Book: Behind Everyman

What a wonderful book!

This is one of those little gems that you'll come across by word-of-mouth only. If you saw it on the shelf in the bookstore, it's very likely you'd pass right by it. Someone needs to have a word with that publisher about the cover design they chose. Not. Cool.

The book has a distinct voice, layered characters, humor humor humor, and a really moving story all wrapped in one. I think the basic idea behind the author's inspiration was, why are so many relationship-type books out there just for women? Men have feelings, too, you know! (Well, maybe that's not exactly what his internal monologue sounded like). But he went ahead, followed his gut, and wrote the thinking-man's guide to love, life, and career.

What you'll discover right away as you open to chapter one, is that the book has a unique twist to it: It's written in the tone of a "How to..." manual, like some sort of fix-'er-upper-do-it-yourself'er. And yet at the same time, as you're learning "how to get your screenplay published", or how to "succeed in online dating," a beautiful story is unraveling before you between this hapless guy and this charming woman, and the whole thing just flows from there.

I read it over 2 days or so. For the final stretch I was sitting on this amazingly soft puffy couch facing a beautiful winter's day. I couldn't have been more "into this" at the time, and often found myself laughing at loud. Always a good sign.

I have to tell you, this book touches your heart, tears you up a bit, and makes you a look a little harder for snowflakes. (Inside joke. You'd get what I meant if you read the book.)

And it's got "make me into a movie" written all over it.