The Lynne Truss Treasury

Mixed bag, but not all that funny:
As a word nerd, I bought Ms. Truss's book Eats Shoots & Leaves, her satirical take on punctuation, but admit I have not read it yet. I saw her Treasury on the display shelf of the library and checked it out, expecting some very clever writing. Maybe it's just that I'm not British, but I didn't find her fiction all that funny or even well-written. In the first story, she seems to try too hard. In all of the fiction, she seems almost self-conscious of the literary devices she's using. Her writing seems to scream, "Look at me -- I'm a writer writing about writers who write! And look at all the clever devices I use!" The columns were a little less over-the-top, but by then I had wearied of her and just wanted to get through the (very hefty) book. Oh, and finally, I don't think the differences between British and American punctuation are so great that comma splices and such are acceptable in Britain. The book wasn't even that well punctuated! Maybe I should have given her only two stars, but the poor dear seemed to be trying so hard I didn't have the heart. If you still think you'd like to read this book, check it out of the library.

The Lynn Truss Treasury:
After reading EATS SHOOTS and LEAVES, I was anxious to read these three comic novels by Lynn Truss. She goes from being hilariously funny to going on and on like someone detached from reality. With only the first of these "comic novels" to pass judgment upon, I would be sure that this author is schizophrenic; or, at least schizoid. I'm disappointed in Ms. Truss and would not recommend this "Treasury" to anyone. Eats Shoots and Leaves is a classic which any and all "wordsmiths" appreciate.

Funny!:
Lynne Truss is a very intelligent, hysterically funny writer. Expect loads of amusing sarcasm and many many laughs reading the columns and short novels in this book.

The Cat's Meow:
I ordered this not knowing what to expect, and was delighted. The stories are mildly weird, well-written and certainly intriguing.

A Mixed Bag:
Lynne Truss made her name in the United States with the grammar bestseller "Eats, Shoots and Leaves", a laugh-out-loud romp through the grammar mistakes that plague the English language. Yet she was well-known in her native England before that for her domestic columns about single life (and cats. Her columns and three short comic novels are collected together in "The Lynne Truss Treasury", which when all is said and done, is a mixed bag of humor, incredulity, and possibly discomfort. The collection begins with 'With One Lousy Free Packet of Seed', the story of a gardening magazine that is about to meet its maker and its staff who doesn't know that the end is coming. When the wide cast of zany characters slowly learn that the magazine is in jeopardy, they do everything they can to stop the buyer from destroying their livelihood, with increasingly bizarre coincidences and events. The novel begins alright and is often times exceedingly funny, but as it progresses and everyone seems to become more deluded by the minute, the ending arrives too quickly and is too much of a summary for all the buildup Truss had mounted. The second novel, 'Tennyson's Gift', involves a wide array of characters both fictional and actual. Truss centers her story around the eccentric poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson, and his time lived in relative obscurity on the Isle of Wight. Tennyson is fearful that his wife and sons will become mad and is forever oblivious to the attempts of those nearest to him to protect him from disruptions. Throw into the mix the author who would become Lewis Carrol, an American phrenologist and his young daughter, and a poor painter forever looking for a sponsor while ignoring his young virginal stage actress wife, and the plot has several storylines to follow. Yet Truss manages to wrap them all up in clever and humorous ways, making 'Tennyson's Gift' the highlight of the collection. The last novel in the collection is 'Going Loco', an appropriately named book for a story that seems to be going nowhere and everywhere at once. Belinda Johansson is a writer of young adult "horsey" books who longs for a life of academic quiet so that she can pursue and write her master work on literary doubles a la "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde". When she acquires Linda, a new cleaning lady from a close friend, she seems heaven sent, quickly managing the parts of Belinda's life that Belinda has no time or temperment for, leaving Belinda to research and write to her heart's content. But Belinda is oblivious to the fact that her husband is living a lie, and can't see the similarities between her research and the life she has all but stopped living. 'Going Loco' is an almost ludicrous concoction of fluff disguised as a comic novel. While it does have its moments, overall it is bizarre and even a little disturbing. The collection is finished out by a variety of columns on different topics, ranging from Christmas, to cats, to movies, to single life, a little bit of everything that Truss can wrap her thoughts around. For fans of Lynne Truss and that strange, idiosyncratic British humor, this collection will be enjoyable, if at times baffling and weird. Lynne Truss is a talented writer and shows promise as a comic writer, but needs to work on sustaining that promise throughout entire works longer than newspaper columns.