Life After Death for Beginners edition by Michael Gerber Literature Fiction eBooks
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Michael Gerber’s satirical novel Life After Death for Beginners follows Tom Larkin, an impossibly famous rock icon who dies at the hands of a deranged fan—or so the world believes. In reality, Tom narrowly escapes with his life; as he recuperates in a secret hospital for the super-rich, his loving but imperious wife Katrinka becomes convinced that it’s safer for everyone if Tom stays dead. Reluctantly, Tom agrees to live out his days in obscurity… until an old enemy reveals that he is still in danger. Stripped of his former fame and access, Tom has to figure out who tried to kill him without publicly revealing his survival. His search leads him back to his old life, to the manager who made him a star; to the other three members of The Ravins, each dealing with his legacy in their own way; to his estranged daughter and the son who thinks he’s dead and of course, to Katrinka, the eccentric, devoted, public face of the Larkin myth.
Life After Death for Beginners edition by Michael Gerber Literature Fiction eBooks
The shooting of John Lennon in 1980 was staged, or at least he didn't immediately die. Or at least that's the premise that launches a hilarious work of fiction called "Life After Death (For Beginners)" by Michael Gerber, in which -- among other things -- Lennon tries to discover who killed him and whether it was for money or politics or love.I guess it doesn't sound very hilarious, and I'm guessing that Yoko Ono, who has been a friend to the peace movement all these years, might not find it hilarious, since she serves as the butt of many jokes. Other butts of jokes include John himself, the other three Beatles, their manager, Jackie Kennedy, Richard Nixon, Gloria Swanson, Elvis, and above all the human race -- which sort of makes it nothing personal for all those other people.
But now it sounds mean-spirited. "Life After Death" may be cynical, but I went into it loving John Lennon's music and his politics and -- more or less -- humanity, and I came out the same way, only with a little extra appreciation for Michael Gerber, as someone who could make me laugh out loud more times than I kept count of -- not to mention rewriting the 60s as an orchestrated plot set in motion by a stand-up comic, plus including the full text of his stand-up routine rather than skipping over that as if it were sex, like most novels would. I do recall a good deal of hilarity in the scene -- I'm not giving much away -- in which John accuses Paul of his murder. I also came away with added appreciation for John Lennon as a man who could inspire someone to invent things he never did or said that are not just hilarious on their own but that gain depth from the idea that it's John Lennon doing them.
I don't know if I could laugh at this book if I were one of the people its characters are based on, except maybe Paul. I think I'd be too busy hiring lawyers to try to prevent the book ever being made into a movie. Luckily, most of us don't show up in these pages at all -- or so we can easily tell ourselves. I'm afraid that if John really were still alive he'd be telling us the joke was on us, that we could only laugh at madness created by beings we more or less recognized as the same type of people we are.
We turn out to be as fragile as Plastic Ono Band, as insane as Sgt. Pepper's, and as embarrassing as a naked photo on an album cover.
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Life After Death for Beginners edition by Michael Gerber Literature Fiction eBooks Reviews
What if John Lennon had survived his shooting?
This laugh out loud book posits an alternative reality in which John Lennon survives his assassination, with hugely entertaining consequences. The writer shows his expertise in Beatles history and 60's counterculture, and harnesses them to the full in the development of his story. He had me laughing from the first sentence, which reads (if I remember correctly) "If I had known I was going to die today, I would have got up earlier." I had a blast reading this book, and so will you.
"Life After Death For Beginners" now shares honors on my shelf with Mark Shipper's classic "Paperback Writer" as the best Beatles-related novel. Michael Gerber considers what might have been if John Lennon (well, an absolutely Lennon-like star named "Tom Larkin") hadn't really died on December 8, 1980, but had been injured and gone underground. In this novel Gerber captures more of the voice and feel of Lennon and the Beatles (the Ravins, in the novel) than many nonfiction writers have. "Life After Death" is hilariously funny when it isn't sad -- sometimes even when it IS sad -- and it will make you think about fandom, fame, and friendship in new ways.
I'm not going to ruin the plot, which is worth discovering on your own. I'll only say that the whole book is narrated by Larkin, and that Gerber gets Lennon's voice perfectly. He's sharp, maddening, and affecting, often all in the same sentence. When Larkin thinks that if he'd known it was the last day of his life he'd have gotten up earlier, I couldn't help hearing Lennon's voice. The ex-Ravins, who Larkin visits in the course of trying to figure out who was trying to have him killed, are also perfectly drawn. Each has his eccentricities, to put it mildly, yet each also comes off believably as someone the Larkin character (who's no prize himself, a lot of the time, and he knows it) would have played with. The scenes between Tom and Oliver (the Paul character) alone are worth the price of the novel. Katrinka (the Yoko character) and her relationship with Tom are similarly on-target Gerber gets their dependence on each other, their bent toward weird self-indulgence, their intelligence, and their genuine affection.
For a novel that's consistently so funny, it's also terribly sad. Partly, of course, it's sad because John Lennon didn't survive and get this opportunity to reassess his life post-40. But it's also sad because it's true more generally that people become for all kinds of reasons estranged from people they shouldn't, that fame tends to warp the objects of fame and their fans, and that grief and regret are inescapable parts of being human. Which is to say that "Life After Death" doesn't cash in on the Beatles, but use their story as a lens through which to look at life more widely. And isn't that why we read books or listen to music, in the end?
Being a lifelong Beatles fan, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The author captured the spirit of "Tom Larkin" so perfectly, injecting wit and substance along the way. Hoping for a sequel!
This is one of my favorite fantasies. 'seems like there is a new dead music legend coming along every day. Gerber can really bring 'em back to life. This story was so very satisfying, and a fun read.
The shooting of John Lennon in 1980 was staged, or at least he didn't immediately die. Or at least that's the premise that launches a hilarious work of fiction called "Life After Death (For Beginners)" by Michael Gerber, in which -- among other things -- Lennon tries to discover who killed him and whether it was for money or politics or love.
I guess it doesn't sound very hilarious, and I'm guessing that Yoko Ono, who has been a friend to the peace movement all these years, might not find it hilarious, since she serves as the butt of many jokes. Other butts of jokes include John himself, the other three Beatles, their manager, Jackie Kennedy, Richard Nixon, Gloria Swanson, Elvis, and above all the human race -- which sort of makes it nothing personal for all those other people.
But now it sounds mean-spirited. "Life After Death" may be cynical, but I went into it loving John Lennon's music and his politics and -- more or less -- humanity, and I came out the same way, only with a little extra appreciation for Michael Gerber, as someone who could make me laugh out loud more times than I kept count of -- not to mention rewriting the 60s as an orchestrated plot set in motion by a stand-up comic, plus including the full text of his stand-up routine rather than skipping over that as if it were sex, like most novels would. I do recall a good deal of hilarity in the scene -- I'm not giving much away -- in which John accuses Paul of his murder. I also came away with added appreciation for John Lennon as a man who could inspire someone to invent things he never did or said that are not just hilarious on their own but that gain depth from the idea that it's John Lennon doing them.
I don't know if I could laugh at this book if I were one of the people its characters are based on, except maybe Paul. I think I'd be too busy hiring lawyers to try to prevent the book ever being made into a movie. Luckily, most of us don't show up in these pages at all -- or so we can easily tell ourselves. I'm afraid that if John really were still alive he'd be telling us the joke was on us, that we could only laugh at madness created by beings we more or less recognized as the same type of people we are.
We turn out to be as fragile as Plastic Ono Band, as insane as Sgt. Pepper's, and as embarrassing as a naked photo on an album cover.
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