Deborah Pickett reviewed Lessons From Lucy by Dave Barry
Like Lucy, Dave Barry is past his best days
3 stars
I’ll put this up front: the dog does not die.
When a comedian gets old, they often descend into the “you can’t say anything”/“everyone gets offended” trope. One chapter of this book is this trope, almost unadulterated. It was painful to read.
The theme, that there are things that Lucy can teach the author, feels a bit contrived, and at the end Barry even gives himself a report card and admits that he hasn’t taken Lucy’s lessons on board. So what was the point of this book again?
Dave Barry’s columns, collected into book form, are some of my most cherished memories from the 1990s. Sometimes I would even emulate the structure of his humour in my own writing.
The lesson I have learned from Lessons from Lucy is that I will stick with his classic works.