Barry funny, for the most part.

This is my first Dave Barry work that I've read, and I have to admit that it has left me with mixed emotions.

In the beginning, I enjoyed it immensely, and found much of humour and some interesting observations, although there were times when that maybe Barry was being a little unjustly crass in his observations. He is, of course, fully aware of his own biases and ignorance when it comes to understanding Japan and the Japanese, and does not claim that the book is authoritative, as it is based on a mere three week trip. The book, therefore, is a very superficial, almost pointless, expose of one persons experiences, and this really makes me wonder about all of the rave reviews that I have read about it.

He does discuss some interesting points, such as the art of comedy in Japan, the implications of wear sunglasses, conformity, but, I guess, had I taken his advice and bought "a real book" about Japan, I have eventually learned about these things anyway, sans his barbed wit of course. So this book was really nothing more than fodder for the expectant Dave Barry fan, of which I'm not sure that I can consider myself one, yet.

Like I said, the was much humour in this book and I was oft grinning or laughing, but then near the end came the chapter on Hiroshima. This chapter is flanked by two dark leafs that are clearly there to indicate that the tone of the chapter is different and more serious. I was, naturally, curious to see how he would handle the topic, and, unfortunately, was disappointed. Of course, my own attitude towards Hiroshima (and Nagasaki) are equally subjective, as is everyone's opinion on such matters, but I was sincerely disappointed that he would choose to air his simplistic understanding of the issue. The tasteful thing to do would perhaps have been to simply not have included the chapter.

Here I could myself launch into a lengthy explanation as to why I thing that he, and many people, are wrong about their views on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but it would do no good. Needless to say, the rest of the book--which fortunately was only a few more chapters--was not as enjoyable.