Joke's Book Club (Oct. 2)

Dear Internet,

You may have difficulty believing this, but I have a difficult time reading fiction. It's not fiction's fault, but rather mine. You see, most fiction is riddled with weight and seriousness and earnestness and complex characters that demand to be not-judged-lightly and, more often than not, some quietly allegorical message with which I am bound to vehemently disagree. But mostly, modern fiction is really not funny.

The last real whack I had Modern Serious Fiction was The Lovely Bones. Which, as it turned out, proved to be neither. Oh, sure, I've flirted with some others -- TC Boyle springs to mind --but nothing serious. The problem with funny stuff is that it's usually not intelligently written. In the case of my favorite funny stuff (John Welter, whom you bastids steadfastly refuse to read) it's no longer being written at all. Then you have to wait years on end to read Chris Buckley next one.

Verily it doth give suck.

So, it's with with a fluttering heart that I read and (suggest likewise) With One Lousy Free Packet of Seed, by Lynne Truss. It's funny, crisply written so that every sentence is a small masterpiece, with mildly eccentric characters who are believable as the plot's absurdity unfolds slowly. The ending is a TINY bit "off" but only a teeny tiny bit.

There ya go.

-J.