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Book Review - "The Happiest Days of Our Lives" by Wil Wheaton
Th3Guns1ing3r writes "
I want to preface this review with a
little explanation on how I got to this point. I don’t remember if
it was in the GGSE forum or if it was on Twitter, but a conversation
was had about following famous people on Twitter. Someone (I won’t
call him out here, but he changes his gamertag more than his
toothbrush and it always includes the letters M, O, J and O…)
mentioned that they followed Wil Wheaton on Twitter and enjoyed his
tweets.
I made some snide comment about Weaseley Crusher, and then
immediately searched for and followed @wilw. From his tweets, I eventually
made my way to Wil’s
blog. As it turns out, Wil is only 2 years younger than myself
and we have a lot of the same interests. He is also an excellent
writer. I added his blog to my Google Reader subscriptions and
entered the world of a father, husband, struggling author and fellow
geek. Wil occasionally updates his blog with excerpts from his
current project, as well as pieces from his previous books. He has
self-published a short collection of writings, titled Sunken
Treasure in non-DRM pdf format which is available for download at Lulu.com for the low,
low price of 5 bux. He has also published audio versions of two of
his books, Just a Geek and The Happiest Days of Our Lives,
available in non-DRM mp3 format from 10quicksteps.com. This
is great for me because I love to listen to audio books on my 90 mile
round trip commute everyday, but DRM usually renders them useless to
me in one way or another, so I rely on my music mp3s, talk radio and
satellite radio. So, when I found out that I could download these
and copy them to my Archos 705 with no problems, it was a no-brainer.
Truthfully, I hesitated over the “Proceed to Checkout” button
because Just a Geek tips the scales at $35, bringing the total
to $54.72, and I was a bit hesitant to spend the cost of a 360 game
on audio books :),but in the end, it was a good choice.
So now that I have you up to date…
the review.
In The Happiest Days of Our Lives,
Wil Wheaton weaves together some genuinely good narrative
storytelling centered around his childhood, his wife and children,
family pets, and working as an actor.
--I want to break in here and say that
I am glad I purchased the audio version because the version is
“super-annotated”, which is Wil's term for “unedited”. :)
Well, it isn't completely unedited, but there are conversations
between Wil and his
friend/recording-engineer/self-publishing-site-host David Lawrence
that were left in, and provide some interesting commentary about each
story.--
Listening to Wil read his stories, I
couldn’t help but think that this must be how the generation before
me felt as they listened to Jean Shepherd narrate the adventures of
Ralphie in A Christmas Story (a purposeful similarity as
admitted by the author later in the book, and he does an outstanding
job). Only these stories go beyond your childhood memories and your
current memory-making life events. They thrust you into the world of
a child/teenage actor. A world to which you couldn't possibly
relate, but somehow Wil tells it in a way that you do; completely. I
think it is because, no matter if he is telling a story that could be
plucked straight from my biography or a story about life on the
Enterprise D, he remains himself, Wil Wheaton.
If you are like me and “grew up in
the seventies and came of age in the eighties” as Wil writes, this
is a set of stories that will move you in one way or another. As you
listen, I dare you not to lose yourself in your own memories of
browsing the Star Wars figures on the toy isle in K-Mart. I dare you
to not genuinely laugh out loud when he addresses the 'damn kids
today'. I dare you to not crack a smile when he takes a trip to Cold
Stone with his kids and gets exactly what he wanted. I dare you not
to squirm a bit as he does a pretty good Dennis DeYoung impression.
And I dare you not shed a tear as he says goodbye to Felix the Bear.
--Do NOT listen to “A Requiem for
Felix the Bear” as you drive to work...or anywhere except for home,
for that matter...--
The Happiest Days of Our Lives
clocks in at just over 3 hours and 26 minutes. A bargain at $19.72,
in my opinion. Why $19.72? If you can't guess, I'll let you go to
Wil's blog and find the answer(s) for yourself. Perhaps it'll spark
your interest in his writings as well, if my ramblings here haven't
done the trick.
Now I can't wait until morning, when I
can begin listening to Just a Geek.
--Did I just imply that I am
looking forward to my morning commute? :~ --"
Posted on Monday, July 20 @ 23:01:46 EDT by firemedic41
