Book Review: Thank You for Smoking

I ended up finishing this book in a little under two weeks. So short book, short review. There were admittedly a number of funny points in the book, but no where near as much comedy as I thought there could have been. The plot was as you might expect: a generic mystery plot written by a political comedian. In other words, not very good.

I think there were also a number of points in the book that were supposed to be character development but didn't really add anything. I feel like you can tell a lot about a book if it contains multiple gratuitous absentee sex scenes. I.E. when two characters begin flirting or leave dinner when suddenly the chapter ends and the next starts with "I woke up to her the next morning..." or "The next day at work was awkward..." Just to make sure we're clear, I'm not asking for the detailed sex scene. But if there's no reason for two characters to have sex, then don't make them have sex just to try and attract more readers. It doesn't work (maybe I'm giving too much credit to my age/sex group there).

Kind of aside from the point, I haven't seen the movie yet and I don't even know if it's still in the theaters. I've basically heard pretty similar things about the movie though.

So again, from "blech" to "wow", I'm giving this a "meh". I promise I'll define that scale somewhere soon, I know it might not mean much to anyone as of yet.

Book I am now reading: The DaVinci Code (second time through)

Past reviews:

• Best American Sports Writing 2005