MY WIFE rarely deigns to speak here. She figures I do a swell job of making a fool out of myself without her help. However, she looked over my 15 Books post, and decided that her commentary was necessary. So, without a nyfur the rado, here is MY WIFE.
Although I have read few of MY HUSBAND's choices, they are his opinion. However, I do have to take exception with his ending remarks regarding the Adrian Mole series.
I happen to know he never finished Adrian Mole - The Cappuccino Years and didn't even begin Adrian Mole And Weapons Of Mass Destruction.
[That is a slight exaggeration. I read the first 3 or 4 pages.]
While Cappuccino Years doesn't have one snorting laughter as the original book does, the last book, Mass Destruction, is worth a fun weekend read.
[In defense of my taste, I'll note that MY WIFE enjoyed the sequel to A Christmas Story, also. It was called It Runs In The Family, and I thought it was fair, at best. If you've seen both, you now have a basis on which to judge both her criticism and mine.]
Another note worth mentioning is regarding Adrian Mole, Aged 13-And-3/4 vs. The Thunderbolt Kid by Bryson. While Suldog was a baby boomer boy, and could have written a book very similar to Bryson's (sans the grandmother with a fondness for 'nigger babies' candy) he was never a 13-and-3/4-year-old acne-inflicted British boy. But, neither was Sue Townsend, who wrote Adrian, and who manages to capture Adrian's voice to a T (and the British, I'm told, are very fond of tea.)
Speaking of the British, our first introduction to Bill Bryson came from reading his Notes From A Small Island (our edition actually published in the U.K., but subsequently re-published in the U.S. with changes to make it more comfy for we less-literate Americans.) Travel adventures are Bryson's forte. As wonderful as Thunderbolt Kid is, his entire collection of travel books are worth the read. I should know. I've been reading In A Sunburnt Country for 8 years now.
Never again, with any stuff.
Wifey
If you don't understand why we're married, after reading this, then you never will.
Soon, with... well, you know.
