Ingenious

After Monday's tooth extractions I have three miserable throbbing wounds in my jaw. It hurts to breathe, let alone to bray great hearty gails of painful laughter. And for long stretches of this short collection I did nothing but laugh, laugh until I was crying, laugh until my liver hurt and my sphincter shook and my jaw felt trampled. And yet I finished it in one sitting, wiping away tears and doubled up so dramatically I actually fell off the couch.

I chuckled a few times reading Me Talk Pretty One Day; George Saunders is infinitely funnier than David Sedaris, and his book is as significant thematically as anything by Vonnegut or Kundera. I haven't laughed so hard in ages--perhaps ever.

It's fitting that my laughter was painful, that it reopened the stitches in my gums--Saunder's satirical view of late model Western capitalism is as troubling as it is hilarious. Highly recommended.