Summary: Don’t hate the playa, hate the game, and then the playa gets playa-ed. With lots of teen sex bits (Handler might have made them all over eighteen, I can’t recall.)
So you want to read a creepy book about a compulsive, masturbating, teenage boy, who seems to have nothing the least bit interesting about him yet still manages to get laid (Marty Sue *cough cough*), I guess All the Dirty Parts is it. It’s a mildly amusing read as an adult, but I’d be loathe to give it to a surly, fourteen year old boy; the last thing this world needs is more boys growing into men thinking, by virtue of them having a cock, that girls fuck them just because hey look, a dick!. At least he goes down on his girlfriend. Teenage boys can read all about that part. Too bad Handler didn’t keep the cunnilingus and then write a book full of sex and well-rounded teenage boys with interests outside of pornography.
In any case, I defer to The Simpsons [Aside: There seems to have been a collective Stop Watching order in regards to The Simpsons. Any time any one quotes something from The Simpsons, it’s always from an episode I’ve seen; it’s never from whatever episodes are on now. I assume The Simpsons is still on now. I assume people are watching it. I’m guessing maybe I’m now too old to be hanging around with the kids quoting the new episodes, or the new episodes are barren of quotes. Either way.]: The Girl Who Slept Too Little and author Milton Burkhart:
I wanted to be a children’s [writer] ever since Playboy wouldn’t publish my cartoons because they were too filthy.
Yes, it’s backwards — Lemony Snicket was around before All the Dirty Parts, but I couldn’t stop thinking about that quote as I read the book. I still like Lemony Snicket, but the more I read by Daniel Handler, the more I don’t want to, and this book, while entertaining for an adult, still is very much ick.
All the Dirty Parts by Daniel Handler went on sale October 19, 2017.
I received a copy free from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.