Love Me By Garrison Keillor

I apologize for any lack of variety in my book choices. When I find a writer I like, I start a love affair with them so intense I can't touch, taste or smell anything else. The only thing to do is to let the infatuation run its natural course, until either I lose interest or run out of material. Right now, I'm totally enamored of Garrison Keillor. I read several of his Lake Wobegon novels before starting this blog and will continue until, broken-hearted, I find myself single again, trying to pick up someone new in the library.

It was a happy accident that I chose this particular Keillor work, Love Me, to read immediately after The Kiss. Both works grapple with the Horatio Alger myth that one should aim high, should be in constant pursuit of happiness. In The Kiss and Love Me, acting on one's aspirations only brings chaos and misery; the male protagonists only reach a measure of contentment at the end of the novels by deciding to make the best of what they have.

The big difference is that Keillor's treatment of this idea is dosed with the author's trademark humor. This isn't a Lake Wobegon novel, though. Rather, it's a semi-autobiographical (and self-referential) tale of a middle-aged alcoholic with writers' block and an inability to keep his pecker in his pants. Despite his dark subject matter, Keillor never leaves us without the light of laughter. True to his Prairie Home Companion origins, Keillor dispenses witty aphorisms at every turn to blunt the severity of his protagonist's, Larry Wyler's, complete ineptness. Consider the scene in which Wyler first commits adultery. It's a despicable act: while his wife, Iris, is out of town, Wyler brings home a mutual friend of theirs, remembering to clear Iris' underwear out of the way first. Comically, his back gives out before he can perform and he leaves us with this pearl of wisdom: "It is so clear to me why adultery should always take place at a hotel; easier to make an exit if things don't work out. Never commit adultery in your own home. This is a rule never to be broken." That's the Eleventh Commandment, no?

Eventually, Keillor's humor descends from amusingly witty to just plain wacky. Wyler gets a job at the New Yorker, which he soon discovers is being run by the Italian mafia. And guess who John Updike asks to put out a hit on the publisher, Tony Crossandotti? Keillor loses me a little here, but as with all his novels, you just have to suspend disbelief, retain a sense of humor, sit back and enjoy the ride. And it is a fun ride, filled with all the sparkle and charm that characterize Keillor's work. If his protagonist is a narcissistic toad, that's okay. Keillor's writing shines all the more for making you like Wyler anyway.