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4.16 AVERAGE
4.16 AVERAGE
emotional
funny
lighthearted
medium-paced
funny
reflective
medium-paced
funny
informative
lighthearted
reflective
medium-paced
Really fun to hear this in the authors own voice. Hodgemans version of humor mixed with life advice and funny stories is charming. It grows on you. Or maybe the beginning of the book is less funny than the middle and end.
Back in the Jon Stewart era of "The Daily Show," back when I had cable and would regularly watch it, I always loved when John Hodgman popped in. His nerdy, slightly awkward, bone dry humor worked for me in a way that I found irresistible.
Later, when I worked in a few different book stores, Hodgman rwrote some books that were essentially goofy OCD collections of comedic facts and tidbits and charts. I always enjoyed thumbing through them, but I was never felt compelled to read them cover to cover. I treated them more like those collections of Onion articles.
Recently, I read Adrienne Miller's "In the Land of Men," a book that focuses on her (gross) relationship with David Foster Wallace and her experience working in the hyper-masculine, toxic publishing industry. Unexpectedly, she name dropped John Hodgman and had nothing but kind things to say about him. This lead to my discovery that he had published two books that were more narratives than quirky collections of factoids and articles, and I was excited to read one.
If you're like me and enjoy Hodgman's general voice, you will undoubtedly have a good time with this book, as I did. Hodgmnan's persona - nerdy, weirdly obsessed with trivial things, and always feeling a little bit like an outsider - is exactly the kind of person I'd love to be friends with. I feel like I'm an pretty much the ideal reader for Hodgman's writing. But unfortunately, I can't say that I completely loved Medallion Status.
Hodgman self-identifies as writing "privilege comedy," and even with all of his self-awareness and self-criticism, can't help but feel a little out of place at this moment in history. This is mostly a book about Hodgman both wanting to feel special and privileged, all the while kind of feeling bad about it and realizing that his feelings of semi-famous rich entitlement are gross.
The first half of the book mostly just had me wishing that Hodgman would give novel writing a chance. There are the core building blocks of a pretty great fall-from-fame existential crisis type story here, along the lines of something like "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood," but with fewer feet. It could have worked well as a narrative about being re-evaluating your place in the universe as you age, and I imagine that's kind of what he was going for, but his life stories are mostly not all that interesting, and there needed to be some stronger connective tissue between the vignettes, even if that connective tissue is the exaggerated drama of a work of fiction. I know he tried with the "secret rooms" idea, and it kind of worked, but it also lead to some of the lower points of the book, like him going back to his college and hanging out with frat kids. A scene like that could have been the climax of a novel - the moment when a grown man discovers that his desire to feel special and included and elevated above the masses is actually pretty sad and pathetic - but it doesn't go that way in this book. In this book, it's just another mildly amusing story.
Luckily, the second half of this book improves significantly. The stories land with more punch, Hodgman spends less time name dropping famous people he knows and being sad about no longer being invited to Hollywood parties, and there are just some nice moments that feel a little more personal and intimate and true. If Vacationland is closer to the second half of this book than the first, I'd love to read it.
Later, when I worked in a few different book stores, Hodgman rwrote some books that were essentially goofy OCD collections of comedic facts and tidbits and charts. I always enjoyed thumbing through them, but I was never felt compelled to read them cover to cover. I treated them more like those collections of Onion articles.
Recently, I read Adrienne Miller's "In the Land of Men," a book that focuses on her (gross) relationship with David Foster Wallace and her experience working in the hyper-masculine, toxic publishing industry. Unexpectedly, she name dropped John Hodgman and had nothing but kind things to say about him. This lead to my discovery that he had published two books that were more narratives than quirky collections of factoids and articles, and I was excited to read one.
If you're like me and enjoy Hodgman's general voice, you will undoubtedly have a good time with this book, as I did. Hodgmnan's persona - nerdy, weirdly obsessed with trivial things, and always feeling a little bit like an outsider - is exactly the kind of person I'd love to be friends with. I feel like I'm an pretty much the ideal reader for Hodgman's writing. But unfortunately, I can't say that I completely loved Medallion Status.
Hodgman self-identifies as writing "privilege comedy," and even with all of his self-awareness and self-criticism, can't help but feel a little out of place at this moment in history. This is mostly a book about Hodgman both wanting to feel special and privileged, all the while kind of feeling bad about it and realizing that his feelings of semi-famous rich entitlement are gross.
The first half of the book mostly just had me wishing that Hodgman would give novel writing a chance. There are the core building blocks of a pretty great fall-from-fame existential crisis type story here, along the lines of something like "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood," but with fewer feet. It could have worked well as a narrative about being re-evaluating your place in the universe as you age, and I imagine that's kind of what he was going for, but his life stories are mostly not all that interesting, and there needed to be some stronger connective tissue between the vignettes, even if that connective tissue is the exaggerated drama of a work of fiction. I know he tried with the "secret rooms" idea, and it kind of worked, but it also lead to some of the lower points of the book, like him going back to his college and hanging out with frat kids. A scene like that could have been the climax of a novel - the moment when a grown man discovers that his desire to feel special and included and elevated above the masses is actually pretty sad and pathetic - but it doesn't go that way in this book. In this book, it's just another mildly amusing story.
Luckily, the second half of this book improves significantly. The stories land with more punch, Hodgman spends less time name dropping famous people he knows and being sad about no longer being invited to Hollywood parties, and there are just some nice moments that feel a little more personal and intimate and true. If Vacationland is closer to the second half of this book than the first, I'd love to read it.
Smooth like butter to read. Some nice insight here and some truly funny bits.
"Your mustache is tight," she said. "It reminds me of my dad's mustache."
"Good night," I said.
My favorite stories were the ones about the Hotel and A Stranger Comes to Town, which reminds me why I liked Vacationland so much and maybe explains why this one fell a little flat.
"Your mustache is tight," she said. "It reminds me of my dad's mustache."
"Good night," I said.
My favorite stories were the ones about the Hotel and A Stranger Comes to Town, which reminds me why I liked Vacationland so much and maybe explains why this one fell a little flat.
I adore Hodgman's Fake-Fact books but never got around to Vacationland. I found this in a free book box and gave it a spin. In the beginning he alludes to Vacationland spilling from him like thread at a spinner's wheel while this one was a little more forced and sadly it feels that way. Some essay's are good and quite funny while others feel like padding. No real analysis or laughs or anything just things he did or so in his travels as a C-list celebrity to the NPR set. Still a breezy read and hard not to recommend.
funny
hopeful
reflective
medium-paced
The problem with successful humorists who get famous for their books about their lives is that they often stop living such colorful lives once they get famous, and once they've mined their pasts, they run out of the most unusual and interesting material. Not John Hodgman, who acknowledges himself as only minorly famous, then writes anecdotes about hungering after more fame, standing on the edges looking at the next tiers up, and getting invited to the kinds of C-list experiences available to a C-list celebrity.
This book is endlessly self-effacing and wryly honest about the pains of working in TV and worrying about getting shut out of TV, and the pains of being the kind of affirmation-hungry person who lusts after high-level status, even if they can only get it by paying for first-class flights and watching the mileage rack up. Hodgman doesn't seem to be chasing fall-over-laughing hilarity here, just the dry humor of getting warm fuzzies out of airline workers calling him by name and letting him in on the members-only lounges where there's sometimes interesting food. It can be a little nerve-wracking being inside his skin for so long when he's so tense about the chance at minor privileges, but this certainly feels like an intimate and honest book, and stories about him obsessing over how to get into a Hollywood party at his hotel, or about how he likes to make breakfast sandwiches at a local Maine diner for fun, really let people in on his personal life.
Just one quibble with this book: There's a story about how he goes back to his alma mater and is invited into the secret haven of a secret society, where he shares his wisdom with them: Say yes to everything you're offered that won't hurt you, it could be an opportunity that leads elsewhere. Then he promptly says no to every form of entertainment they suggest, including lying to them when they ask a getting-to-know-you question, and not even finding out the rules to the party game they bring up. Where's that spirit of adventure you'd just finished instilling in them, John? I want to know the rules to "Fantasy," whatever that is!
This book is endlessly self-effacing and wryly honest about the pains of working in TV and worrying about getting shut out of TV, and the pains of being the kind of affirmation-hungry person who lusts after high-level status, even if they can only get it by paying for first-class flights and watching the mileage rack up. Hodgman doesn't seem to be chasing fall-over-laughing hilarity here, just the dry humor of getting warm fuzzies out of airline workers calling him by name and letting him in on the members-only lounges where there's sometimes interesting food. It can be a little nerve-wracking being inside his skin for so long when he's so tense about the chance at minor privileges, but this certainly feels like an intimate and honest book, and stories about him obsessing over how to get into a Hollywood party at his hotel, or about how he likes to make breakfast sandwiches at a local Maine diner for fun, really let people in on his personal life.
Just one quibble with this book: There's a story about how he goes back to his alma mater and is invited into the secret haven of a secret society, where he shares his wisdom with them: Say yes to everything you're offered that won't hurt you, it could be an opportunity that leads elsewhere. Then he promptly says no to every form of entertainment they suggest, including lying to them when they ask a getting-to-know-you question, and not even finding out the rules to the party game they bring up. Where's that spirit of adventure you'd just finished instilling in them, John? I want to know the rules to "Fantasy," whatever that is!
When the Property Brothers manage to greenlight Property Only Child, I hope they'll stretch the definition of "young childless couple" so that Hodgman can be my very special boy.
If you haven't read this book I promise you that's 100% not as creepy as it sounds.
If you haven't read this book I promise you that's 100% not as creepy as it sounds.