One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories, by BJ Novak

One More Thing
BJ Novak
Knopf: New York, 2014
ISBN: 978-0385351836

I don’t read a lot of short stories, for no other reason, I suppose than it not being habit, though I do appreciate a shorter format every now and then.  When I came upon BJ Novak’s book, I knew I had to give it a crack.  This is the guy who wrote for The Office, after all!  Plus – we’re from the same hometown (badass Newton, Mass.)  Now, bear with for a moment.  Though I totally loved reading this book,  I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to having moments I did not totally love, due to Novaks occasional moments of awkward cringe and wince humor, much like on The Office.  The stories in this book are truly zeigeist works.  Novak aptly embraces and skewers a whole American generation (as well as those generations on both sides) – which perhaps causes those awkward, hard, societally introspective looks that caused me to wince in recognition. His stories entertain as he speaks truth through fiction, and he explores what seem to be generationally pervasive themes like hopefulness, dissatisfaction, selfishness, altruism, searching for self and love, the precarious balance between apathy and excitement, and the pervasive obsession with socializing through the Internet.  

Geektastic: Stories from the Nerd Herd - In which I learn that reviewing collections of short stories is a challenge and give up without trying.

Geektastic: Stories from the Nerd Herd,
edited by Holly Black and Cecil Castelluci
Little Brown and Co.: Boston, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-316-00809-9

This month my book club read Geektastic: Stories from the Nerd Herd, a collection of short stories by a variety of YA authors.  And as I am well overdue for a review, I figured it would be a good one, especially post-club meeting group-think.  But you know what?  It is not easy to review a book of short stories.  Why?  All the stories are so different!  Sure, there is a greater goal.  But it’s kind of like going into the fruit aisle in a grocery store to evaluate it and being all “Yes, I see that you have something in common. You are all fruit.” But you’re still looking at apples and oranges.  And some people like oranges better than they like apples.  So I’m doing away with formal review format for this guy and just telling you some thoughts.  I will be brief, and then more in-depth after the jump, where there may be SPOILERS.  I hate spoilers!  You have been fairly warned!  Regardless, this is a fun book, and frankly it’s a switch up in format to be able to read 15-20 pages and have everything end so you can take a break and move on to a totally different topic.   I recommend it!

Thoughts about the whole book, in bullet format because I like bullets (not the real ones): 

·      There is a wide variety of geekdom represented here.  It is a veritable spectrum, from high, convention attending geekery, to high school theatre geekery, to scholastic geekery.  I personally enjoyed the spectrum, and as one book club participant pointed out, it was important.  It acknowledges the humanity behind geekery!  While sure, there are varying levels of commitment, we are ALL geeks in our own way, whether we attend conventions in our Storm Trooper uniforms, spend a lot of time fondling comic books, or spend hours struggling to perfect the ultimate brownie recipe.  That person looking at you in the mirror?  Huge geek. 

·      This book is HEAVY in the romance department.  It was something that I didn’t realize when reading it, but once someone brought it up, it was hard to avoid it.  Most stories involve romance or crushes.  Which, perhaps, is a device to tell of an important moment in the lives of the characters, as opposed to them being geeky at whatever they are geeky at.  Because an object in motion is so much more interesting than one at rest.  Physics.  Laws of.   Boom, I just scienced you.  But there are ways other than romance that an object can be in motion, YA authors.  But I still liked it, so not a major complaint.

·      Apparently only the paperback version has a glossary, and only a short one at that.  I would have appreciated a glossary at times, and or a heads up as to what some of the stories were about.  I didn’t know Scott Westerfeld’s Dungeons and Dragons story was about D&D.  I thought it was online gaming!  In short, while I got some things, I’m admittedly not down enough with high geekery to understand all of it.  Help the non-initiated out!  You’re only as strong as your weakest reader.  I did, however, really enjoy stories where I learned about aspects of high geekery I never knew about, like Cassandra Clare’s “I Never”. 

·      In a couple of places I wasn’t sure about the gender of characters.  It turns out I wasn’t the only one, as we talked about it at book club!  It was always cleared up, but I still think a few (“Definitional Chaos” & “The Stars at the Finish Line” could have gone Sapphic with no problem, considering that's what I thought was going on until a male pronoun was used.  Food for progressive thought, YA authors!)

·      I really enjoyed the comics that separated the chapters.  They were almost all witty and well drawn!

·      It’s a little weird when the authors you expect to have some of the best stories let you down!  And let me down some did, while others went on to shine and steal the show.  Onto the possible spoiler section!