Description:
A warning to readers: though Ben Stiller (Flirting with Disaster) and Janeane Garofalo (The Truth About Cats and Dogs) used to be a couple, do not confuse their advice book with Chicken Soup for the Couple's Soul. This is more of a cross between James Thurber and E.B. White's satirical Is Sex Necessary? and MTV's Beavis and Butt-Head: Chicken Soup for the Butt. The ex-couple give us alternating chapters of remarkably rambling, extravagantly ironic, showbiz-insider's philosophical musings, but they do discuss their actual relationship, just to let you know where they stand--right on your funny bone, exerting maximum pressure until you beg for mercy. After their breakup, writes Garofalo, "We agreed that in the future we would only meet for professional purposes, or if we were drunk and felt like having emotionally destructive sex." This faux tome (also read by the authors on audiocassette) is a meeting of the minds for professional purposes. But again, don't be fooled by what these wily authors say! The intriguing chapters referred to in the opening pages--"Why Can't I Sleep Around and Still Love You?"; "How to Fake an Orgasm to Show Your Love, or The Art of the Squeal"; "Negotiating with God for What You Want--and Getting It!"; "Pros and (Very Few) Cons of a Third Party in the Bedroom"--these chapters do not in fact exist! What does exist is a dog's breakfast of jokes from a pair of clowns. Read it and weep, but heed it at your peril. --Tim Appelo
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