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thepoptimist's review
3.0
Gene works within the confines of a terse newspaper style pushing against the constraints of limited lines of copy. There's not much room for meandering prose and building a scene. It's just the facts ma'am. He also relies on the aside and necessary tangents that loop around the main narrative to keep up the punishing pace of information. It's just I kept getting jarred out of the flow.
He's a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist (both are included in this collection) so don't listen to my armchair criticisms. I love the ideas behind most of his stories too, whether it's a write up on Doonesbury creator Garry Trudeau, having dinner with a girl he had a crush on in elementary school or following around a wildly successful but ultimately damaged children's entertainer - the stories have got legs. I just wasn't that into them.
He's a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist (both are included in this collection) so don't listen to my armchair criticisms. I love the ideas behind most of his stories too, whether it's a write up on Doonesbury creator Garry Trudeau, having dinner with a girl he had a crush on in elementary school or following around a wildly successful but ultimately damaged children's entertainer - the stories have got legs. I just wasn't that into them.
carlettathegreat's review
4.0
Really fantastic collection of essays from Weingarten. There are a few that drag on a wee bit too long for my taste, but overwhelmingly fantastic stories.
trogdor19's review
4.0
This book is an example of great writing.
The subject matter is all over the place, but the writing is spot-on, always entertaining and sucks you in whether you have any interest in a particular topic or not. This should be a textbook on creative writing.
The subject matter is all over the place, but the writing is spot-on, always entertaining and sucks you in whether you have any interest in a particular topic or not. This should be a textbook on creative writing.
alijc's review
4.0
A smaller than usual group - only 5. Not everyone had finished the book, but everyone loved it. The writing was superb and the timing impeccable. The essays (most of them anyway) were funny, but gently so. There was no mockery, but rather compassion. Indeed, Weingarten somehow managed to find something heartfelt in the most unlikely subjects.
k8brarian's review against another edition
5.0
Can I give a book six stars?
Loved this - definitely my top book of the year so far. I laughed, I learned, I interrupted my husband to read passages aloud to him. Has he written other collections? Definitely going to make a point to read his articles from now on.
Loved this - definitely my top book of the year so far. I laughed, I learned, I interrupted my husband to read passages aloud to him. Has he written other collections? Definitely going to make a point to read his articles from now on.
bookishlibrarian's review against another edition
5.0
I first read Weingarten's heartbreaking Pulitzer-winning feature "Driven to Distraction" about parents whose children dyed from hypothermia after being mistakenly left in the car. He brings a similar compassion and empathy to the other pieces in this collection, and in most of the other pieces a wicked humor, as when he sets out to find out definitively which city deserves the designation of Armpit of America. In other notable pieces, he convinces Joshua Bell to perform as a busker in the DC subway and he profiles The Great Zucchini, a sought-after children's entertainer that hides some secrets of his own.
lijon's review
5.0
Book of essays by prize-winning Washington Post reporter. Really good writing. Highly recommended.