Best. State. Ever.: A Florida Man Defends His Homeland by Dave Barry

Best. State. Ever.: A Florida Man Defends His Homeland
by Dave Barry
Pages: 256
Date: September 6 2016
Publisher: G.P. Putnam's Sons
Series: None

Review
Rating: 4.70 out of 5.0
Read: July 26 2016

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley, and G.P. Putnam's Sons exchange for an honest review.

If this was a collection of short stories, or a novel or a travel guide (maybe), I’d probably include little bits of information about each story. But this is a humor essay collection. Based around the theme ‘Florida: The Joke State’, and involves little tidbits about why and how Florida became ‘The Joke State’ (became such ~ 2000 Presidential election; thousands of lawyers parachuting in attempting to ‘determine’ how someone someone intended to vote based on how they drooled on their ballot); and the odd, weird, funny things that occur in Florida. The kinds of thing wherein someone can see just a headline, without any type of location mentioned, and just know that the story is about Florida.

The above is kind of why I am not attempting to write little tidbits about each story. All that happened is that I decided to try to provide more detail about something and it was not funny, insightful or clear. What I wrote, not what was in the book.

So I might mention a few things here and there, but will not be that detailed, or that through. It is a humor book. Trying to provide details for such is not fun for anyone involved.

So – one of the stories involves Dave Barry driving out into the swamps and visiting a local tourist attraction that features a ‘Skunk Ape Research Center’. And then driving back to Miami. I’m not sure if it was intended to be funny; I assume so; though it appears more ‘defending Florida’, the subtitle of the book.

Another essay involved mermaid sponges, and the seductive call of the sponges. Well, at least that is the opening. It’s actually about Wiki Wachee, a tourist attraction that involves women swimming around in mermaid tops and tails, and being watched by people. Also, there are water slides, and a wilderness boat thingie. At Wiki Wachee, I mean. The essay also includes other touristy areas reachable by Route 19.

I think I might be reading more of a travelogue than a humor essay book (Dave Barry traveling around to various locations in Florida). Interesting though. With humor mixed in.

It is somewhat difficult to know how to rate books like this one here – humor essays, nonfiction, etc. Should I take note, in my rating, the part wherein Barry noted he was going to cover the whole state, and then proceeded to cover almost only those things within a few hours’ drive of his house in Miami (the almost only is the part wherein he went down to Key West). A few other parts of the state are mentioned, mostly as places that exist, but not visited. I believe, and I could be wrong about this, that everything north of Miami was ignored, except for a mention of Disney and where visitors come from. As a travelogue, I would, in fact, have to adjust my rating because of that. But it is not actually a travelogue – at least not set up to be one, even if the essays contained within might seem that way. So no, I do not adjust the rating because of that issue.

So, the long and short of it is that I’d probably rate this, tentatively, around 4.5 stars. Fun humorous book with a few interesting stories.

July 27 2016