theleatherette:

I just wrapped up Zombie Spaceship Wasteland by Patton Oswalt, and hoo boy it was one of the better reads I’ve encountered this year. It was kind of jarring reading something that hits rather close to home— the feeling of semi-kinship crept over me that always pops up when I meet someone else who’s an escapee of the burbs. 

I think my favorite thing about this book isn’t just Oswalt’s trademark biting wit. I expected the story to be pretty linear: childhood, adolescence, college, stand-up, etc etc. But happily, this text zigs and zags in awesome ways. Chapters are told in forms like a diary account, a documentation of growing up written as a wine list, and a straight-up delightfully explained example of contributing to a screenplay. At least that’s how I interpreted it, I could be totally off the mark. 

There’s a lot of books out there by comedians that have a strict agenda solely made of laughs. (Judah Friedlander’s How to Beat Up Anybody is a good example and always makes me spit my midday wine break everywhere) A bunch of them are great. Zombie Spaceship Wasteland isn’t one of those. Trust me, there are tons of funny moments but I think what Oswalt is trying to get across is how his intense love of film, books, music and an incredible depth of pop culture wisdom has made him who he is as a person and a comedian. 

I remember how I felt this first time I read Harlan Ellison—Love Ain’t Nothing But Sex Mispelled, which if I remember correctly, kicks off with a short story about all-American teenagers and abortions in Tijuana. Or cracking open Phillip K. Dick or Thomas Pynchon. Or the first time I saw Divine declaring that she better get them cha-cha heels for Christmas in Female Trouble. Fierce images and stories that made me want to say YES, this is what I need to absorb to make the banality of the cracked sidewalks and strip malls of my hometown bearable. And Zombie Spaceship Wasteland is a testament to all that good stuff.

So whether you’re a comedy fan or not, check it out. Plus there’s a handy dandy three-part personality portion, where you can figure out what Oswaltian category you happen to fall into. Turns out I’m a Zombie who’s growing up to be a Wasteland. 

I completely forgot this book existed. Need to read it.