkward exposition and strange soliloquy. Instead of a witty description of Jeeves' discontent over Bertie's ghastly upper-lip appendage, we hear the actor groaning and moaning in a most peevish manner, in a word: whinging.

All the above sounds odd and irritating, and would be off-putting enough to make most listeners give it up. I'm not most readers when it comes to a Wooster and Jeeves novel, so I stuck it out, and boy am I glad I did! Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit turned out to be a cracking good read!

It's no different than any of the other 101 books (or however many there are) on the dynamic duo in this series. Bertie's having a typically rough morning after a raucous night out when hell breaks out and rings his doorbell. One of his torturous aunts is in need, a former fiancee may or may not wish to marry him again, the significant other of this former fiancee wishes to wring Bertie's neck (or in this case, break his spine in upwards of a half dozen different locations), a minor heist is required of Bertie by his aunt, and Jeeves will save the day 9 times out of 10.

It's a tried and true formula from which Wodehouse seldom varies. So why bother to keep coming back? One likes the well-known rerun and is grateful for the old trusty laugh when so needed. I often pick up a Wodehouse when I'm down or blue or in some other variation on the state of sadness. A dose from a reliable rib-tickler can get one out of a funk as well as an aspirin relieves a headache, and this book is an even more potent remedy for what ails you.


NOTE: I'd like to make a further note, a sidebar if you will, regarding the audiobook. The performances were mostly top-notch. I attribute this to the use of about three actors who've voiced the Bertie character in other Wodehouse books. One played the main role, while the others supported. Fantastic casting!

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Uncle Fred's At It Again!

Uncle Fred in the Springtime by P.G. Wodehouse
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Oh my goodness, what in the dickens is going on now? Impostors, you say? At Blandings Castle, you say? Well, you don't say!

Lord Ickenham, aka Uncle Fred is at it again. The OCC (original cool cucumber) has cooked up another improbable scheme to make all well again in a world in which he loves her, she loves him, Father A doesn't approve, Father B doesn't approve, Young Gadabout A needs a bit of the ready cash, and so does Young Gadabout B. Who better to tie these things all together than Uncle Fred?

Wodehouse juggles plots with dizzying skill. I did a rough count and Uncle Fred in the Springtime contains approximately a bucketload of characters. Every character's got an agenda and they all compete with and against one another simultaneously. Sometimes the plot lines are silly, sometimes skillful, and sometimes they leave you wondering, "What? Who? Where?" in the most delightful way. It's like a murder mystery in which no one gets murdered...not too seriously at any rate.

I Was Told There'd Be Laughs

I Was Told There'd Be Cake by Sloane Crosley
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This won awards, was a best seller and was heralded by critics? I feel like the publishing world needed a darling in 2008 in the humorist category and chose Crosley for lack of a better.

Occasionally humorous, sure, but I couldn't get past the notion that this was the humor of the spoiled, the unchallenging laughs of white privilege, the shrug-it-off-and-smile of upper-middle-class woes, such as forgetting your keys, leaving your wallet behind, spending hundreds on a locksmith after locking yourself out of your Manhattan apartment, enduring an annoyed boss because you're a kid just out of an expensive college who has no real marketable skills, getting lice at summer camp...at summer camp...jaysus, even the book's title has a "let them eat cake" sense of careless entitlement.

Credit where credit's due, Sloane Crosley is a decent writer and a decent humorist. She can turn a good phrase now and then, enough to garner spot laughs through out.

The problem is a lack of material worth writing about. Come on, a whole chapter on the computer game The Oregon Trail? Admittedly, I've written about the game in a book of mine, for about a paragraph, not a whole fucking chapter! This book feels like the author is just too young, lacks any meaningful life experiences worth writing about, and is stretching the hell out of what little has happened to her.

Light Laughs With And About Amy Poehler

Yes Please by Amy Poehler
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

An autobio from a funny lady I admire? Yes, please!

Of course I want to learn more about a woman who's made me laugh for a good long while. For a stretch of time there, Amy Poehler was the only funny thing SNL had going for it and then she created one of the more endearing characters in television on her hit show Parks & Rec. How can you not love a confident woman who makes you laugh?

Many have not loved her book, Yes Please. I blame the reader and high expectations. For one, readers, you shouldn't read a comedian's memoirs, you should listen to them via audiobook. Performance is their thing, so why would you think they'd translate perfectly through the written medium? Secondly, the high expectations of a book put out by a comedian on the top of their game leads the readers into thinking that whatever this person touches will turn to gold. Not always true, especially if said comedian didn't want to write the book in the first place.

...And Poehler definitely didn't want to write this book. In fact, she spends too much damn time at the beginning telling the reader how much she didn't want to write this book. That is a bad beginning. I'm often wary of memoirs that go meta. It tells me that the author is straining for things to write about and it also chimes a dissonant tone. Who wants to be involved in anything with an unwilling participant?

Once the rocky intro is out of the way, Yes Please gets down to the good stuff. Poehler gives her fans a smattering of her life's story, even divulging her occasional naughtiness. She's a middle class white girl from the New England 'burbs...very little drama there, but at least she's willing to dish a little dirt on herself, what little there seems to be. Honestly I don't read this for "the dirt". I'm more interested in their success story arc and how it all happened. Inevitably it comes down to hard work, but no matter how many times I read that, I find it reassuring.

I think that this is not a beginning to end tale of her life from birth to present has annoyed a few people. I didn't have a problem with that. I do however agree with the detractors who complain that the book goes off the rails once too often. For instance, long lists of not-so-funny alternative character names and the like could have been dispensed with. I would also add that not all of the celebrities called upon to contribute little bits and blurbs through out the audiobook were successful. My hero Carol Burnett, for instance, sounded sad and tired.

Still, I maintain that the audiobook is the best way to enjoy this. There's plenty of laughs that I just can't imagine being had without hearing them.

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A Change Is In The Wind, But All's Well

Much Obliged, Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Aw, this makes me sad. Much Obliged, Jeeves is one of Wodehouse's last books in the Jeeves & Wooster series and it's just starting to show a some life, after so many books-by-rote.

The usual plot and characters are all in order. Finicky friends and daffy family members all seemingly conspire to thrust Bertie Wooster neck-deep into the soup, then jam him between a rock and a hard place. Hovering about the periphery is the all-knowing, gentleman's gentleman extraordinaire Jeeves, ready to extract his master and set all to rights.

Where this book differs from other Wodehouses is in the little details. Bertie's narration makes it plain that Much Obliged, Jeeves comes later in the Wodehouse oeuvre by referencing past exploits...and I'm not just talking about that scripture prize he won in school or the article he wrote for Milady's Boudoir on "What the well-dressed man is wearing." I'm not even talking about the big reveal that Jeeves actually has a first name. The real difference is in how Jeeves interacts with Wooster. It's not a vast shift to the left, but there is a slight subversion in his tone, a sort of sauciness to his lip service, a kind of sass to his soliloquy. Yes indeed, Jeeves expresses himself here with more than just a raised brow and I found it shocking...SHOCKING I SAY!

Seriously though, it was nice to see an old familiar character being appropriately stretched a bit. After all the patience-straining nonsense Jeeves endures, it seems quite natural for such a clearly superior mind to grow a tad surly over such trying times. I only wish Wodehouse had started this process and expanded upon it years, nay, decades prior.

In summary, Much Obliged, Jeeves is a solid book in the series, but if you're a newcomer, I'd suggest starting somewhere earlier. Perhaps, Right Ho, Jeeves or The Code of the Woosters would be more suitable. These books don't need to be read sequentially, and you'd be fine if you read this one first, but I think the newb would be better severed with a more elementary introduction. Wouldn't want to muddle the grey matter, now would we?

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Stewart Skewarting US Politics

America (The Book): A Citizen's Guide to Democracy Inaction by Jon Stewart
Reviewed by Jason Koivu
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

America (The Book) is not the Daily Show, but it's damn close.

This is one of those cases where it might seem like a good idea to listen to the audiobook and hear the actors' deliveries in order to mimic the feeling of watching the tv show as much as possible. However, then you'd miss out on the high school textbook mock-up layout and that's missing half the point.

A Citizen's Guid to Democracy Inaction is modeled after a civics class text replete with horrible study guides, misguided questions, those pop-out boxes for more incorrect information, etc and also etc. It's all one big lampoon of laughter and I loved it!

Yes, it can sometimes be silly in a juvenile way...

“It's not that the Democrats are playing checkers and the Republicans are playing chess. It's that the Republicans are playing chess and the Democrats are in the nurse's office because once again they glued their balls to their thighs.”

And its insight isn't exactly mindblowing (or is it?)...

“If "con" is the opposite of pro, then isn't Congress the opposite of progress? Or did we just fucking blow your mind?!?”

However, occasionally a particularly spot-on, cutting remark is made...

“Classroom Activities
1. Using felt and yarn, make a hand puppet of Clarence Thomas. Ta-da! You're Antonin Scalia!”

Stewart and crew roast the U.S. Government time and again, so as you could imagine, it's a great read for Jon Stewart Show fans, it's also a good one for liberals in general and a tolerable one for Republicans who can take a joke.


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Found Is A Funny Find (sorry)

FOUND Magazine #1 by Davy Rothbart
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

FOUND is a collection of funny and occasionally hilarious stuff (pictures, letters, "lost pet" posters, etc) found by the editor or contributors and compiled in one place for your maximum enjoyment.

Zinester Davy Rothbart took some of the better bits from his hit zine of the '90s and quickly came out with a more professional looking magazine/book type of thing. It really just speaks for itself, so...











I found FOUND to be better ingested in smaller bites than this. Too much random shit in one sitting doesn't set well. The bit-sized zine was more to my liking, but probably you're not going to be able to find it anymore, so I suggest grabbing a copy of the book and reading only a couple pages at a time.

There is no theme, no message or moral. This is just stuff. Some of it is thought-provoking. Some of it is sad. Some of it is just plain odd, because it's taken out of context. Some of it isn't so funny no matter which way you look at it. But hey, that's reality. If there is any point to all this, it's that a mishmash of street detritus can be taken as a reflection of the hopes and dreams that constantly fill and empty our lives from cradle to grave.

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Funny Guy Eats Food, Gets Fat

Food: A Love Story by Jim Gaffigan
2014
Reviewed by Diane K.M.
My rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Warning: Do not read this book when you are hungry. The discussions of pizza, cheeseburgers, bacon, doughnuts, steak, and all kinds of yummy foods could break your diet.

Comedian Jim Gaffigan loves food and talks a lot about it in his standup routines, including his popular bit on Hot Pockets. This fun book talks about the different foods he likes and dislikes, and his favorite restaurants around the United States. I was tickled to note that I had eaten at a few of the places he mentioned, and filed away other recommendations for future trips. 

He has a good sense of humor about being overweight, and says he never takes food or restaurant advice from a skinny person because they aren't passionate enough about food to overdo it. He also takes issue with the dieters' claim that Nothing tastes as good as thin feels. "I for one can think of a thousand things that taste better than thin feels. Many of them are two-word phrases that end with cheese. Even unsalted French fries taste better than thin feels."

I think my favorite section in the book is when he shows a map of the U.S. and has divided it into different food sections, such as Coffeeland in the Northwest, Seabugland in the Northeast, Steakland in the Plains, Wineland in Northern California, Mexican Food land in the Southwest, Super Bowl Food land in the Midwest, etc. He reserves the distinctive name "Food Anxiety Land" for New Orleans, because the food there is so good and he whenever he visits he panics because he feels he never has enough time to eat enough of their delicious food.

I also liked that Gaffigan doesn't call himself a foodie; instead, he prefers the term "eatie."

"I don't have anything against foodies. I appreciate their love of food and I envy their knowledge and culinary escapades, but I'm generally satisfied with what I've been eating. Foodies seem to be on a never-ending search for new restaurants and interesting dishes. I don't have an insatiable desire to discover what makes something taste good or to find exotic combinations ... There is plenty of regular food I still want to enjoy."

This is an amusing and enjoyable book and I frequently laughed out loud while reading it. I recognized some parts from his standup routine, but it was still funny in print. My one criticism is that it is a bit long for a humor book — it's more than 350 pages. It was my mistake that I tried to read it straight through, when it's better to give comedy a little time to breathe, like wine. Trying to gulp a humor book down in one sitting means it will get repetitive and taste like slop. However, I would still recommend this to anyone who likes Gaffigan's humor or who also likes American food; just don't try to imbibe it all at once.

Now if you will excuse me, I need to go order some pizza.