Alice Waters and Chez Panisse: The Romantic, Impractical, Often Eccentric, Ultimately Brilliant Making of a Food Revolution

Alice Waters and Chez Panisse: The Romantic, Impractical, Often Eccentric, Ultimately Brilliant Making of a Food Revolution
Average customer rating:

Interesting overview of the not-so-intentional leader of California Cuisine

Saint Alice - hagiography of a restaurateur

Life altering

Fine history of fascinating people and a wonderful place to eat

Alice Waters and the food revolution

Alice Waters and Chez Panisse: The Romantic, Impractical, Often Eccentric, Ultimately Brilliant Making of a Food Revolution
Thomas McNamee
Manufacturer: Penguin Press HC, The
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1594201153
Release Date: 2007-03-22

Amazon.com

You can't tell the story of Chez Panisse, Berkeley's famed restaurant, without relating that of its diminutive founder, proprietor, and sometime chef, Alice Waters. This is what Thomas McNamee does most handily in his Alice Waters and Chez Panisse, a chronicle that begins with the seat-of-the-pants opening night of the "counterculture" venture in 1971, and ends 35 years later with Waters's restaurant an American institution--one credited with birthing California Cuisine, a style devoted to simplicity, freshness and seasonality. The book also limns, with tasty gossip, the ever-evolving Chez Panisse family, including the cook-artisans uniquely responsible for dish creation; follows the attempts, mostly failed, to put the restaurant on sound financial footing; shows how dishes and menus get made; and of course pursues Waters as she broadens her commitment to "virtuous agriculture" by establishing ventures like The Edible Schoolyard and The Yale Sustainable Food Project.

The success of Chez Panisse--Gourmet magazine named it the best American restaurant in 2002--has everything to do with Waters, yet she remains an elusive protagonist. Sophisticated yet naive, professional and amateur, hard-driving but emotionally blurry, she invites reader interest but doesn't always satisfy it, as least as presented here. If McNamee cannot quite bring her to life, and if his tale lacks an insider's full conversance with his subject, he still engages readers in the considerable drama of people finding their way--blunderingly, with talented intent--to something new. With menus, narrated recipes, and photographs throughout, the book is vital reading for anyone interested in food, period. --Arthur Boehm

Book Description

In an authorized biography-the story of Alice Waters, Chez Panisse, and the San Francisco 1970s counterculture food revolution that invented "American cuisine"

Not so long ago it was nearly impossible to find a cappuccino or a croissant in this country, and goat cheese and mesclun lettuce were virtually unheard of. Most people had no idea what "organic" food was, and even fewer thought about "sustainable farming." But in 1971, in a corner of Berkeley, California, a young Francophile named Alice Waters opened a small counterculture restaurant for her friends called Chez Panisse and launched an entirely new way of thinking about and serving food in America. Without an ounce of business sense or financial discipline, Alice relied on the coterie of devoted friends and followers who developed around her and on her strong principles of, among other things, using only locally grown and organic ingredients at the peak of their seasons, to keep her restaurant afloat. It was a reckless, extravagant, inexperienced venture that would have failed at any other time and place, but that instead-somehow-turned into a food revolution.

Today, Alice Waters may be the most important figure in the culinary history of North America. Chez Panisse revolutionized what it means to eat out and gave birth to a new nationwide cuisine-the first in this country not associated with a single region or ethnic group, the first "American" cuisine. Gourmet's 2002 appraisal ranked Chez Panisse as the best restaurant in America, and The New York Times has called Alice "the mother of American cooking." Alice has become a public figure, revered and idolized by many. The first "foodie," she has become a famous chef, activist, advocate, and spokeswoman whose personal beliefs have become the values of an entire food movement. But her complex personal character is hardly known at all.

Thomas McNamee was selected by Alice to document her story and was given exclusive access to her and her closest friends, to the Chez Panisse archives, and to private collections and memorabilia. As the story unfolds over the decades, we learn of her many passionate loves, her marriage, her divorce, the birth of her daughter Fanny, her failures, her critics. We come to know the extraordinary cast of characters who have formed the ever-shifting Chez Panisse community-a make-shift family with complex relationships, competing interests, and a strange, almost cultish, devotion to each other and to their work.

Customer Reviews:

Interesting overview of the not-so-intentional leader of California Cuisine.......2007-10-08

Any foodie worth her sun-dried sea salt knows the name Alice Waters. Waters was the person who spearheaded the move to fresh, local produce that's grown sustainability and locally, and Chez Panisse is probably the most famous restaurant that most of us have never visited.

So I was particularly interested in Waters' story. I'm glad I read it, as I feel like I now know things that I ought to know... but I can't say that this is a Wow book. If you have the opportunity to read the book, do; but I don't think you have to drop everything to put it on the top of your Must Read pile.

Yes, Alice Waters created a revolution in the way that Americans, or at least food-conscious Americans, think about food. But she didn't set out to do so as though she was on a lifelong mission... she just wanted to open the sort of one-star Michelin restaurant that she had encountered across France. Through a set of remarkable happenstance (which makes me think simultaneously -- if oddly -- of both Forrest Gump and Connie Willis' Bellwether), Waters was always in the right place at the right time. The right person always showed up in her life, at the time needed. And -- here's a lesson far beyond foodiehood -- she repeatedly took disaster and turned it into opportunity.

For example, after she brought Italian wood fired pizza to the States (oh geez, she started *that* trend, too?), an oven started a huge fire. The restaurant had to be renovated in a hurry, so instead of recreating the small door between kitchen and dining room, she made a big open area... and began a trend towards the "open kitchen." Waters was just solving a problem, but her innovation started a trend.

This is all interesting stuff, and it's interwoven with the events of Waters' own life (such as a procession of lovers, her marriage, motherhood), as well as the strong personalities who have been associated with the restaurant (many of whom have become celebrity chefs or written cookbooks, too). Much of this is from quoted interviews. It's interesting, and the author does a good job (though not dispassionately, as it's clear that the author *likes* Waters). The result, though, is that I felt informed and educated, rather than blown away or inspired or fascinated. That is: I liked this book. I didn't adore it.

Saint Alice - hagiography of a restaurateur.......2007-09-25

McNamee's book is an excellent read, no doubt. The story flows, the characters build, the plot thickens. I've been fortunate enough to often eat at Chez Panisse, particularly in its first 5 years, and had seen more than a few of the scenes the author, or one of his correspondents, describes. Alice's determination and pursuit of the best possible ingredient have always been remarkable. She's a Taurus, isn't she!

My only quibble is the rather overly respectful view McNamee takes of her. She's more a flesh and blood person than a saint, and the author might take that into account if he continues to plumb this vein of research.

All in all a fairly well researched and well written tome. Perhaps not as evocative as the chapter on Chez Panisse in David Kamp's, United States of Arugula, but a good book to open to any page & foster a laugh, a sigh or an hurrah!

Life altering.......2007-09-06

Adored this book. It will change the whole way you look at food, from farming it to eating it. It also helped hone my palate and I am still running about buying ingrediants mentioned in it. Have bought three additional copies for friends.

Fine history of fascinating people and a wonderful place to eat.......2007-07-05

The background and history of Chez Panisse is a grand addition to the good meals I've eaten there over many years. Thanks to the author for capturing the early years with such vitality.

Alice Waters and the food revolution.......2007-06-08

This is an inspiring and clear-eyed view of the woman who is indisputably linked to the revolution in American cuisine. Before Alice Waters, thinking about organic food, local food, support for small farms, eating seasonal foods, food as essential to a return to civility, did not pervade the collective consciousness of our society. The book paints her, warts and all, breathtakingly well and Alice gets into your mind leaping off the pages to look over your shoulder as you buy and prepare dinner. Her revolution is not about food. It is about life and how to live it. It's a great read.

The Happiest Man in the World: An Account of the Life of Poppa Neutrino

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A Portrait of a Hero and Nut
The Happiest Man in the World: An Account of the Life of Poppa Neutrino
Great Book
The Freedom of Movement

The Happiest Man in the World: An Account of the Life of Poppa Neutrino
Alec Wilkinson
Manufacturer: Random House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1400065437
Release Date: 2007-03-13

Book Description

The Happiest Man in the World buoyantly describes seventy-four-year-old David Pearlman, a restless and migratory soul, a mariner, a musician, a member of the Explorers Club and a friend of the San Francisco Beats, a former preacher and sign painter, a polymath, a pauper, and a football strategist for the Red Mesa Redskins of the Navajo Nation. When Pearlman was fifty, he was bitten on the hand by a dog in Mexico and for two years got so sick that he thought he would die. When he recovered, he felt so different that he decided he needed a new name. He began calling himself Poppa Neutrino, after the itinerant particle that is so small it can hardly be detected. To Neutrino, the particle represents the elements of the hidden life that assert themselves discreetly.

Inspired by Thor Heyerdahl and Kon-Tiki, Neutrino is the only man ever to build a raft from garbage he found on the streets of New York and sail it across the North Atlantic.
The New York Daily News described the accomplishment as “the sail of the century.” National Geographic broadcast an account of the trip as part of its series on extreme adventures. And now he is on a quest to cross the Pacific on a raft. If he makes it, he plans to continue around the world. No one has ever sailed around the world on a raft. Meanwhile, he has invented the Neutrino Clock Offense, an unstoppable football play, which a former coach of the New York Jets describes as being as innovative as the forward pass.

The philosophical underpinnings of Neutrino’s existence are what he calls Triads, a concept worked out after years of reading and reflection. He believes that each person, to be truly happy, must define his or her three deepest desires and pursue them remorselessly. Freedom, Joy, and Art are Neutrino’s three.
The Happiest Man in the World is a lavish, exotic, funny, and deeply serious book about a man who has led a life of profound engagement and ceaseless adventure.

Customer Reviews:

A Portrait of a Hero and Nut.......2007-07-17

Alec Wilkinson has written for _The New Yorker_ for years, and has ideas about who makes a good subject for his prose. "I do not believe that someone is a proper subject, or a laudable figure, only if he has made a lot of money or been a politician, an actor, a freakish public figure, or a criminal," he writes in _The Happiest Man in the World: An Account of the Life of Poppa Neutrino_ (Random House). Indeed, Poppa Neutrino is none of these. He is a rafter, a football strategist, a street musician, and most of all an independent being who in his seventy-odd years has relentlessly done things his own way. This makes him a real hero, but it also makes him a nut; there is no reason the two cannot be conjoined, but his way of living his life is not one readers can expect to be completely comfortable with. "I wouldn't suggest that anyone regard Neutrino as a model," Wilkinson confesses. "It wouldn't be sensible. I don't even myself regard him entirely as one." Model or not, Neutrino is unique, and he is happy, and if you jettison materialistic standards (as Neutrino surely has) he is a success, and Wilkinson's delightful, amused, and affectionate portrait lets us in on the life of an eccentric who is as worth knowing in his way as any tycoon or president.

Neutrino's mother was an incorrigible gambler, and his father was a sailor who wasn't around. He flunked school and was thrown out of the Army because he enlisted at fifteen. He attended seminary and was thrown out, and then headed a group called the Salvation Navy, which traveled on waterways and made money by painting signs. He formed a ragtag musical group and got some money by it, but money wasn't important, just getting by was: "His poverty had exposed him again and again to the harshest torments, and yet he behaved as if no one could be as fortunate as he was to wake up with the whole day long to invent." He invented a football tactic by which a quarterback can send signals to a receiver after a play is underway, and part of the book is devoted to Neutrino's traveling to different schools to interest them in his revolutionary tactic, which seems to work but is just too different for the teams to incorporate (so far). The main arena for his invention, however, is that of rafting. "Neutrino was not the first man to build a raft and sail it across the Atlantic," writes Wilkinson. "He was the first to cross the Atlantic on a raft built from garbage." Neutrino may have spent his life as a drifter, but he did so literally, and made an adventure and an art form of it.

He also made it a spiritual quest. He created the Church of the Seven Levels, which incorporates his metaphysics based on triads. "There's only one thing in my soul," Neutrino says. "It's attack. Whether it's musical, spiritual, emotional, it's a multileveled attack. If you don't attack, you're just receiving all the blows of life." And yet paradoxically, he is on a non-offensive and introspective quest: "I am always asking myself, How can I become more involved, more passionate, and less vulnerable?" If Neutrino had taken his philosophy and energy and expended it in business, he would have been a millionaire many times over, but then he would just be one of millions of millionaires, and he would not have been the fascinating character profiled here. At the end of the book, Neutrino, elderly but hanging on after heart attacks, is still making rafts, perhaps one to go across the Pacific. Few who read this intimate and absorbing book will want to imitate his particular style of life, but there is much to admire about Neutrino's eccentricity. "I'm going out of this life as what I have worked and striven my whole life to be, a free man - free of possessions, free of greed, free of worry and strife. Free of anything superfluous."

The Happiest Man in the World: An Account of the Life of Poppa Neutrino.......2007-07-17

I question the title. There are certainly happier people than Poppa Neutrino. However, Poppa Neutrino is an interesing character for a well written book. After reading the latest books on major polical figures, it is a pleasure to read a book about someone who "marches to his own drummer" and is not at least concerned with his image. I don't think many people will like this man, but it is inspiring to read about someone who is truly an individual in the age of conformity.

That being said, by the end of the book, I find myself disappointed. I ended the book feeling sad for Poppa Neutrino, although, the author clearly admires him. I found myself feeling that Neutrino wasted much of his opportunites to leave the world a better place.

Great Book.......2007-05-12

Great reading, seemed to remind me of On The Road. Highly recommended.

The Freedom of Movement.......2007-04-05

Alec Wilkinson's book has one big thing going for it: Poppa Neutrino, aka David Pearlman. Even a hack writer couldn't ruin this story.

Wilkinson begins with a 3-pronged hook - (1) Neutrino has just created a football play that will revolutionize the game; (2) he is planning to build a raft from scraps and sail across the Pacific; and (3) he's so eccentric that he changed his name after a dog bite in Mexico.

The first part of the book, in my opinion, is the best. It's a history Poppa Neutrino from birth to age 70. Peppered throughout are his philosophical musings. We learn of his childhood in San Francisco as the son of a Gambling mother, memories of falling asleep under card tables and living on the road, joining the army at 15, fights, love affairs; other highlights include Neutrino and others starting a religion, creating a band, sailing across the Atlantic in a raft. At first, I thought I was reading the greatest put-on ever written; the book seemed to be pretending to be non-fiction, and yet had to be totally, outrageously, fabricated. There are many elements of tall-tale here, and since Neutrino is the one retelling his story, one has to believe he is stretching the truth a little. Getting his teeth punched out, and then sticking them back in his gums backwards, where they remained for 30 years, is one example. Nevertheless, fact or fiction, the history of this itinerant man, his adventures, his outlook on life, are golden. Wilkinson sticks well to the meat of the narrative; but at times he treats major events too brusquely. Some of Neutrino's adventures need more space - they are that compelling. I think an extra 100 pages to the man's history would have benefited the book.

The last 2 sections of the book settle into the present, with Neutrino a 70 year-old man recovered from several heart attacks, trying to pursue 2 more ideas/adventures. The football play ends up being merely an interesting idea, although not so revolutionary - but reading how Neutrino follows his ideas through to the end, and his time on an Indian reservation in NM with a high school team is compelling. The final 1/3 of the book is the weakest, I feel, as we spend far too many pages with Neutrino as he prepares to sail a raft across the pacific. For a book that has such punch, such an engaging pace, much of this section feels redundant and at times page-filler. The interesting parts are the adventures, not the mundane details of a man procrastinating.

Neutrino's rafts are unbelievable looking - I suggest going online to see them - as there are no pictures in the book, and they defy description.

Overall, I can't help but regaling my friends and neighbors with the details of this man's life. On another level, one has to feel that Wilkinson's book could have been at least 1/3 better. I await the documentary - Random Lunacy: Videos from the World Less Traveled.

Eccentric America, 2nd: The Bradt Travel Guide to All That's Weird and Wacky in the USA (Bradt Travel Guide)

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I thought this would have more places to see
Quirky road trips
Better then the first edition!!!
New Adventures
Great Gift!

Eccentric America, 2nd: The Bradt Travel Guide to All That's Weird and Wacky in the USA (Bradt Travel Guide)
Jan Friedman
Manufacturer: Bradt Travel Guides
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1841620904

Book Description

A guide to all things wacky, weird, curious, and bizarre in the U.S.A.

Customer Reviews:

I thought this would have more places to see.......2007-06-08

and less festivals and such. I wanted places that I could visit any time, not just at certain times of the year. It does have some interesting things in it, but not enough of what I was looking for.

Quirky road trips.......2007-05-10

This book was helpful but didn't have the "townie" attractions so to speak but we had and are having fun with it!!!

Better then the first edition!!!.......2005-04-09

I wrote this about the 1st edition : This is really a top notch book for the guys that like to get in a car and drive down the state highways - avoiding the interstates. "Eccentric" = don't be scared off buy that - this is not a book of weird stuff - just FUN stuff. This is one of those landmark travel books that comes out every now and then. The author really did the homework to get it all down in print. ==== Now all that has changed is that it is BETTER. We sell this book in our gift shop - it is the best seller. What I like about it is that the author does not make fun of her subjects like other wacky travel guides. Also the amount of details is really handy to the traveler who likes details.

New Adventures.......2004-08-07

Eccentric America leapt off the book shelf and into my hand. Many uncontrollable chuckles and a few tears of laughter later, I exited the book shop with two copies. Within five merry, laughter-filled minutes the eleven year old son of a friend said, "Thanks, Tom," took a copy, and commenced planning his family's upcoming road trip to LA. We're all going adventuring together, thank you.

Janet has created a classic guide that has loaded my life with kinky, weird and fascinating now and in-the-future destinations of interest, erstwhile she has filled my soul with laughter, laughter and more laughter.

A bit of local adventuring initiated by Janet's cook book of weird and wacky, and I was thinking, "I've got an idea or two for you, Lady." Then I visited her website. Oh my god, the adventure bug is contageous. Just can't wait for what Janet and her team comes up with next.

Great Gift!.......2004-07-31

Whether you're traveling across America or just enjoy reading about the strange festivals and peoples across the US, this book would make a great coffee table/bathroom reading book! The map to eccentricity is fantastic, showing the spread of eccentricity isn't what you would necessarily stereotype (we're not all in California!) Anyone who wants to discover unusual facts about Americans and their odd celebrations will love this book.

Average customer rating:

Prismatic
This one is a classic
Captures a Time in Life Most of Us Can Easily Relate To.
first love and nonconformity
Impossible ideals...

Stargirl (Readers Circle)
Jerry Spinelli
Manufacturer: Laurel Leaf
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Mass Market Paperback

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ASIN: 0440416779
Release Date: 2004-05-11

Amazon.com

"She was homeschooling gone amok." "She was an alien." "Her parents were circus acrobats." These are only a few of the theories concocted to explain Stargirl Caraway, a new 10th grader at Arizona's Mica Area High School who wears pioneer dresses and kimonos to school, strums a ukulele in the cafeteria, laughs when there are no jokes, and dances when there is no music. The whole school, not exactly a "hotbed of nonconformity," is stunned by her, including our 16-year-old narrator Leo Borlock: "She was elusive. She was today. She was tomorrow. She was the faintest scent of a cactus flower, the flitting shadow of an elf owl."

In time, incredulity gives way to out-and-out adoration as the student body finds itself helpless to resist Stargirl's wide-eyed charm, pure-spirited friendliness, and penchant for celebrating the achievements of others. In the ultimate high school symbol of acceptance, she is even recruited as a cheerleader. Popularity, of course, is a fragile and fleeting state, and bit by bit, Mica sours on their new idol. Why is Stargirl showing up at the funerals of strangers? Worse, why does she cheer for the opposing basketball teams? The growing hostility comes to a head when she is verbally flogged by resentful students on Leo's televised Hot Seat show in an episode that is too terrible to air. While the playful, chin-held-high Stargirl seems impervious to the shunning that ensues, Leo, who is in the throes of first love (and therefore scornfully deemed "Starboy"), is not made of such strong stuff: "I became angry. I resented having to choose. I refused to choose. I imagined my life without her and without them, and I didn't like it either way."

Jerry Spinelli, author of Newbery Medalist Maniac Magee, Newbery Honor Book Wringer, and many other excellent books for teens, elegantly and accurately captures the collective, not-always-pretty emotions of a high school microcosm in which individuality is pitted against conformity. Spinelli's Stargirl is a supernatural teen character--absolutely egoless, altruistic, in touch with life's primitive rhythms, meditative, untouched by popular culture, and supremely self-confident. It is the sensitive Leo whom readers will relate to as he grapples with who she is, who he is, who they are together as Stargirl and Starboy, and indeed, what it means to be a human being on a planet that is rich with wonders. (Ages 10 to 14) --Karin Snelson

Book Description

Stargirl. From the day she arrives at quiet Mica High in a burst of color and sound, the hallways hum with the murmur of “Stargirl, Stargirl.” She captures Leo Borlock’s heart with just one smile. She sparks a school-spirit revolution with just one cheer. The students of Mica High are enchanted. At first.

Then they turn on her. Stargirl is suddenly shunned for everything that makes her different, and Leo, panicked and desperate with love, urges her to become the very thing that can destroy her: normal. In this celebration of nonconformity, Newbery Medalist Jerry Spinelli weaves a tense, emotional tale about the perils of popularity and the thrill and inspiration of first love.

From the Hardcover edition.

Download Description

In this story about the perils of popularity, the courage of nonconformity, and the thrill of first love, an eccentric student named Stargirl changes Mica High School forever.

Customer Reviews:

Prismatic.......2007-10-03

How do I even begin?
This is one of the best books I've ever read. One of the best books ever written. I was walking through a bookstore, and I was scanning all the norm, all the cliche titles. I'm not really expecting to find anything at all. I hardly ever do. The section that is supposed to interest me I find dull and unoriginal. Its as if some people think that children my age (twelve) are machines and can be fed the same thing over and over and over and OVER.
Then I see the blue cover, stuck in between other titles. You had to have your eyes out for it. I spotted it. It was nearly hidden. I'm glad I saw. The title just sings to me.
Ooh. Stargirl.
I read the back. I read the first chapter. She's playing the ukelele, she's dancing around the cafeiteria in her long white dress, in the middle of the dull, indifferently-conformed Mica High student body, where Leo Borlock, the protagonist, is watching along with all the other kids at the tables, ogling at this girl who calls herself `Stargirl', strumming her ukelele and singing, with a rat riding happily on her shoulder.
That is enough for me. I bought it. I finished it in a night and a day.
It's not your run-o-the-mill `be yourself' story. And its not telling to just simply `be different'. Its about truly being who you want to be (or, rather, who you ARE--made up of the dreams of the person you ARE before you wake up in the morning), and also about doing good with what time we have on this earth.
And I did have a feeling that I would be heartbroken by the end. I was. But somehow that only added to the experience of this luminous story.
Its about feelings. Its about first love, about caring for others, about spontaneous acts of kindness, about a slender ray of sunshine in darkness.
Archie said it best: "When a Stargirl cries, she does not shed tears, but light."
It inspired me to think about people in general. It inspired me and surprised me. I look for little things. I find myself naturally drawn towards everything I overlooked before. I like these rare books that I can read and really remember, taking little bits of it, if only sentences, and them becoming apart of me, and carrying them around inside of me and those words echoing throughout me.
Bravo to Mr. Jerry Spinelli. This is a perfectly prismatic story.

This one is a classic.......2007-09-26

Okay, I'm going to say it. Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli is a young adult classic (maybe even a children's classic but that's really a cataloguing issue that I am ill-equipped to discuss). This designation raises the question: What makes a book (any book) a classic? For me it means a book that is timeless; something you can read years and years after it was written without the book losing its vibrancy. A classic also needs to have memorable writing and characters. It needs to speak to the reader. It needs to be a book that you enjoy more every time you read it or talk about it. Classics are the books you want to immerse yourself in: the books you wish you could live in with the characters that you wish were your friends.

I'll say it again: Stargirl is a classic.

The story starts with Leo Borlock, who moved to Mica, Arizona at the age of twelve. Around the time of his move, Leo decided to start collecting porcupine neckties--no easy task, especially in Mica. For two years, Leo's collection stood at one tie. Until his fourteenth birthday when an unknown someone presented Leo with his second tie, someone who was watching from the sidelines.

Mica's unusual events don't stop there. The story continues when Leo is a junior in high school. On the first day the name on everyone's lips is Stargirl. Formerly home-schooled, Stargirl is a sophomore like no one Leo (or any of the other Mica students) has ever met before:

"She was elusive. She was today. She was tomorrow. She was the faintest scent of a cactus flower, the flitting shadow of an elf owl. We did not know what to make of her. In our minds we tried to pin her to corkboard like a butterfly, but the pin merely went through and away she flew."

After finishing this book and recently reading Love, Stargirl (Spinelli's newly released sequel), I have my own explanation: Stargirl is magical. She represents the kind of magic more people need in their lives: to appreciate the little things, to dare to be different, to be kind to strangers. The kind of magic where you still believe things can be wondrous.

In the story, Leo soon realizes that Stargirl might be someone he could love.

Unfortunately, high school students don't always believe in (or appreciate) magic like Stargirl's. As the school moves from fascination to adoration and, finally, to disdain Leo finds himself in an impossible position: forced to choose between the girl he loves and his entire lifestyle.

Technically speaking I love everything about this book: the characters, the story, the cover art. This one has the full package. Spinelli's writing throughout the story is perfect. He captures Leo's fascination with Stargirl as well as his equivocation as he is forced to choose between Stargirl and "the crowd."

Stargirl is not a long book. The writing is cogent, sentences brief. Nonetheless, the text is rich. This book never gets old or boring. Spinelli creates a compelling, utterly new narrative here (with a charmingly memorable heroine).

Captures a Time in Life Most of Us Can Easily Relate To........2007-09-19

High school is a very trying time in any young adult's life, and if you happen to be a nonconformist, the going is twice as difficult. If you remember your teens without regret, your are part of the few who do.

Jerry Spinelli shows us a world that more than vividly captures the affections of a boy named Leo for the unusual Stargirl who's social status changes almost as often as her names. Now, I'll admit like some of the reviewers here that she was a bit over the top in her behavior, but it seems that Spinelli exaggerated her to make his point about how cruel kids can be to others who don't act as impulsively on their whims as our heroine.

I learned in my own high school years that it's okay if others don't like you for being yourself, but when someone like Leo is very close to you and expects you to change, it's a different matter entirely. If you were teased in school for associating with a "stargirl" or a "starboy," you usually gave them a nasty and unceremonious dumping. Leo held on instead, cringing all the while as he kept on crushing Stargirl's spirit by asking her to give up pieces of what attracted him to her in the first place. A rather truthful and sad social commentary about people at any stage of life.

A wonderful glimpse into Leo's psyche as his tale of first love makes him grow up and regret his poor choices with a truly unique and wonderful individual. With beautifully simple details that even the youngest reader can grasp, quirky humor, and heart-tuggingly painful moments that deal in heartbreak and peer pressure--plus a touch of mystery--I would recommend Stargirl to anyone who is grasping with this issue. The book also has a surprising and bittersweet ending that will bring a smile to your face. Age recommendation: 9 to 90!

first love and nonconformity.......2007-09-02

The years in high school are really the years in which you discover what kind of person you really want to be. It is where you are allowed to make your first big mistakes in life, in love, and hopefully learn from them. Leo, the narrator of Stargirl, meets the nonconformist Stargirl Caraway and the two, through the actions, decisions and consequences that follow, propel each other into a more adult understanding of love, community, mob mentality, acceptance, courage and sadly, the events that follow when all of those things fail. It is a touching story about how the people you meet at this time in your life and how you react to them can really shape who and what you become.

Sarah Phelan, author of Stay At Home Stay At Home

Impossible ideals..........2007-08-27

As a Christian, when I read Stargirl at the age of 16(back in 2001) I thought it was the most awesome book ever - period. Stargirl represented everything I wanted to be; carefree, beautiful, bold, and honest. I was a shy girl who acted tough and confident, but I wanted to be able to be like Stargirl prancing around the school singing happy birthday to people I didn't know, sending cards to random people, and putting daisies on my desk at school. To me Stargirl represented a fearless woman who could do what she wanted without fear of judgement. Now, as I am older I still want that, but I feel differently about how Stargirl acts.

The character of Stargirl is used to contrast against the other students of Mice High who are afraid to be themselves, but go with the flow, and critize anyone who goes against. Stargirl is the catalyst who gets people like Leo to think that maybe he should stop caring about what people think. I do agree that people need to care about what other people think so much when it causes them to judge themselves, and conform to what they percieve as "normal". The character Stargirl is used here to tell children and teenagers that true freedom is found in being who you were created to be, and not who you think you should be, or others think you should be.

As the story progresses we see that Leo is less keen on complying with Stargirl's antics when it conflicts with his reputation; such as her knack for cheering for the other team at basketball games. Later Leo looks back on things and sees how he tried to make Stargirl change, and it ended up making her miserable, and realizes he lost his first love because he kept trying to change her.

There are two things I want to note about "Stargirl". One, although Leo was wrong to try to change Stargirl, it was not a bad thing for her to change. This is because her passions were unbridled, she didn't understand restraint, and yes while she did good to break Mica High out of their shells, she also needed to come to a balance where she herself learned that some conformity is a good thing (Such as conforming to the image of God or being obedient to parents).

Two, I initially loved the idea of Stargirl erasing herself, because I use Christian meditation (focusing on Jesus) as a way to get away from the world. The book gave an impression that she was a Christian, but when I started reading the new book "Love, Stargirl" I realized Spinelli was not in the least talking about a Christian form of meditation, but rather an Eastern form of meditation. I understand this in the second book, but it is important to note that Stargirl calls her practice of erasing herself "Mind Washing", which reminds me a lot of Eastern meditation and New-Age practices that tell us to empty our minds.

I am not saying that Stargirl is a bad book, in fact it is an amazing book. It is still one of my favorites because it does illistrate how we are often expected to fit a certain mold when every person is different and has their own personality. I am just not excited about books that tell our children that non-comformity is good either, but we all have to conform on some level. I am not saying that Spinelli was telling us to live without restraint, but rather that we should enjoy life more. I agree with that, but the message gets mixed up in all the fluff and can be easily misconstrued.

*ENJOY ~Amy

Average customer rating:

Billie Letts is captivating!
Review from Texas
A departure and new direction for Billie Letts
Certainly not the best by Billie Letts
(Really 3.5 stars) Under the moon, in a week...

Shoot the Moon
Billie Letts
Manufacturer: Grand Central Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0446695068

Book Description

From one of America's best-loved storytellers-the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Where the Heart Is-comes her latest national bestseller, a tale of a small Oklahoma town and the mystery that has haunted its residents for years. In 1972, the tiny windswept town of DeClare, Oklahoma, was consumed by the terrifying disappearance of Nicky Jack Harjo. When he was no more than a baby, his pajama bottoms were found on the banks of Willow Creek. Nearly 30 years later, Nicky mysteriously returns in this intriguing and delightfully hypnotic tale, full of the authentic heartland characters that Billie Letts writes about so beautifully.

Download Description

In 1972, the town of DeClare, Oklahoma, was consumed by the terrifying murder of Gaylene Harjo and the disappearance of her baby, Nicky Jack. When the child's pajama bottoms were found on the banks of Willow Creek, everyone feared Nicky Jack was dead, although his body was never found. Nearly thirty years later, Nicky Jack mysteriously returns to DeClare. His sudden reappearance will stun the people of DeClare and stir up long-buried emotions and memories. But what Nicky Jack discovers among the people who remember the night he vanished is far more than he, or anyone, bargains for. Piece by piece emerges a story of dashed hopes, desperate love, and a shocking act with repercussions that will cry out for justice...and redemption.

Full of the authentic heartland characters that Billie Letts writes about so beautifully, SHOOT THE MOON is a hypnotic tale filled with suspense and emotional truth. It further establishes Billie Letts as an American writer to be reckoned with—an original storyteller whose words go straight to our heart.

Customer Reviews:

Billie Letts is captivating!.......2007-09-09

Billie Letts creates a wonderful story in Shoot the Moon. She holds you captive until the very end with her twists and turns in the plot. Her characters are so intriguing. I highly recommend this book.

Review from Texas.......2007-07-16

I don't know where Billie Letts gets all these characters. This is a good book and one that keeps you turning the pages. The story line was good and I love the twists and turns that keep you guessing. I gave it 4 stars because there are so many characters that it is sometimes difficult to keep up with all of them. However the main charcters are like people you know. I would recommend this for a good read.

A departure and new direction for Billie Letts.......2007-04-23

I've read several of Ms Letts' novels and have loved each and every one of them. Her characters were a tad on the eccentric side and her writing made me care about all of them.

Her newest novel, though, is somewhat different. In the first place, though it doesn't quite fall in the genre, it could easily be termed a mystery - something I wasn't prepared for when I picked up this book. In the second place, at least one, possibly two, of the characters in "Shoot the Moon" is a definite SOB - O Boy Daniels, the local sheriff; and Arthur McFadden, his half-brother and owner of the local radio station.

The plot in and of itself is nothing to write home about. Mark Albright, a Hollywood veterinarian, discovers after his parents deaths that he was adopted and manages to trace his roots back to DeClare, Oklahoma. He travels to DeClare to find out about his biological parents and winds up in the middle of a small-town drama. Turns out his mother was killed when he was a baby, and until he showed up the town thought he was dead too.

The rest of the book concerns Mark's search for himself (as Mark Albright and as Nicky Jack Harjo, the name he was born with), for his parents, and for the killer of his mother. Along the way we meet and get to know several interesting characters, on both sides of the moral fence - the aforementioned sheriff and radio station owner; Teeve Harjo, owner of the local mom-and-pop store and her pregnant daughter Ivy; and Hap Duchamp, local lawyer and Matt Donaldson, the local fire chief - the unlikeliest couple, gay or straight, that you will ever run across.

The only fault I can find with this story is that Letts didn't give full descriptions of her characters until the story was well under way. It took me a while to realize that Mark and his biological mother were Native Americans, which turns out to be central to the plot. But once that confusion was cleared up it turns out that "Shoot the Moon" is a wonderful small-town mystery by someone who, it seems, could write another one if she wanted to.

Certainly not the best by Billie Letts.......2006-10-11

While I couldn't seem to put the book down, I believe it was mainly to see if it all turned out the way I predicted. It did. I couldn't pin down the "who done it" but thought it was someone connected to O Boy. I loved "Where the Heart Is" and truly expected more from this author. The book read like a bad Lifetime movie.

(Really 3.5 stars) Under the moon, in a week..........2006-08-22

This was a great after-work, getaway book. The story line was unique and interesting to me (Veterinarian, my father; adopted, me).
Dr. Mark Albright, Hollywood Veterinarian complete with fancy car and uptight clothing, mourns the loss of his parents and soon discovers he has a 'past' that he can not remember. He was adopted at 10 months old, never being told, and he begins his search with the only piece of information he has... His original birth cert. listing Gaylene Hjaro as his birthmother.
Dr. Albright soon discovers he is really Nicky Jack Hjaro, who was thought dead at 10 mnths old after his mothers (sort of unresolved) murder 30 years before.
We meet some interesting folks along the way, but most charachters are not fully developed. The relationship between Mark (NickyJack) and Ivy, and even Ivy's mother would have been unforgettable if Mrs. Letts had dug a little deeper.
All in all.... Good plot, quick read, entertaining mini-twists.
3.5 stars. Would recommend for it's content and simpleness (every once in a while one just needs a little quirky, nonsensical romance with a twist, that may be read in a few days!), not for it's lasting ability.

Average customer rating:

Good, but where are the inventive women?
Wonderful Children's Book. Only somewhat like "Meet the Robinsons"

A Day with Wilbur Robinson

Manufacturer: Laura Geringer
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0060890983
Release Date: 2006-08-22

Book Description

Come meet the Robinsons: Young Wilbur has a robot. Uncle Art has his own flying saucer. Cousin Laszlo has an antigravity device. The butler is an octopus.

It's snowing in the east wing. And somebody left the Time Machine on, so . . . Well, perhaps you'd care to read what happens next.

From William Joyce, creator of the Emmy-winning Rolie Polie Olie as well as author and illustrator of a stack of whimsy-based entertainments for children and like-minded adults.

Customer Reviews:

Good, but where are the inventive women?.......2007-09-21

First off, my son loves this book. He's 3 1/2 and he has wanted it to be read to him before night time and nap time for the past week. That means that it's up there.
It's a neat book that looks like it takes place in the 20's. Basically, it's two boys wandering around the Robinson Estate, and they are looking for Grandpa and his false teeth. The different pages tell of encounters with different family members. I don't really think of myself as a radical, but they mainly meet male members of the family who are inventing something or doing something cool. Women are mentioned a few times. The sisters are talking on the phone and trying on their prom dress. The grandmother is helping the grandfather. The mom is helping the dad. And at the end there is a lively reading of tarzan by the mom. But I was left wanting to read about someone like a wacky aunt who just got back from Africa or some woman with a little vigor.

Wonderful Children's Book. Only somewhat like "Meet the Robinsons".......2007-05-03

I was afraid that my kids would not resonate to this book after expectations that it was the "Meet the Robinsons" book. That was not the case. My children love this book and have repeatedly asked to have it read at bedtime. There are similarities in the book to the movie, but the overall plot is quite different. The differences are quite enjoyable. It's a much simpler story, so it works better at bedtime and with a wider age range of children. The author and illustrator also created Rolie Polie Olie and the book has the same retro- cartoon style. The artwork is quite endearing. Would love to have some of the illustrations to hang on the wall.

The Call of the Weird: Travels in American Subcultures

Average customer rating:

Amazing how he does it!
It doesn't get much weirder than this: a compelling account of believers in the unbelievable
Already Done Better
Good,just not complete
Vonnegut Type Craziness - Enjoy!!!

The Call of the Weird: Travels in American Subcultures
Louis Theroux
Manufacturer: Da Capo Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0306815036

Book Description

"The king of offbeat documentaries sets off across America in search of the weird and wacky. Cool." -- Mail on Sunday (England)

No, it doesn't get much weirder than this: Thor Templar, Lord Commander of the Earth Protectorate, who claims to have killed ten aliens. Or April, the Neo-Nazi bringing up her twin daughters Lamb and Lynx (who have just formed a white-power folk group for kids called Prussian Blue), and her youngest daughter, Dresden.

For a decade now, Louis Theroux has been making programs about offbeat characters on the fringes of U.S. society. Now he revisits the people who have most intrigued him to try to discover what motivates them, and why they believe the things they believe. From his Las Vegas base (where else?), Theroux calls on these assorted dreamers, schemers, and outlaws--and in the process finds out a little about the workings of his own mind. What does it mean, after all, to be weird, or "to be yourself"? Do we choose our beliefs or do our beliefs choose us?

And is there something particularly weird about Americans?

America, prepare yourself for a hilarious look in the mirror that has already taken the rest of the English-speaking world by storm:

"Paul Theroux's son writes with just as clear an eye for character and place as his father.... And he's funny.... Theroux's final analysis of American weirdness is true and new." -- Literary Review (England)

Customer Reviews:

Amazing how he does it!.......2007-10-19

He seems to write just like he makes documentaries. With that silly, selfconscious undertone and his ability to love people who are obviously not lovable. The book reads like a train.

It doesn't get much weirder than this: a compelling account of believers in the unbelievable.......2007-07-15

Louis Theroux is an Oxford graduate and former writer for the satirical magazine "Spy" and for Michael Moore's award-winning "TV Nation," as well as a former host of the BBC series "Weird Weekends" and son of American travel writer and novelist, Paul Theroux. The Call of the Weird is his first book, and it is a superlative work of journalistic effort.

Ten years after hosting a BBC series on weird American subcultures, Theroux decided to follow up on and write a book about his interviewees.

These are people most of us would want to avoid: Thor Templar, Lord Commander of the Earth Protectorate, who claims to have killed ten aliens (of the extraterrestrial rather than undocumented Latin American variety); April Gaede, a neo-Nazi mother bringing up twin daughters Lamb and Lynx, who form the "White Power" folk group Prussian Blue; Marshall Sylver, get-rich-quick guru, life coach and indicted fraudster; Oscody, nostalgic survivor of the suicidal Heaven's Gate cult and Jerry Gruidl, self-nominated fuhrer of the violently racist Aryan Nations organization - dreamers, schemers and outlaws all.

Theroux attempts to discover what motivates people to believe outrageous things, what it means to be weird and to be oneself, and whether Americans have a peculiar propensity to believe in the unbelievable.

Theroux's subjects include UFO enthusiasts, porn stars, white supremacists, brothel prostitutes, gangsta rappers, and, strangely, Ike Turner. Theroux gravitates to them because he believes - and attempts to document - their use of weirdness to feel "alive," and that's "more important than telling the truth."

Theroux is pointedly (and poignantly) asked by one contact, "Have you ever argued with a member of the Flat Earth Society? ... it's completely futile, because fundamentally they don't care if something is true or false. To them, the measure of truth is how important it makes them feel. If telling the truth makes them feel important, then it's true. If telling the truth makes them feel ashamed and small, then it's false."

Theroux's writing is clean, clear and tight and his interviewing style is wonderfuly textured and illustrative, bringing his subjects to life, keeping local dialects and cultural or socio-economic related slang in place to vivid effect.

"Call of the Weird" is a wonderful psycho-social travel essay, a "Passport to Adventure" that allows us a peek at what's happening at the margins of civil society out between and beyond the boundaries of the inappropriate, the bizarre, the macabre and the truly grotesque.

Already Done Better.......2007-07-06

Perhaps I would have enjoyed this book more had I not read another similar, more comprehensive, and better book just a few months ago. If you like this book, or if you are considering this book, I strongly recommend you take a look at Them, by Jon Ronson in addition/instead. It's much better and covers a wider variety of extremists.

Good,just not complete.......2007-06-13

This is a fairly easy read and the subject is quite interesting so it's overall worth a look. With that said, however I was expecting a more diverse subject matter; this book misses some categories of people, let alone certain individuals. Ike Turner is weird no doubt, but what about Michael Jackson or Prince? Where's a chapter on the Goth culture, or Pagean religious people? How about the Amish? Circus people? How about the eco terrorist groups or PETA? Instead there's 3 chapters devoted to right wing nuts and certainly some bias must of come into play not to cover the left wing nuts that prefer their own brand of anarchy. Still written well for what it covers.

Vonnegut Type Craziness - Enjoy!!!.......2007-05-25

Vonnegut type craziness plus television's version of reality gives this book a chance to define what is really weird from UFO cults to gurus to drug-crazed musicians

Average customer rating:

Nobody does "eccentrics" like the Brits!!

Brewer's Rogues, Villains & Eccentrics
William Donaldson , and Willie Donaldson
Manufacturer: Cassell
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0304357286

Book Description

Presenting the Hall of Shame! Both entertaining and indiscreet, this dictionary of callous cads introduces a host of wildly colorful characters. Here are assassins and arsonists, hangmen and horse thieves, hell-raisers and highwaymen, not to mention an array of poisoners, quacks, and forgers. Meet Ronald Biggs, one of the participants of the Great Train Robby, and Julie Amiri, a thief who found being detained by policemen...very exciting. There's enough degradation, depravity, and dottiness to delight anyone. A Selection of the Readers Subscription Book Club.

Customer Reviews:

Nobody does "eccentrics" like the Brits!!.......2003-12-06

Everything you never knew that you wanted to know about the oddballs, rogues, cads, scoundrels, footpads, and other non-conformists who made the "Sceptered Isle" what it is (and was). I got this book since I really enjoyed "The Henry Root Letters" and "Root Into Europe". Our old friend the 5th Duke of Portland is well represented(see "Ballroom, construction of one underground"), as are swindlers, the Krays, women who served as men in the Army, train robbers, etc. The list truly does go on and on. If you are familiar with "Lock, Stock, & Two Smoking Barrels", Lenny McLean, who played Barry The Baptist, and Vinnie Jones, who played Big Chris are both subjects of bios here, but although I mostly seem to be citing criminals in this review, there is far, far more to this book. I highly and unreservedly recommend this! (By the way, I recently learnt "Willie" Donaldson died. His obit in the UK press was WONDERFUL. A womanizing, drunken druggie....no wonder his entries about Keith Moon and Brian Jones sound so accurate!!)

Baseball Eccentrics: The Most Entertaining, Outrageous, and Unforgettable Characters in the Game

Average customer rating:

Don't Let The Cover Fool You

Baseball Eccentrics: The Most Entertaining, Outrageous, and Unforgettable Characters in the Game
Bill Lee , and Jim Prime
Manufacturer: Triumph Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 157243953X

Book Description

Baseball Eccentrics is a celebration of the characters who have graced the game over the years, as told by one of the biggest of them all. Bill Lee also decries the scarcity of interesting personalities in today's game and examines some of the roots causes for this lack of spontaneity. His hilarious collection is a tribute to flakes past and also a call to today's players to loosen up and have some fun.

Customer Reviews:

Don't Let The Cover Fool You.......2007-04-22

I appreciate Bill Lee's sense of humor and genuine love for the game of baseball. However, I base my rating of only two stars on the fact the vast majority of the stories are found in numerous other books and have been told in similar form for years. There are few original stories if you have already read humorous anecdotes about baseball in other books. In addition, the cover of the book showing Yogi Berra smiling while reading a three dimensional comic book leads one to believe this would be a book suitable for kids to read. On the contrary, the book is laced with profanities. If this doesn't bother you, and you are not already familiar with funny baseball stories, then you probably will enjoy the book and give it a higher rating than I did.

Average customer rating:

Amusing big city satire
I give Tepper the green light....
Tepper Isn't Going Out: A Novel
A MODERN JAMES JOYCE ULYSSES FOR BLASE NEW YORKERS
I laughed alot

Tepper Isn't Going Out: A Novel
Calvin Trillin
Manufacturer: Random House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0375506764
Release Date: 2002-01-15

Amazon.com

New York City and America's car culture smash together in Calvin Trillin's Tepper Isn't Going Out, a humorous tale of the urban quest for an open parking space. When a mailing-list broker, Murray Tepper, decides to spend his days plugging meters so he can sit in his car reading newspapers and waive off suitors hopeful of gaining his spot, little does he know that his odd behavior (even by New York standards) will set off a media buzz, provide him with cult-hero status, and incur reproach from the paranoid, dour Mayor Frank Ducavelli, who focuses on curtailing Tepper's "abuse" of the parking meter system.

Granted, the plot of this novel is quite thin, but, while not leaving you in stitches, Trillin provokes many smirks and smiles with his wit. For instance, he writes of magazines titled Beautiful Spot: A Magazine of Parking and the potential of Spin: The Magazine of Salad Drying. When Tepper suggests that his friend Jack leave his car's flashers on while parked illegally, Jack responds:

And draw attention to myself? Not a chance. I always park in front of hydrants. The secret is to park smack in front of them rather than just too near them. You have to go all the way. If you're smack in front of them, the cop rolling down the street can't see that there's a hydrant there at all. You have to be brazen. That's my motto, in parking and in life: be brazen.

Trillin's book should appeal to commuters and city dwellers everywhere, and anyone else looking for a chuckle. --Michael Ferch

Book Description

Murray Tepper would say that he is an ordinary New Yorker who is simply trying to read the newspaper in peace. But he reads while sitting behind the wheel of his parked car, and his car always seems to be in a particularly desirable parking spot. Not surprisingly, he is regularly interrupted by drivers who want to know if he is going out.

Tepper isn’t going out. Why not? His explanations tend to be rather literal: the indisputable fact, for instance, that he has twenty minutes left on the meter.

Tepper’s behavior sometimes irritates the people who want his spot. (“Is that where you live? Is that car rent-controlled?”) It also irritates the mayor—Frank Ducavelli, known in tabloid headlines as Il Duce—who sees Murray Tepper as a harbinger of what His Honor always calls “the forces of disorder.”

But once New Yorkers become aware of Tepper, some of them begin to suspect that he knows something they don’t know. And an ever-increasing number of them are willing to line up for the opportunity to sit in his car with him and find out.

Tepper Isn’t Going Out is a wise and witty story of an ordinary man who, perhaps innocently, changes the world around him.

Download Description

Tepper isn't going out. Why not? His explanations tend to be rather literal: the indisputable fact, for instance, that he has twenty minutes left on the meter.

Tepper's behavior sometimes irritates the people who want his spot. ("Is that where you live? Is that car rent-controlled?") It also irritates the mayor -- Frank Ducavelli, known in tabloid headlines as Il Duce -- who sees Murray Tepper as a harbinger of what His Honor always calls "the forces of disorder."

But once New Yorkers become aware of Tepper, some of them begin to suspect that he knows something they don't know. And an ever-increasing number of them are willing to line up for the opportunity to sit in his car with him and find out.

Tepper Isn't Going Out is a wise and witty story of an ordinary man who, perhaps innocently, changes the world around him.

Customer Reviews:

Amusing big city satire.......2006-11-12

When someone knows the minutiae of parking laws, times and places, and wants to get the absolute most out of time on the meter, they are definitly from the big city and probably from New York City. To those of us that travel there, it is a confusing set of signposts that may often result in an encounter with NYC Parking Po-lice. To Murray Tepper, it is a well known, well marked (mostly) and well travelled map.

Tepper Isn't Going Out is amusing satire, laugh out loud in a few places. Great characterizations (other than Murray himself, the mayor, the pollster, and many of the people on the street) and a plot that borders on ridiculousness while still taking bits and pieces from today's newspaper headlines.

Highly recommended, would make a nice read for a long plane ride or weekend vacation.

I give Tepper the green light...........2006-09-11

Anne Rice has written great novels about immortal vampires. Tom Clancy tells tales of supper powers embroiled in global struggles shaping the political structure of the modern world. In this book, Calvin Trillin writes about a guy in his car. Please don't misinterpret this as implying any kind of road trip anything; the car doesn't actually move. This is Trillin's great `guy sitting in a parked car novel' and is a great satirical look at life in the big city.

Tepper Isn't Going Out: A Novel.......2006-08-06

Very funny, New York centric though my not appeal to the heartland.

A MODERN JAMES JOYCE ULYSSES FOR BLASE NEW YORKERS.......2006-07-13

the ever deadpan Trillin does a great if incomplete job of bringing LEopold Bloom from the Liffey to the East River. Leopold Bloom is enormously generous and concerned for others. Greater love has no man than this, to lay down his wife for his friend, let own his newspaper, etc. But Tepper won't even give another driver his rare parking space. Despite the rationalization that his random grunts administer divine wisdom for hurt souls, Tepper is really just another selfish and self-centered New YOrk slob who'd rather give you the finger than the time of day.

Still a funny if deceivingly simple story of the Gogol type.

I laughed alot.......2005-12-08

A great satire on life in a big US city. Trillin captures the frustration associated with battling life's daily problems; and the obvious incapacity of the politicians who try to make it all work. The parking thing is a clever metaphor.

I moved out long ago. A few days visit to such a place is more than enough. Give me small town America every time.

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