Jonathan Tropper's The Book of Joe is one of the better books I've read this year, and it's been a pretty good year so far. It's a sweet novel that looks at the life of a successful novelist who wrote disparagingly about the town where he grew up only to return seventeen years later as his father falls into a coma. Tropper's writing reminds me of Jonathan Franzen, that bittersweet recognition that life hasn't turned out the way you expected, and that material success sometimes isn't the answer.
And then, the whole visual image of the book was shattered when I looked up the movie version on the imdb and found out Joe Mantegna is to play "Joe." Ew. He's only supposed to be 34, so they must have it wrong.
Highly recommended. The Book of Joe gets the broken hip salute, which essentially means I'd give it a big booty bump if the book was a cute fellow at a rock and roll show.
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