Danny Wallace
Micro-nation
founder, comedian and author of Friends Like These Danny Wallace is the British equivalent of AJ Jacobs (or perhaps vice versa?). He’s happiest when he’s on a quest, a self-created adventure to achieve something. Wallace comes up with a set of self-created rules, then strives to follow …
Danny Wallace
The rise of social media makes the idea of losing track of friends seem a bit quaint. But even if you are “friends” with some of your former classmates, co-workers or other pals on Facebook or Twitter, its not the same thing as seeing them in the flesh …
Berkeley Breathed
Breathed’s first collection of Bloom County strips in 26 years is a bittersweet and rather odd collection. While fans are delighted he is back, the topic matter that lured Breathed back is unfortunate. Bloom County suddenly burst back into life in the summer of 2015. Almost immediately, Breathed …
Jen Lancaster
Lancaster’s switch from snarkily funny autobiography (Bitter is the New Black, I Regret Nothing) to fiction has been highly successful and incredibly satisfying. Admittedly, her inspiration comes from the same well – nasty women in the burbs getting life lessons in a hilarious, if sympathetic, way.
By …
Penn Jillette
Yes, that Penn, of Penn and Teller. One has a first name, one has a last and together they’re magical. *ba-doom-ching*
Jillette, a man prolific in many things – writing, magic, acting, opinions – was also quite prolific in the weight area. After a nasty health scare, he …
Michael Perry
Seed catalogs are responsible for more unfulfilled fantasies than Enron and Penthouse combined.
Perry’s Truck is a love song to his vintage truck, but also to so many other parts of his life – gardening, his neighbors, fellow fire fighters, family, seed catalogs, The Joynt bar, his fledgling …
Marian Keyes
While I have loved all of Keyes’ books, The Woman Who Stole My Life feels closer to her original titles (Watermelon, Last Chance Saloon). Less of a tear-jerker than than previous few (The Mystery of Mercy Close), there is still plenty of Keyes’ …
Graeme Simsion
This sweet, funny story follows professor of genetics Don Tillman as he tries to find the perfect wife. It soon becomes clear that Don has Asperger’s Syndrome. That is, it is clear to everyone but Don. Deciding a large questionnaire is needed to weed out unacceptable applicants, Don …
Thomas Thwaites
Could you build a toaster? “Sure,” you say. “I’d just get a kit on amazon.” No, from scratch? “Well yes, I could get all the parts online, probably Ebay, and cobble one together.” No, from real scratch. Mining the ore and refining it. Forming each delicate piece. Creating …
Michael Perry
On Christmas Eve itself bachelor Harley Jackson stepped into his barn and behold there illuminated in straw a smallish newborn bull calf upon whose flank was born the very image of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
‘Well,” said Harley, “that’s trouble.”
And thus begins The Bard o’ …
Thomas Thwaites
Who hasn’t looked at their pet and thought “Damn pal, you have it good. Food, toys, naps and not a care in the world.” Inspired by similar ruminations while dog-sitting Noggin the dog, eater of horrid things, Thwaites decided to write an arts grant application to give being …
Ross Petras and Kathryn Petras
The Petras siblings have done it again. Wretched Writing is a neatly categorized compendium of the most cringe and laugh-inducing writing. The vulgarians aren’t just beating down the gates. They’re inside, comfortably ensconced and pounding out one atrocity after another. No wretched writer escapes the …
Zac Bissonnette
Selected wisdom from murderers, stock swindlers, and Lance Armstrong
Here are some of the sounds you will likely make while reading this book: Pppft! WHA? Unnnggh! Ha! ….ohhhhhhh. Bissonnette has hand-picked some of the most delightfully un-selfaware bits of advice for some really lousy people. Bernie Madoff’s investment …
Edmund Crispin
Crispin is one of those golden-era British mystery authors that is too little known today. His Oxford don, Gervase Fen, is funny, snarky, whitty, absent-minded and brilliant. Whirling from one unlikely event to another, finding clues (and only clues) in the oddest places, Fen and associates solve crimes …
Jonas Jonasson
Jonas Jonasson is the Scandinavian Carl Hiaasen, retelling a 20th-century Thousand and One Nights.
Not enough of a description? Huh.
Like Hiaasen (and his Florida-insane cohorts Tim Dorsey and Dave Barry), Jonasson starts with the every-man anti-hero who gets sucked into an increasingly unbelievable series of events. …
Michael Palin
The second installment of the diaries of actor and writer Michael Palin is an excellent continuation of Diaries 1969-1979: The Python Years. Palin continues to chronicle both the successes and failures of himself and his Python cohort, but also his own family’s growth, his wonderful spunky mother …
