Some funny thoughtful essays on our culture. I liked the forward to Huck Finn, the eponymous essay is good, the Dubai essay fine. Some of them were too cute for me. Too much trying satirism.

This rather varied collection of essays was published in 2007, and most of them feel very much of this time, full of post-9/11 thoughts about war and violence and the ways in which human fear drives human stupidity, culminating in a short, hopeful piece at the end that, I admit, kind of choked me up a bit.

Several of them aren't really essays at all, but humorous pieces, satirical and otherwise. I found those kind of a mixed bag, but most of them at the very least gave me a smile. There are also three longer, vaguely journalistic pieces in which Saunders goes to various places (Dubai, Nepal, the Mexican-American border), and several essays about literature and writing, including some examinations of particular literary works. I found those last ones particularly insightful and enjoyable, as Saunders certainly knows about good writing.

And, of course, there is the title essay, about the degradation of news media and the negative effect of that on society, which feels at once feels both dated and more depsressingly relevant than ever.

Over all, it's a bit uneven, maybe, but the best of these essays are really good, and pretty much all of them are at least interesting. As is Saunders himself, who impresses with his ability to accept that life, and people, and literature, and everything are complicated, and that the best and most honest way of thinking about it all is to just... let it be complicated, and to approach that complexity with compassion and a sense of humor. Although if you've read his fiction, probably that ability shouldn't come as much of a surprise to you, really. ( )

Despite the worst cover in book publishing and a title nearly as bad, this is an incredibly good, valuable, intelligent, loving, endearing, and vivid collection of essays . . . entirely conversational, if you were having the best conversation you ever had, puzzled and seeking and needy, thoroughly joyful and tragic, these tales from the world we actually live in are indispensable.
They are even better than Saunders' stories, and that's saying a thing. ( )

A real mixed bag of essays, not just in quality but in tone. There is straight-up satire, travel writing, praise for other authors, and a couple pieces that read like Saunders' lesser short stories. There are some gems in here - usually the longer pieces - but I am very happy that I did not buy this book. ( )

Several really good essays in this book. Something about Saunders really just clicks with me -- for example, upon reading his essay on Barthelme's "The School," I went back to my copy of B's Sixty Stories to revisit and found that it was the only story in that collection I had dog-eared. I didn't love all the essays in this book, but several really worked for me, and the letter from a dog (not precisely an essay) made me cackle when I first read it and cackle again when trying to keep a straight face while reading it aloud to my family later. ( )