Sunday, August 15, 2004

Wake Up, Sir!

Detoured from Discworld for just long enough to read Jonathan Ames's very funny new novel, Wake Up, Sir!

I still like his short essays the best of all. The Extra Man was a great read, but it recycles material that comes in its most edgy and peculiar form in the nonfiction pieces. Something happens when Ames turns this into the material for a novel: it's still good, it's still funny, but it's a little less perverted and a little more sentimental. In this as in the other, the narrator is just a bit too much of a nice guy! And less of a truly demented pervert, which is what I really love about the essays. However, both novels are full of really hilarious stuff. And the narrative voice is well maintained and appealing. Well worth reading.

1 comment: