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Summary: Much-needed satire of American crap
Review: Is there a funnier, more wise writer in America today? His observations on pop culture are dead-on. He says what everyone thinks but no one dares to say. And says it better than anyone.
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Summary: This book sucks
Review: I heard a radio interview with the author and thought that his quips about popular culture would be the icing on the cake of a much more substantial, humerous book. The radio interview was like a movie preview that contains all the decent parts of a bad movie. What I found on reading the book were too many conclusory "this sucks" remarks. You can get this kind of analysis on any junior high school playground.Queenan taking on Red Lobster, Kenny G, John Tesh and Cats is like shooting fish in a barrel. I wish he would try a little harder next time.
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Summary: Umm...
Review: Well, I bought his book with some high hopes (I hate Jerry Lewis as well...), and I would agree that his trashing of that Western literature juggernaut, V.C. Andrews and her classic canon, "Flowers in the Attic" is the apex of the "HA HA's" that this book will deliver, but over all, I was dissapointed. Too much, far too much complaining, and not enough "HA HA's." I need more "HA HA's," Mr. Queenan. You need more reviews of "Flowers in the Attic" and less of "Cats sucks." And I do not mean for those comments to be taken literialy; just use them as a spring board... And by the way, Red Lobster sucks.
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Summary: Funny but disappointing
Review: Joe Queenan's earlier book, "If you're talking to me. . ." was hilarious, and though his latest book contains the occasional good belly laugh, for the most part I found it disappointing. The main problem is that he spends too much time saying that things suck, but only infrequently delves into why. When he does, as in his summary of the book "Flowers in the Attic", he is a genius comic writer, but most of the time he just describes things as sucking, which gets a little old after awhile.
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Summary: A not-unbiased and not-too-witty trashing of popular cultur
Review: I love reading criticism of American popular culture. However; for the criticism to ring true it has to be unbiased and unaffected by the business interests so responsible for our tawdry culture. I was reading this book while visiting the eastern epicenter of American kitsch (I assume the western one is Las Vegas), Disney World. No where in Queenans work is there any reference to Disney's shallow and vulgar dissemination of culture -- an obvious and glaring omission. Why? The obvious answer is that the book is published by Disney's print house, Hyperion. Need I say more? Queenan trashing Disney would be like the Tomorrowland employee ansering me honestly when I asked him to show me which ladies' room the "Tomorrowland Baby" was born (and discarded) in. (By the way, the T-Land guy said he didn't know what I was talking about and nervously laughed.) Queenan's book is filled with paragraph upon paragraph of mindlessness taken out of context. I could do the same with "Red Lobster," but I won't. It takes more than that to be persuasive and enlightening. It also suffers from sloppiness. In one chapter, the author tries to demonstrate his open-mindedness by praising Sizzler and its waiters from the Ivory Coast. By the chapter's conclusion the memorable waiters have become Sierra Leonean. Save your money. This is not a volume that you will want in your library.
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Summary: Unreadable at any price
Review: All right, maybe it's just me but I bought the book and looked forward to an intelligent trashing of our popular culture. Now, I am just as uncomfortable with Barry Manilow as the next effete snob and I can also agree that the dishes prepared by a Red Lobster are only marginally related to fresh seafood. I can also agree to disagree on which of the other "icons" of pop culture are of little or no value. What bothered me about the book was the sanctimonius manner in which it was presented. Athough there surely is some room for differences of opinion, I do not understand why the he attacks his prey with such vitriol. In all fairness, I only was able to get through about two thirds of the book and found that I could just not go on. It would have been much more palatable if his attempts at humor were wittier and less in the manner of personal attacks on those involved in "culture non grata". Mr. Queenan has taken a good idea but only scratched the surface of some of the very real issues related to popular culture. This book would have had much more promise if it was less of a personal diatribe and more of a reasoned critique but then, perhaps the books appeal lies more in the author's opinions. I took this book on vacation last week along with Bill Bryson's "A Walk in the Woods". Bryson writes mainly about travel but includes a goodly amount of comment on popular culture world wide. I have read almost everything that he has written and although Bryson can certainly get "earthy" in his prose, he does it in a self effacing way which naturally brings a smile to one's face.
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Summary: It was better the first time when it was called "Bad".
Review: I liked this book better the first time, when it was called "BAD: The Dumbing of America" by Paul Fussell. The book is basically just recycled observations, even if many are dead on. Joe's just not as funny as he was when he was writing for Spy Magazine. Perhaps he got food poisoning eating at Red Lobster or listened to too many Billy Joel songs?
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Summary: An insignificant book by an insignificant writer...
Review: but side-splittingly, bowel-pinchingly funny nonetheless. Queenan's ability to skewer people --his sheer power to just _unload_-- is what drives this book. It's page after page of vitriolic commentary on Americana, and although the tone never changes (he writes like a frustrated pop culture critic...oh, wait...that's because he is one), it's still an absolute thrill. Just a laff-riut. Sure, there are times when he strikes close to home, and you feel like unloading on the author himself. ("Hey, Queenan! Hop on down from yer little East Coast throne of self-indulgence and chat with the mortals! Maybe we read pop novels because WE ENJOY THEM! How's that intellectually taxing job at TV Guide going, by the way?") But as long as you engage that third brain cell, and have the ability to laugh at yourself, then this book is a must-read. It's a real peach.
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Summary: Great premise;repetitive, mean spirited and loses steam fast
Review: Queenan starts off with a good premise by exploring American kitsch. However, in a land overflowing with material for his book, Queenan is guilty of being repetitive and mean spirited in his attacks. The 2nd half of the book meanders and loses steam rapidly. I couldn't wait to put it down. Queenan's talents lie in the short columns and bits he does on Imus. For someone who grew up in Philadelphia and North Philadelphia at that, he displays an amazing amount of snobbery and elitism. Get off your high horse, Joe! You write for People magazine, the bible of kitsch! This is an account of a writer who has significant problems dealing with his past. And finally, what is with the attack on Billy Joel; did you two get into a bar fight or did he steal your parking spot as well in the Hamptons?
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Summary: Queenan puts the "I" in irony
Review: Joe Queenan is a writer who knows how to put the "I" in irony. Red Lobster, White Trash and the Blue Lagoon is a very bad book, and one can only suppose the results are intentional. How else to explain the smug patter, the oh so self-indulgent glibness of the urban sophisticate as he plumbs the shallows of American popular culture? It is, after all, only a joke: a two hundred page gag played on the unsuspecting reader, no doubt himself an urban sophisticate. "You want a few cheap laughs," smirks the author, "about how bad really bad entertainment can be? Well, guess what, you Kronos Quartet listening, Umberto Eco reading twit -- you're holding a prime example of it in your over manicured hands right now!" Like a less italianate Dante, a slower Swift, Queenan chronicles his "odyssey" (how literate!) from a Broadway viewing of Cats to that seventh circle of schlock, Branson, Missouri, all the while brooding about the increas! ingly wretched state of his cultural soul. And there, you see, is the whole point. This isn't a book about the self-evident worthlessness of, say, Tom Clancy novels; it's about Joe Queenan. Posturing as a modern day Mencken decrying the new boobeoisie, Queenan instead dishes up a sort of cut-rate Hunter S. Thompson, navel gazing his way through the junkyard without benefit of controlled substances. Are there clever lines scattered throughout the book? Yes. Do they suffice to sustain the reader's effort (let alone expense)? No. In a world already over full with Suckiness (Queenan's pet term) RL, WT & BL only adds its widow's mite to the pile, as the author almost certainly knows. More chablis, anyone?
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