Book 9 - Garrison Keillor "Lake Wobegon Days"

[jazzy_dave]

Garrison Keillor "Lake Wobegon Days" (Faber & Faber)



More than a few reviewers, even the complementary ones, have called this book "rambling"--and is it ever. It has no real narrative focus from what I can tell from the 50 or so pages I could make myself read. It seems more loosely connected stories and history of fictional, Lake Wobegon, Minnesota, U.S.A, a small town not far from the twin cities. In the opening chapter, "Home" it shifts without warning from a super-omniscient to first person and back, from present to past tense and back. There seems to be a narrator, because we hear about "when grandmother died" and "in 1958 when six of us boys" and how he had "turned 16" but it just didn't gel for me. I soon lost patience with the folksy voice and boy did I hate the frequent footnotes--by the time you got through them you've completely lost the thread of the main narrative. I didn't find this funny. I not only didn't laugh out loud, I didn't crack a smile.

I could see this was literate and lyrical and got an idea why some might be charmed, but I was irritated and bored out of my mind. Humor is such a personal thing. Just not for me.

Comments

[cmcmck.livejournal.com]

'Humour is such a personal thing'

Yes! I laugh out loud at the late Spike Milligan's novels f'rexample but I know he leaves many unmoved.

[davesmusictank.livejournal.com]

Now i do enjoy Spike Milligan but this failed to make me laugh.

[splodgenoodles.livejournal.com]

IIRC, I like this one (but a long time ago). I was, however, already a fan of his audio work. What I recall was that every so often, he wandered into darker territory for which I would be emotionally unprepared.