Synopses & Reviews
Dave Barry Is Not Taking This Sitting Down (Susie Breck, Melissa Coates): What's been getting Dave Barry all worked up lately? What can possibly induce him to rise up - yes, actually out of his chair - in indignation? Well, lots of things. For instance . . .
The plague of low-flow toilets
Day trading and other careers that never require you to take off your bathrobe
The parent-misery quotient of school science fairs
Pine-sap transfusions for tired Christmas trees
The real skinny on the IRS, Donald Trump, the airlines, and so much more...
Dave Barry Hits Below the Beltway (Laura Grafton, Melissa Coates): Below the Beltway includes Barry's stirring account of how the United States was born, including his version of a properly written Declaration (When in the course of human events it behooves us, the people, not to ask "What can our country do for us, anyway?" but rather whether we have anything to fear except fear itself) and a revised Constitution (Section II: The House of Representatives shall be composed of people who own at least two dark suits and have not been indicted recently).
Dave also cracks the income-tax code and explains the growth(s) of government, congressional hearing difficulties, and the persistent rumors of the influence of capital in the Capitol. Among other civic contributions, his tour of Washington D.C. should end school class trips forever.
Tricky Business (Susie Breck, Mike Council): The Extravaganza of the Seas is a five-thousand-ton cash cow, a top-heavy tub whose sole function is to carry gamblers three miles from the Florida coast, take their money, then bring them back so they can find more money. In the middle of a tropical stormone night, these characters are among the passengers it carries: Fay Benton, a single mom and cocktail waitress desperate for something to go right for once; Johnny and the Contusions, a ship's band with so little talent they are ... well, the ship's band; Arnold and Phil, two refugees from the Beaux Arts Senior Center; Lou Tarant, a wide, bald man who has killed nine people, though none recently; and an assortment of uglies whose job it is to facilitate the ship's true business, which is money laundering or drug-smuggling or...something.