The Pleasure Of Being ABSOLUTELY WRONG

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The staff at

the Billy Jean King Library

assured me that books

offered to the public

for donation were 

fumigated and sanitized

before being shelved

 

This book was one of them

and I pleaded total ignorance about

David Handler + Stewart Hoag

 

I had absolutely no intention 

of reading this book

but the cover image

is suitable for framing

 

For twenty cents,

the book was mine!

 

Twenty hours later,

I glanced at the first page

before giving the cover 

the axe

and...

I was proven 

absolutely wrong

 

I couldn't put 

the flucking book down

!!!

 

Ostensibly,

it is about the publishing industry

which the author

chews up into gobs of goo

and spits them out until

a few dead bodies

appear

Decadence

—in fifth gear—

is everywhere 

in this novel

and that thing 

known as

THE TRUTH

finds 101 places

to hide

Literary name-dropping

fills the pages like

umbrellas filling the sky

in that Magritte painting

 

There is highbrow hilarity

and below-the-belt

laugh-out loud

observations

 

Scott Fitzgerald

would have loved this book

after thanking the Gods

for not having to live

in the 21st Century:

 

It is impossible

to picture him

snorting lines 

of cocaine

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© Paul Oliverio ©

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