Rating: 
Summary: Dirty
Review: This might have been a fun book if it had been more decent, but it just went too far. It deserves an R rating, and I find nothing at all amusing about that. I threw it in the trash before I was half done. And I won't pick up any more of Barry's fiction unless I have reason to believe it's no worse than a PG-13.
Rating: 
Summary: And no trouble at all except to put down before you finish
Review: If the Marx brothers could have teamed up with the Keystone Cops in a 21st Century cops and robbers episode in print they might have picked Big Trouble as a nice fit. Puggy, a benign version of the modern 'street person' phenomenon, drifts to Miami to find himself at home living in a tree over the fence separating the family a wealthy low-level gangster from the world of consequences. He stumbles into a job in a run-down bar owned by two ex-Russian gunrunners dealing in stolen Soviet arms, and so begins one of the funnier dead-serious books I've read this century. A kid in a squirt-gun assassin game tangled into the activities of real-live hit-men, a man-woman Miami's finest cop team tightroping it between battles of the sexes and societal chaos all combine to make this a readable, laughable, believable book you might even put aside to read again a year from now..
Rating:
Summary: one word - Hilarious
Review: Fasten your seatbelts, cause Dave Barry is taking you for a bumpy ride through the streets of Miami! Watch out for New Jersey mobsters, FBI agents, teenagers with squirt guns, and Russians selling nuclear weapons. Oh yes, and don't run your car into that goat crossing the street, or that dog that looks like Elizabeth Dole. This is a very enjoyable and fast read.
Rating: 
Summary: Big Trouble is Big Disappointment
Review: I purchased this book with high expectations. Every column Dave Barry has ever written has cracked me up and this book was made into a movie, so it had to be funny, right? Wrong. Even when Barry tries to be funny, it's not in the plot of the story, which is complicated enough without having to search for something to laugh at. The only times where this book is mildly amusing is when he describes various things, mostly his characters. It becomes difficult to laugh at the characters' actions when they're surrounded by such things as shootings, abusive marriages, and bomb smugglings. It also doesn't help that the 'funniest' part of the book is described on the back cover. This may have been a funnier read if I had been a resident of Miami, but I'm not. I expected to laugh out loud several times throughout the course of this book. I was left looking for something more than this empty, sidewinding, time-wasting novel.
Rating: 
Summary: Floridian Satire with no crocodiles
Review: I didn't know anything about Dave Barry before I read this first novel, save for watching the file adaptations, which I thought was cute fun if a little too "in-your-face". "Cute fun" is an apt description for the book as well. It slides off the reader like candy, but leaves very little aftertaste.
Rating: 
Summary: An instant Barry classsic.
Review: This is barry, barry good. (ha ha) Not only does it have interesting character, a good plot speed, laugh out loud parts ("'Herk! Herk!' said Elizabeth Dole"), and a nice conclusion, it does all this in a way not JUST Barry fans will enjoy. At the barry least, rent it form your library. (Ok. I'll stop.)
Rating:
Summary: A charming adventure definitely worth the laugh.
Review: I was fortunate enough to find this amoungst a pile of bargain books somewhere. I read it almost a year and a half before the movie came out a few years ago. It was hilarious, I loved it! I honestly haven't seen the movie yet, but considering the previews and the talent that starred in the roles, I don't really see any way the movie could do this book justice. It's not fair for me to say that, until I see the movie, so reserve my opinion for personal until it's founded. Barry tells the tale of several people from so many different walks of life that get thrown together in a madcap adventure only imaginable by Dave Barry. The characters are realistic, charming, and funny. They reflect typical American stereotypes without bashing the people that relate to them. The setting is Miami, Florida. I've never been to Miami, but I hear it's nice. Dave does a very good job of including the setting in his adventure. The events that happin in this crazy tale are unforgettable. A goat, a dog, a mismatched pair of police officers, a homeless man, a deadbeat father, his starcrossed teenage daughter with her boyfriend, and his alienated wife, their latin maid, a grizzly biker, a worn out advertising man, two clumsy common crooks and a plethora of corporate snakes, mob thugs and government agents participate in the funniest story I have ever read. This book is definitely a keeper. I love Dave Barry and his satirical comment on society and it's bungling participants. Read the book even if you've already seen the movie. It's well worth the chuckles. Besides, laughing out loud is healthy.
Rating:
Summary: Stick to columns
Review: Big Trouble by Dave Barry Every now and again a high-caliber journalist makes the jump into book writing. When Mitch Albom wrote Tuesdays with Morrie, the whole country took notice and made it a long-time bestseller. It changed some lives. That is the power a Pulitzer-prize winning writer can wield. And then there's this book. I've been a Dave Barry fan for about six years now after being introduced to his work by my ex-wife. Like the ex-wife, Barry was better back then. This attempt to carry his socially aware commentary cum booger jokes is a cacophony of characters that are indifferent, at best. Part of the problem is that, what is whimsical in a 500-1000 word article is really hard to sustain over the course of 250-300 pages. It would seem then, that in order to avoid putting all the jokes in the actions of one character, Barry introduces many to do the work. Too many. What emerges is a psuedo-adventure book that is supposed to be funny in all its wackiness. Only problem is that too many characters lead to confusion in the simple task of trying to remember who is who. When you can't separate one character from the next, the distinction that makes each of them funny is also lost-not that there was much distinction to begin with. Furthermore, this book was written with movie rights in mind; I'm sure of it. It does not read like a book. It is full of quick, underdeveloped scene changes that might work well on the big screen, but just seem unfocused on the page. I've not seen the movie, but I'm assuming this is one of those rare occasions when the movie might actually be better than the book. I venture to say that, had this book not had Dave Barry's name on it, it would've never been published. I hear that Barry has recently finished another novel. Somebody should've stopped him. On thing is for certain, though. I'll not be reading it.
Rating:
Summary: Big Trouble is Big Tounge-in-Cheek Fun
Review: Dave Barry really catches the spirit of the struggle an ordinary guy faces when hilariously unordinary things happen. His humor is refreshing and simple. His story is unpredictable and hilarious. If you enjoy a little irony salted in your humorous analysis of social chaos, then you will probably really enjoy Dave Barry's Big Trouble. Read the book before you see the movie though! Otherwise it's just not right!
Rating:
Summary: Laugh-out-loud funny
Review: Dave Barry is already notorious for winning a Pulitzer Prize for using words such as "booger" in his syndicated column. Now comes his first novel, "Big Trouble," a tale involving a bunch of savory and unsavory characters, including (but hardly limited to) a boozing embezzler, a put-upon ad man, a pair of weapons-dealing Russians, two hit men from New Jersey, a hallucinogenic toad, and a sports-talk radio station which gives new meaning to the phrase "vast wasteland," all set against the urban shooting gallery that is Dave Barry's Miami. Anything else would be giving away the plot. "Big Trouble" is like a Dave Barry column come to raucous life, and is a definite cure from the depression resulting from reading the morning headlines. Gleefully funny, outrageously inventive and full of memorable phrases, the book is a laugh-out-loud winner.
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