Rating: 
Summary: Take a chance on Tepper
Review: TEPPER ISN'T GOING OUT is a swift little novel that actually ends up saying quite a lot -- about the city of New York, about the modern idea of celebrity, about the seemingly random connections that give order to a chaotic universe. But mostly it's about parking. Tepper, the main character, is a hobbyist parker. He finds a legal spot and squats there, because he actually isn't going out. His strange habit eventually finds its way into the newspapers, turning Tepper into a kind of modern-day guru on the mountaintop. New Yorkers make the quest to his current parking spot to ask his advice on any number of subjects. Eventually, Tepper's parking gets him entangled with the mayor of New York, who is obsessed with keeping order in the city, and who is not-so-subtly modeled on pre-9/11 Rudy Giuliani. So the story gets rolling, culminating in street riots, demonstrations and a trial, but all conducted in a very quiet, very orderly manner, of course. It's a sweetly humorous book that will make anyone want to go parking, but not go out.
Rating: 
Summary: Wonderfully Amusing
Review: Tepper Isn't Going Out is a wonderfully amusing novel--a look at the eccentricities and quirks of native New Yorkers that somehow look normal after a while. Tepper is probably in late middle age and fairly successful-successful enough to afford garage parking for his car. In his younger days, he couldn't afford a space and so became obsessed with finding the best on street parking. The obsession continues, even though the need has not. Tepper still drives around in search of the perfect space and when he finds one, he utterly relishes it, staying in his car, reading the paper. Of course, this annoys other would be parkers because Tepper isn't going out. His behavior gets noticed by the New York press, other New Yorkers and the mayor. The goings on in this novel, which based on a pretty simple premise, are very amusing and witty. Trillin Really has a way with noting the absurdities of New York and its natives. Enjoy.
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Summary: Pure Delight
Review: Tepper Isn't Going Out provides a wonderful etude on story telling. There is no heavy handed moralizing or point-down-throat-shoving. There is simply a funny woll constructed plot, and some very very funny jabs of wit. You will chuckle out loud, and when you aren't chuckling, you will smile. The story end in satisfaction. Not a challenging story, but why would that ever be a bad thing? This is candy, and candy of the first order. Give it a taste. You'll come back for more.
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Summary: Tepper will keep you at home
Review: Tepper Isn't Going Out will keep you at home, reading and laughing. I've got a bookshelf full of Calvin Trillin's books and have been reading him for nearly my entire adult life. His wry observations and dead-on satire intersect with a sweetness that makes his writing better than many other humorists.Even though we live in a post-September 11th world that lionizes ex-mayor Guliani, the quirks in his personality that many New Yorkers came to know are satirized wonderfully well in this slim volume, which boasts a unique premise and funny descriptions on every page. Almost everyone I know who lives in NYC has a Calvin Trillin anecdote to share, of his wry observations at PTA meetings or his gustatory delight on display while eating some spicy food. Reading Trillin is like being in Manhattan - and that's even when he's talking about D.C. or Kansas City. Tepper is well worth the trip, and you don't even have to leave your living room.
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Summary: Parking a car in NYC has never been so entertaining
Review: Tepper, a native New Yorker in his 60's, has taken to parking his car in the evenings and on weekends in desirable spots around the city, putting his money in the meter and spending his time sitting in his car reading the paper. Cars stop by asking him if he's going out, he tells them that's he's not, usually by flicking his wrist in that "move on" sort of way. As far as he's concerned, he's parked perfectly legally and as long as there's money in the meter he has every right to occupy the parking spot. It is a curious habit he has developed and his family and friends are a little concerned. He knows all of the city's parking rules by heart. Mention any street or avenue and he can tell you what hours of which days you can park there and what hours you can't. This is a result of living in the city where alternate side of the street parking (so the streets can be cleaned) dominated large parts of his evenings as he searched for a parking spot where he could leave his car parked legally longer than just overnight. Now Tepper has a car garage and he is, apparently, having a little trouble adjusting Anyone who lives or has lived in NY (or probably any city) and knows the horrors of parking there will definitely be able to appreciate the humor of Tepper's circumstances, and this is indeed a fairly entertaining book. Much of the action (if you can call it action) takes place in Tepper's car. But the humor here is very dry and understated and unless you can appreciate that you just might get a little bored reading about Tepper's parking conquests and dilemmas. Eventually, Tepper becomes a sort of local hero and celebrity, as people begin waiting for him in front of parking spots he is known to frequent. They stand in line, taking turns sitting in the passenger's seat of his car seeking advice about their lives. Tepper is a man of simple logic - in fact, listening to Tepper talk about parking is very reminiscent of Chauncy Gardner and his "metaphors" for gardening which enlighten everyone around him in Kosinsky's "Being There." And lest you think Tepper is some NYC loon, he's not. He has a family and plenty of good friends and he owns Worlwide Lists, a business that specializes in selling lists of prospects for direct-mail ordering. Ultimately, Tepper finds himself in some legal trouble as the mayor (a stand-in for Guiliani for sure) tries to stop him from parking for sport. This of course causes him greater celebrity and now he has lawyers who want to represent him, agents who want him to write a book about his life, etc. Calvin Trillin is a longtime columnist for The New Yorker and, humorously enough, actually served as editor for an issue of "Beautiful Spot: A Magazine of Parking." This book is light and fun and entertaining and not a bad way to spend a couple of days.
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Summary: Zen and the Art of Parking
Review: The "Moby Dick" of the Parking Genre
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Summary: The Philosophy of Parking
Review: The content of Calvin Trillin's "Tepper Isn't Going Out" can be utilized as a primer for anyone with big city parking problems as it details the do's and don'ts, the wheres and the whens of parking in New York City but also how to crack the code of any big city's parking: know your neighborhood, read the signs...basically know the rules. But this isn't all that "TIGO" is. It's also a gentle, humourous observation of Life here in the USA circa 2002. Parking as metaphor: where and why we don't fit in; can't find our niche. Murray Tepper as Exestential Man trying to carve out a place for himself and his car; always staying within the boundaries, feeding the parking meters, always parking legally. This is not Kavka's Worm unaware of why he finds himself in his circumstances for Murray Tepper is all to aware of his.
Murray Tepper is a gentle man, married, part owner of a marketing list company who enjoys driving around NYC looking for legal parking places in which to stop and read his evening paper.
By doing so, he draws the ire of NYC's mayor (named appropriately Ducavelli or "Il Duce") who hates "disorder in any form."
When Tepper naturally becomes a celebrity, people drop by his car and ask for advice: relationship, business, money, etc. The manner in which Tepper replies (or more to the point doesn't reply) to these inquiries reminds me a lot of the Peter Sellars character in "Being There" as Tepper mostly smiles and agrees and allows the questioner to work through his own question until he finds the answer himself yet hilariously credits Tepper.
It's fun to note the Trillin was also involved in a one issue magazine named "Beautiful Spot: A Magazine of Parking."
Trillin is not out to write the Great American Novel here but nonetheless he's accomplished what few writers do: he's written about the everyday things and concerns of life and made them important enough so that we the readers exalt them. As DH Lawrence said: "Do away with masters, exalt the will of the people."
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Summary: Stay Right Where You Are, Tepper
Review: The man who solved America's Chicken-a-la-King Crisis is still at it, better than ever. I've read everything Trillin has published, and I'm here to tell you he writes circles around the majority of writers working today. Read, Laugh, Enjoy. There's always something.
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Summary: I wish it was longer
Review: This book is exactly what I wish Walter Kirn's 'Up In the Air' had turned out to be; the man's personal quest is about as pointless - he parks. You wouldn't think a book about parking would be funny but I enjoyed every bit of it, from the first finger flick to the last bit of beaurocratic silliness. As a non-New Yorker I couldn't empathize, all I could do was laugh.
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Summary: NYC as we loved and hated it, pre-9/11
Review: This book offers a great snapshot of pre-9/11 NYC -- i.e., before Guiliani-worship set in. Trillin (of New Yorker fame) offers a delicious portrait of NYC before the crisis hit -- the portrayal of the mayor, (non-)affectionately known as "Il Duce," is classic. Any true NYer will relish this book. Not particularly deep or challenging, but as fun to read as a book can get.
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