Number 24 this year is Friends Like These by Danny Wallace. It was my husband who first introduced me to Danny Wallace (and his sometimes partner in crime, Dave Gorman) and their 'stupid boy projects', and I've enjoyed all Wallace's capers since then. Some more than others of course, and Friends Like These is enjoyable.

On the cusp of turning 30, recently married and burgeoning yuppie Danny has an about-to-turn-thirty crisis sparked by being asked to be a godparent to the child of some friends. This request galvanizes for him that he doesn't really want to fully grow up, to trade fun for throw cushions, to stop going to the pub, etc. He likes the IDEA of becoming a man, but not the actual participation in it completely.

With the arrival of a box of his old belongings from his Mum, Danny finds his old address book, from his childhood. It has 12 names it, people whom he's long since lost contact with and has only a few times in the past 16 years or so, wondered how these people are doing. Well, when Danny's closest current mates, Ian and Wag both announce that they are going away/moving away, Danny is spurred to track down all those people from his past. Danny also has the blessing of his wife, Lizzie, to do all this and finish it before his 30th birthday, a few months away.

Some are easier to find than others, and so he immediately gets together with them and finds it very rewarding. He also begins writing answers to letters he recieved from one friend 16 years ago, hoping that they will find their way to the sender. Danny ends up going to Los Angeles to meet one friend, and finish playing an elaborate prank upon him (which involves Danny masquerading as a furrie) in retaliation for a prank Danny was the butt of fifteen years ago. Danny also journeys to Australia and Japan in search of friends. All this travelling always makes me wonder how well Danny does off of the writing of his 'stupid boy projects'. And then I realize he's probably making a decent living off his stupid boy projects, and well, that's pretty damn awesome.

As usual, this is a funny, funny book, which also does make you think. In the era of Facebook, it's easy to find old friends online, but never really have to go farther than that. Danny takes it that step further and reconnects in person, and finds it much more rewarding. It's an interesting idea, but one I doubt I'd launch into.

In what is likely to be the last book I read this year, we come to number 27, Yes Man by Danny Wallace.

It was probably late 2005 when G introduced me to Danny Wallace and his cohort Dave Gorman as they embarked on a world-wide journey to meet 52 other people named Dave Gorman. I thoroughly enjoyed Are You Dave Gorman, and so when G offered me other books written by one or the other, I read 'em. But funny enough, neither of Dave or Danny's solo efforts wowed me as much as AYDG did.

Until Yes Man.

Danny Wallace, after having a conversation on a bus with a mysteriously wise man, takes up the man's challenge to 'say yes more'. At this point in Danny's life, his long time girlfriend has broken up with him (she'd had enough of all the 'stupid boy-projects' in his life) and he just wasn't going out at all. He was saying no to everything.

So, for a good chunk of a year, Danny decides to say yes to everything. He says yes to buying a car, he says yes to journeying to Amsterdam to help out the son of an imprisoned sultan (yes, it is an internet scam), he says yes to going out with friends, he says yes to flyers and freaks he meets on the street, he says yes to a new job, he says yes to everything.

And mostly, everything turns out well. Indeed, Danny seems much happier with everything. Oh he goes through some ups and downs and at times he desperately, desperately wishes he could say 'no' (one of the biggest ones being when he runs into his ex-girlfriend and her new beau on a date, and when the guy asks Danny, out of sheer politeness, if he'd like to join them, Danny of course says yes), but overall, it sounds like saying yes more definitely turns out to be the positive experience he hoped it would be.

Of course, it also does leave him in some debt, but due to his new job at the BBC, he seems to be able to handle it again.

Its interesting to read this and think about your own life and all the things you say 'no' to. No to going out to friends, no to travelling to places you've always wanted to go, no to various opportunities etc. We say 'no' a lot because, as Danny discusses, it is easier than 'yes' most of the time. No can be a lot safer than yes. I'd like to be able to say yes more, but sometimes, I also think I say yes enough. But Danny did also prove that no is necessary.

Necessary, but oftentimes overused. It is something we should all think about using more judiciously, and not just out of habit.

Alrighty, I finished Danny Wallace's journey into culthood, er, sorry, collective-hood, Join Me.
It was a very good read, but not as side-splittingly funny as Are You Dave Gorman? Join Me was definitely more introspective, but still a journey about self discovery. Danny was inspired to create Joine Me when a Swiss great uncle of his passes away, and Danny is told by some family members, that at one point, this uncle had wanted to start a collective of people living on his farm, helping each other, living in harmony, etc. Basically a commune. Danny finds this wonderful and so places an ad in a newpaper, asking people to simply "Join Me". All they have to do is send him a passport photo. And from there it begins and it grows throughtout the UK to Belgium, Norway, and even the Far East.

I did find it sad that Danny and his girlfriend Hanne, who was such a wonderful character in Are You Dave Gorman?, eventually did break up over Join Me. To her, it was just 'another stupid boy-thing', whereas to Danny, it was an important meeting of minds, of people inspired to do good deeds, etc. It was sad that they couldn't agree on it (although Danny was a prat and hid his collective from her for most of it), although Hanne did eventually join him, but only as a member, not as his significant other again.

So anyway, good read, quite thought provoking really.

And now I'm onto some Christopher Moore hilarity, reading one of his older books that I'd been meaning to read forever but haven't gotten around to, Lamb: The Gospel according to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal. It promises to delightfully irreverant, but with enough good punches to also make you think. Christopher Moore hasn't failed me yet.

Gah, I've been so slow with reading things lately. Stems from two things: I'm able to get out more since I only have Jet part of the time (which has its bonuses and its disads), and I got a beautiful new TV at the beginning of the month and have found myself watching TV for simply the sake of watching my awesome new TV. I'm getting a handle on this though, and am slowly returning to my regular viewing habits of only watching the Amazing Race, Lost and some incarnation of Law & Order.

So, since I was last here though, I have indeed finished the Maltese Falcon. I think the ending of the movie is very different from the one in the novel. I seem to remember in the movie, Humphrey Bogart breaking open the Falcon and some ridiculously expensive jewel was inside it. Or am I making that up? Anyway, book was good, but because I seemed to have that ending fixed in my mind, I was quite surprised at the ending of the book and I'm not sure if I'm disappointed or not. Kinda like when I read Jaws finally and got to the end and said "That's it? Boring!" Say what you like about Speilberg these days, he definitely improved on the ending of Jaws.

Also finished Are You Dave Gorman. I got off to a slow start with it, but ended up loving it and laughing myself silly at parts of it. It really is a good thing the authors were able to parlay their silly bet into a book and a BBC series, I can only imagine how far in debt Dave Gorman was after travelling to places like NYC, Italy and Tel Aviv. Being of Norweigian decent myself, this was my very, very favourite passage in the book, said by Dan Wallace's Norweigian girlfriend:

"I am in charge on this trip," said Hanne sternly. "Nothing is going to go wrong. You two have been very sloppy so far. You need a Norweigian in charge. Or a woman. Or better still, a Norweigian woman."

And, as her boyfriend then states, there's not a lot you can say to that. LOL.

I also finished my rereading of the complete Chronicles of Narnia. And, as I'm trying to break out of a writer's block concerning the superhero game I run, I also re-read all the Warren Ellis written trades of StormWatch. Still not inspired though...

Last night, since I was so close to finishing Are You Dave Gorman, I picked up Close Range, the collection of short stories written by Annie Proulx that Brokeback Mountain is in. I've only read a couple of the stories so far, but I'm quite liking them. She's very Alice Munroesque by way of Wyoming. I'm looking forward to getting to the Brokeback story considering how much I adored the movie.

No, I haven't finished the Maltese Falcon yet, I'm about 2/3 of the way through it. Very good, LOVED the scene where we first meet Cairo and he's holding the gun on Sam, so Sam (violently of course) takes the gun away from him, they talk, reach an agreement, Sam gives him the gun back, and Cairo immediately turns it on Sam again. Brilliant!

No, I haven't finished the Maltese Falcon yet, but I did start another book last night, called Are You Dave Gorman? Its a strange little book lent to me by co-worker Graig, and so far, is quite amusing. Its written by two friends who embark on a journey to find 54 other men named Dave Gorman. As you may have concluded, one of the authors of the book is named Dave Gorman. This whole adventure comes 'round during a drunken bet, when the other author refuses to believe that there are other people around who are named Dave Gorman. So, that night, they find themselves on a train to Scotland to find the first of the other Dave Gorman's, a general manager of a Scottish soccer team. It's all quite amusing, very quirky and British, and despite the fact that it is written by two separate people, their writing styles mesh well without losing each distinct voice.

I've also made a promise that I will try and launch myself into Love in the Time of Cholera again. So yeah, after finishing my searches for falcons and Dave Gormans, I will go back to cholera. Maybe.