This book bothered me. Probably because I could identify with Matt a little too closely. Not that my world is falling apart, but that I still share his insecurities. It's a Generation X book, this. Financial/Career insecurity and the "whatever" response. Not that Matt doesn't worry - he worries incessantly, right? - but in the end the "It's OK" mantra is something akin to "Nevermind" right? And the relationships aren't shallow, but they seem to be on the surface. Matt knows his wife has her shallow, materialistic side; but there's more to her than just that. She's still there at the end and you get the sense they'll work through it. I can't write anymore (TIME!) but the more I think about this book, the farther away I get from the discomfort of reading it, the more I like it because it's typically Gen X.

Amusing but unremarkable

weird book, would not recommend to people in my reading circle

I started reading a hard copy but it was overdue at lib, returned it, and got the audiobook from lib. I enjoyed reading it more than listening to it. The writing is clever and humorous. Something is lost when read aloud, maybe it was the 1.5X pace I listened to it that didn't help?
I'm not buying the ending, why would Lisa stay with him, when Chuck loves her? His bald spot? I don't think so. Hard to say since the story is written from one perspective only.

10 Word Review...
Walter White meets Walt Whitman at the financial crisis crossroads.

This was completely different than I expected it to be, but I enjoyed it. The story takes place over one very stressful week in the main character's life and is full of the same vivid descriptions and sharp, witty writing as Beautiful Ruins. My biggest complaint is that the wife is portrayed as a total shrew who used to be awesome, thus justifying the husband's bad behavior.

OK, so I came close to putting this book down about 2/3 in, as it gets a little too ridiculous for its own good, but I'm glad I didn't, because I would have missed this gem of a paragraph:

"So I make one phone call, and just like that, we're eating pizza at 6:30. What is this world? You tap seven abstract figures into a piece of plastic thin as a billfold, hold that plastic device to your head, use your lungs and vocal cords to indicate more abstractions, and in thirty minutes, a guy pulls up in a 2,000-pound machine made on an island on the other side of the world, fueled by viscous liquid made from the rotting corpses of dead organisms pulled from the desert on yet another side of the world and you give this man a few sheets of green paper representing the abstract wealth of your home nation, and he gives you a perfectly reasonable facsimile of one of the staples of the diet of a people from yet another faraway nation.
"And the mushrooms are fresh."

Middle-aged poet with ill-timed sense of humour attempts to drag his family out of possible homelessness after quitting his job to start a business where he dispenses financial advice through poetry... it's hilarious and heart-warming. Loved it :) It was a nice travel companion during my trip to Europe and broke up the annoyances of airplane and train commuting very nicely. The rabbit-hole that our protagonist, Matt Prior, finds himself falling into is rather strange but his follies and successes are amusing. And all because of a late night milk run to 7-11.

I bought this book and Beautiful Ruins without realizing they were by the same author. I was just really drawn to the title of this one, and the story of the other. It wasn't until I had bought them and put them next to each other on my shelf that I noticed they were both Jess Walter.

I revisited this one because I was going to read his new novel, beautiful Ruins. Maybe the first time i read this it seemed more poignant. I did not have that same feeling the second time through. In fact I only got to something like page 90 before turning off my reader and moving on the the next title. The whole premise of the first scene and the details that he brings to the fore front just don't seem important or for that matter interesting.