Books |
How I Became a Famous Novelist
Steve Hely
By
Published: Jul 22, 2009
Category:
Fiction
Steve Hely is one of those annoying guys who not only gets into Harvard, he ends up running the Lampoon and then, after graduation, almost immediately becomes a writer for David Letterman. Now he’s written How I Became a Famous Novelist, and the only reason I don’t hate this young punk is because he’s penned the funniest book I’ve read all year and I literally laughed out loud at the spooky rate of at least once per page.
How did this happen? Hely went to a bookstore: “Seeing the massive quantities of books of all genres and varieties, I got to thinking, ‘What if one book contained all of these?’ "
That’s what he told USA Today. To The New Yorker, he admitted something closer to the truth: “Walking around huge bookstores inspired me — there are so many books! And so many of them are so crazy!”
Well, guess what? So is this one — just in a good way.
Here’s the story: Pete Tarslaw’s one talent as a kid was writing thank-you notes. Writing his college essay? Cake. So was majoring in English in college. So was scoring a cool girlfriend: “The fetching Polly Pawson first slept with me because it was easier than walking back to her room.”
Graduation is a double shot of reality. He’ll have to make his way in the world. And he’ll have to do it without Polly, who has rejected his career plan for them — “conning a wealthy dowager” — and is off to law school.
When we meet Pete, he’s living in Boston, working for EssayAides and rewriting college essays for rich kids. He lives in a dump with an equally depressed roommate. He eats sour cream and chives potato chips for breakfast. At night, he watches TV or reads, for no good reason, the Sunday New York Times Book Review — specifically, the bestseller lists. Without exception, he concludes, the writers suck, and none sucks more than Preston Brooks, “the Mannheim Steamroller of novelists.”
Worse cometh: Polly sends a mass e-mail to announce her engagement. Pete cannot go to the wedding as a loser who writes college essays. He needs to be successful. And at something easy. Something like….a novel. Because he has now seen Preston Brooks on TV and decided he’s “the greatest con artist in the world”.
Well, Pete can con too. Because if there’s one thing Pete thinks he knows about the writing game, it’s this: “The financial success of an author is inversely proportional to the literary worth of the book.”
And so he begins to write. You do not have to know about the literary world or the book business to find the humor. On the merit of exotic locations: “Americans trust knowledge acquired abroad. The Mediterranean, in particular, has a potent sun-dried magic for them, as evidenced by their love for Andrea Bocelli and the Olive Garden”. On the “hard work” of writing: “It was more like shoveling snow or cleaning out the attic, tedious labor toward a very distant end.” And there is the Truth about the greats: “Faulkner, a southern huckster in the Bill Clinton mode…”
Is there sex? Yes, but not like in books. Drugs? Yes, but not what you think. Does Pete sell his book and make it? Hey, look at the title!
If you’ve just had surgery and the stitches seem less than industrial strength, hold off. Otherwise, get ready to chortle.
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