Rating: 
Summary: Clever and funny (says the art skool grad)
Review: I bought this book because I met Chip Kidd at my work and he signed a copy for me, and - well frankly, because the book desgin is so beautiful. (Yeah, yeah, i know... you can't judge a book by its cover - but being the perfect consumer that i am, something as beautiful and ineteresting as this caught my eye.)
The book tells the story of a boy going to his state college to major in "art." Eccentric art skool friends, nutty professors, and the pretentions that come in the field, are accurately portrayed. Because I graduated art skool a year ago, i find this book particularly amusing. He perfectly describes the look one recieves when you answer the "what's your major question?" with "Art!"
Thank you Chip Kidd for a wonderfully clever novel.
=)
Rating:
Summary: A Wonderful Debut!
Review: I've had a difficult time lately finding contemporary novels that interest me beyond the dust jacket. Most novels look great, sound great, but lack substance. Chip Kidd's debut is one of the rare exceptions.Kidd manages, in a relatively clean, simple narrative, to explore the depths of the human need to create. He does so with wit, vigor, and insight. I literally could not put the novel down once I started it last night (and I really could have used those extra hours of sleep--but the novel was too engrossing). I have one question though: Does anyone know why Chip Kidd thanks The Berkshire Mall (of all places)? Overall, a brilliant work of contemporary fiction. Buy it and enjoy.
Rating: 
Summary: This book is good.
Review: Chip Kidd, graphic designer of book jackets and what not has finally decided to write a book of his own. The book is about a dude going to college in the 1950s and dealing with a zany, ecclectic teacher that is self assured and downright perterbed with society. He wants things to be more imaginative and sincerely challenges his students to make the best out of his class: Graphic Design. It's a book about taking what you have and making something out of it. it's about taking your life and doing something important and leaving behind a legacy that, even if nobody witnesses it, you will be able to feel pride in your own undertakings.
There is some egotistic undertones of college savants, but that adds to the enjoyment. Take this book with a grain of salt because it's not quite salient enough alone, that is unless you view it as a piece of art. I think Kidd does. He has made a product with inconsistancies and imperfections. This is part of the identity of art--not everything that serves a purpose is perfect. It's about locating our imperfections and accentuating them, perhaps.
Rating:
Summary: A tempered response
Review: It's something of a shame that the word "monkey" has become so painfully overused. Where people who think they're being 'surreal' say "fish", people who think they're being 'wacky' say "monkey". Perhaps Chip Kidd gets a small part around this by eschewing words for pictures on the front cover of his novel. The Cheese Monkeys is part autobiography, part post-teen fantasy, part intense lecture on the importance of good graphic design. Kidd made his name (and makes his living) designing book jackets for Alfred A. Knopf (the company, rather than the man), and is oft credited with causing some sort of revolution in American book covers. Although probably not on the scale of the French or Industrial revolution, his work has meant that the US is climbing out of its horrible hole of poor book design. When turning to writing, he wasn't going to avoid the subject, or indeed avoid implementing it. Not only does the cover not support the title, but writing appears on the edge opposite the spine. The openy-page-turny side. A feat I've not seen since I drew zig-zaggy patterns with a red pen across my mum's childhood copy of The Treasure Hunters. Spread the pages in one direction and you see one phrase, bend the book the other way to see a second. It's a gimmick, but dammit, it's a cool one. Layout inside is thoughtful and interesting. The traditional form of the copyright and publication bumph is played with, dragged over pages, printed backwards, etc. Thankfully the main text of the book itself is left well alone, although printed with an inch margin on all for sides. But of course this is just pretties. It also has a fine story. The autobiographical tone of a young man studying art at State University is confused by its being set in 1958, eight years before Kidd was born. Why this is doesn't appear appreciable at first, until you meet the first potentially unlikely event, and he begins to play with a reader's assumed trust of the biographical tone. The central protagonist meets the most perfectly captured literary form of that type of girl everyone has met at one point - and been bewildered by, male or female. She's dangerous, inspired and far too clever for the world she's trapped in, creating a disciple of the narrator, while of course having an inevitable, unreachable boyfriend. But more of the story is devoted to one particular lecturer, Winter Sorbeck, a hideous and brilliant man, spiteful and passionate, cruel and inspiring. He teaches "Introduction to Graphic Design", and as such the book forms its own circle, utterly vicious. A positive quote printed in the book (it carries negative reviews as well) says "cliche free". This is both completely true, and entirely wrong. Kidd never uses a single cliche, be they descriptive or narrative. But he invents about three hundred phrases that damn well should be. The ceaselessly inventive prose is never obvious, and really does become complete apparent until you read anything else at all, at which point you'll begin to spot the hackneyed phrases that infest all our language.
Rating:
Summary: The worm forgives the plow.
Review: Have you ever had a teacher so obnoxious, so hateful,and such a jerk that you will never forget him\her?, much less forgive for putting you through such hell? Now, do you remember anything from the class? If your like me, you do; now you know why that teacher was so crass. Not everyone likes the technique but darn-it it works. This book highlights an experience with such a teacher. It is told from the perspective of a student who gleens the meaning of his instructors tirades while still taking the class. Unlike me who just recently figured why a teacher would browbeat students with nearly impossible problems and unreachable expectations. This seems to be on alot of design lists, and rightfully so. Don't be fooled though, this is for anyone who was pushed to a higher level of understanding by someone who was a jerk. You are the worm, life is the plow.
Rating:
Summary: Hilarious yet completely twisted
Review: I picked this up in search of a book for a presentation...I'm the person who looks at the book jacket and says 'oh this is interesting'... so as a coincidence I ended up reading this delightfully funny book. I found myself laughing out loud numerous times throughout the novel. Although sometimes a bit confusing, the characters have a nice mix and compatibility to one another. I could "see" and picture the characters just from the personality details. Toward the end of the novel, the plot took a mysterious twist and the mood (of the book AND of me i found) changed. All in all, this novel was definetely worth my time and reminded me how much I loved reading. Highly recommended...
Rating: 
Summary: First reactions
Review: The copy of Cheese Monkeys that I read belongs to my aunt. She is a graphic designer, and teaches at a college. She is a lovely person. Okay: Parts of this book made me laugh, particularly the beginning, where the main character meets Mills, or Hills, or whatever her name is. It's a bit cynical in its description of school and art classes, but very funny. The people you meet are quirky, but seem to fit in the "normal" scale of personalities. Then, from when the main character first meets the graphic design professor Winter, things seem to get increasingly warped. The man is an amazing, sadistic kind of genius; your best and worst dream of a teacher. His assignments are so horrible they're hilarious, and you want to cringe at what the students reply with. His design commandments are interesting... I am completely ignorant of graphic design, so I have no idea if the ideas are sound, but they sound as sure as rock. Finally, towards the end of the book, things become surreal. Relationships break down. Characters behave confusingly, and you have to puzzle out what is going on... "was what is happening now somehow hinted at earlier on? why is person x acting like this? what is going on?" There's a last assignment that drives the students to fatigue and insanity and dismemberment, echoing oddly with the protagonist's earlier opinion of van gogh and _ART_. In the end, everything collapses. I was so unsatisfied when I finished Cheese Monkeys that I immediately hunted down my aunt, and asked her to explain the book to me... And still didn't really get it. Granted, I did read the whole thing in one gulp, so I might have missed some key part, some detail that would make the whole thing come together, but I'm still wondering: Did the author write the book that way on purpose??? What is he trying to say, that college will break you down??? That to create great design you have to be a maniac? Is this book a kind of biography of Chip Kidd, or what??? Was the main character (Happy, forget the real name) sexually attracted to the teacher, or was it some kind of weird disciple-worship thing?? What exactly did he do with the Polaroid camera??? Did that chick die? Good things about Cheese Monkeys:
->Writing. It kept me hooked all the time. ->Style. Both the beautiful cover, the font, everything. And writing-style, too. -> Plot. Even if it confused the hell out of me, it never got boring. ->It was a thought-provoking book. Am I not still thinking about it? ->Characters. I definitely did care about them... Felt sorry for some students, hated Himillsey what's-her-name, and wanted to know more about the GD teacher. I don't know whether to recommend this book or not. Read it at the library, maybe, then you decide.
Rating:
Summary: Good is Dead and I'll tell you why.
Review: After reading the book Cheese Monkeys, I needed to find meaning for the statement Good is Dead. Being a graphic design student myself and about to graduate soon, I needed to understand why this statement had an impact on me, and many students like myself. I met the author at the 2004 Miami Book Fair, and as he was signing my book (why not?) I said to him... "So why is Good Dead?" and he looked at me and smiled, and proceeded to write in my book... Chip Kidd says, why be a good designer, when you can be great? That is what it means. Why should "good" be the ultimate goal of designers... when GREAT is so much more?
Rating:
Summary: Fun and Reckless
Review: This book falls into the category of "I feel bad for people that can't enjoy this book." I picked it up as a recommendation from someone and I'm so glad I did. It's fun, witty, reckless, decadent, and makes you look at the world more creatively. I had several laugh-out-loud moments reading this book. Since I was a theater major in college (now a computer programmer), the concept of a teacher that was both crazy, sadistic, and pushed you past your limits in ways you could not have imagined really struck a cord with me. Put all these reviews aside, read the book, and have a good time.
Rating: 
Summary: Kidd tries too hard, or perhaps, not hard enough.
Review: Like most other readers of this novel, I was immediately drawn in by Kidd's skillful metaphor, colorful wit, and quirky character development. The first 200 pages or so are absolute *gold*, but thereafter it seems almost as if the became bored with what he was writing and took it in a completely different direction (a transition much akin to switching from drive to reverse in a car while it's still in forward motion.)
Toward the end of the novel, Kidd cops out with a lack-luster, anti-climatic ending, and leaves the reader feeling confused (what exactly happened to the oh-so-promising beginning?) and rather disgusted.
Chip, I'll read another one of your novels when you have the patience to *apply* your skill (and you do have immense skill), rather than trying to make a statement by squandering it in flashy unconventionalism and cheap thrills.
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