Book Review – How To Traumatize Your Children

How To Traumatize Your Children is one in a series of intentionally dubious “how-to” books by the publisher Knock Knock. Artfully called the “self-hurt” series, these books are put together like a standard how-to or field guide, but cover topics that one would likely rather not have happen. So it’s all a joke, kindof, and if you see the cover and think it looks funny, you’ll probably think it’s funny.

The construction of the book itself is very nice, with a plastic-y feeling cover that reminds one of water-resistant guidebooks or first aid manuals. It’s a nice size and it feels good in the hand, being both substantial and slightly textured, though it is prone to creasing, and when it does it is quite unsightly. The pages are nice and thick, with a substantial binding that really locks everything in place. The presentation is just really nice and evocative. I’m a fan.

Unfortunately, once inside things start to go downhill a little bit. The book is divided into 10 chapters, 7 of which are various types of parenting styles, bookended by an introduction and conclusion like this is some kind of essay. It starts off pretty funny, with an interesting rationalization for the book’s existence at the front and a nice step-by-step guide on how to traumatize kids in different ways. The first problem here is the graphic design: little yellow “bubbles” with competing thoughts start to pop up in chapters as little asides, but these quickly start coming in between connected paragraphs, or in some case in the middle of paragraphs, running the flow of reading into a brick wall at inopportune moments. And the second is that the joke gets old pretty fast, and the writer(s?) makes no attempt to get more creative with it as time goes on. While the book lists many “different” parenting styles, they all end up being described in the same way, and the list of effects they have on the children is essentially unchanged each chapter. There’s nothing new, it just keeps talking and talking and talking. If I had read the introduction, two middle chapters at random, and then the conclusion, I would’ve gotten all this book had to give me, and maybe even had a better experience.

It’s not too egregious, and I wasn’t frustrated or angry as I continued, but it just got boring. And for a book that is basically a joke, that’s forgivable. I don’t think anyone was really intended to read the entire thing. It seems more like something you’d leave lying around for when guests come around, or give as a gag gift (or get tricked into buying at a store) that someone will pick up, laugh, leaf through a few pages, laugh again, and then put down. And it does that quite well. Whether or not that’s worth the cover price is up to you.

I was disappointed, but only mildly. My expectations for a book called How To Traumatize Your Children were justifiably quite low, and this book actually surpassed them for a moment in the beginning, but failed to live up to its own promise. It’s a well put together item, with well done if… lifeless artwork, and questionable graphic design/layout. The contents are funny, but not too funny, and maybe at bit too cynical. It just left me really ho-hum on the whole matter. If you read the title and thought it sounded funny, this might be the book you’re looking for, but it really has nothing more to offer than that, and to some it might still fall flat.

Book Review – Politically Correct Bedtime Stories (By: James Finn Garner)

I’m slightly surprised that Politically Correct Bedtime Stories was published in 1994, but I guess the politically correct joke bit has been going around for quite some time. The book is a humorous re-imagining of 13 “fairy-tales” by James Garner, of whose other work I have no familiarity with, but he seems to be riding this one pretty well and perhaps for good reason. The joke, of course, being that he has rewritten these classic tales for a more “enlightened” modern audience with higher standards of… something. But is it successful?

The book is fairly short; 80 pages for 13 stories, including several blank pages. The average story is about 5 pages and Snow White takes up most of the rest. Going over the stories wouldn’t be very helpful because you and I probably already know them. And even ones like Rumplestiltskin and The Pied Piper that I’ve never actually read or watched have been absorbed through a kind of cultural osmosis. The cultural awareness of these stories also helps with the brevity of their retelling, which is a strength of the book. Garner has it down which parts of the stories to overrun with political correctness for maximum effect, but had he continued at the length of the original stories it would quickly have grown stale (Snow White was almost too long for me). And, of course, the humor comes from seeing these culturally-engrained stories changed by modern cultural preferences dialed up to the extreme. In some cases the moral is lost and in some it is retained; in some cases the plot is as predictable as the story we know, and in others it jumps off the tracks and heads spiraling down a cliff of ridiculousness, but in all cases they are recognizable.

The vast array of areas from which we get our folklore means that the only common thread between these stories is Garner’s extremely “politically correct” veneer and as such the book isn’t really a cohesive experience. Again its brevity helps here, making it easy to pick up and put down, reading a story at a time; or to make the massive changes in pace fly by. It knows what it wants to be, and that is an overblown parody of political correctness juxtaposed with stories never meant to fit that mold. And it is quite funny, not outrageously my-favorite-humor-book-ever funny, but more than funny enough to justify its reading time (and probably its price too). Exaggerated political correctness is just funny when applied well and not overdone. So is the idea that when using language that supposedly offends no one to tell a story, so many people will become “offended”. Most fairy tales are based on common sense (if perhaps containing outdated moral practices simplified for ease of retelling) and as one reads on they get the feeling that their common sense is being assaulted. And that, as so often it is, is funny. Still, I was consistently (and pleasantly) surprised by the directions the stories took (the 3 little pigs setting up a “porkinista” government after violently retaking their homeland is my favorite). It seems so easy to simply replace the language with “politically correct” alternatives, but continuous story variations keep one guessing and the book interesting.

I liked the book, and if you read the title and thought “that sounds funny”, you probably would, too. It’s well-written satire that is just offensive enough to both parties to be a bestseller while not alienating its audience. If the sequels are about as good I might have to pick them up as well, but until then, this one was a short, fun read that should appeal to anyone looking for its type of humor.

Blog 1-24-16 – Little bit of Late

Hello! As the observant of you might have noticed, Saturday comics were quite a bit late this time around. I apologize for this and will attempt to not have this happen in the future. That being said, this week’s Weekly Feature (which only appears on dragoncompany.org on Wednesdays) will be several days late due to scheduling issues.

I will be working to prevent things like this, but the coming month will offer many opportunities for me to be late. So depending on which way the wind blows there will be either a lot of lateness or (most) everything will be on time. Unfortunately there isn’t much in between.

I hope you have a nice day!

-Austin