Word: keillors
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...look past these expected barriers, Wobegon Boy can prove to be quite an entertaining read. But the question remains--can the average, non-Midwestern reader appreciate Keillor's morality-twinged humor...
...knows anything about Keillor's style of writing, the story line may be rather style of writing, the story line may be rather predictable: Midwestern Boy Named John Makes Good, Midwestern Boy Longs for Home and 'Real Lutheran Values,' Midwestern Boy Gets in Trouble at Work with Liberal Bores, Midwestern Boy Goes Home and Realizes Meaning Of Life, Midwestern Boy Finally (and Unexplainably) Gets Great Elusive Girl...
...characters Keillor creates are often caricatures, but that is exactly what makes them so funny to read about. He takes people whom the modern world would normally take seriously--John's co-workers at the radio station, for example--and outlines them in 3-word descriptions. John's beer-drinking buddies from back home, however, are punctuated with long and often hysterically funny anecdotes. "Bug lotion has no effect whatsoever on those Florida flies," one old man mentions over beers at the local bar. "A crucifix helps, but you have to hit them really hard with it." The locals become...
...Keillor's charmingly lucid writing, however, cannot hide the gaping flaws of the plot and main characters in Wobegon Boy. Almost halfway through the novel, a magazine with a front-page picture and article appears one day, depicting John as a "portly Lutheran Lothario" who "tried to 'psychologically seduce'" women at the public radio station where he works. However, up to that point in the book, readers are lead to believe that John is kind, quiet, in love with his girlfriend Alida, and not coming close to stepping on anyone's toes along the way. This sudden, almost violent disclosure...
...time Keillor has moved on and is attempting to crack jokes again, the sour aftertaste of the unresolved and uncomfortable scenario stays in one's mind. The liberals are portrayed as unsympathetic whining yuppies, but John himself is far from innocent. When trying to entice a rich elderly lady to donate her fortune to his radio station, he describes an opera--which, incidentally, bears a startling resemblence to the Tony- and Pulitzer-Prize winning Rent--produced by his main competetor for the money. After describing it with much disgust, John declares that "people writhing around...singing political slogans does...