I’ve been putting off writing this review for the longest time because, well — hasn’t everyone read this book by now? At least once? What else is there to say about it?

That it’s charming (really charming, without being at all smarmy)? That it will disarm cynical readers? Make you cry if you let it? That it is a small book, you could read it all in one sitting, but it will stay with you long after you put it down? I’m pretty sure all these things have been said about The Little Prince many, many times.

That doesn’t make them any less true.

I had a stack of books to read on vacation (most, I will confess, are still unread) and a few books set aside to read to get to vacation. This was one of those. I needed a shot of whimsy and true emotion and questioning the absurdity of most grown ups, and this book delivered it. It’s the kind of thing I shouldn’t read once, but probably once every few months.

If you haven’t read it in awhile, do yourself a favor. You probably need to see the not-really-very-good sketches (except for the boa constrictor) and be reminded.

In the course of this life, I have had a great many encounters with a great many people who have been concerned with matters of consequence. I have lived a great deal among grown-ups. I have seen them intimately, close at hand. And that hasn’t much improved my opinion of them.

I bought this book over twenty-five years ago in a second-hand shop. (Holy crap!) I spent the then, to me, significant amount of $5 on the hardcover mostly because I was captivated by the seagull photographs. Some were printed on translucent paper, and the play of light and the birds in flight was something I had to have.

I had no idea who Richard Bach was at that time. I didn’t run out and read all his stuff afterwards, either, though I do still have a copy of Illusions. Turns out, I remembered more about the photos than I did the story. It is about flight (literally and metaphorically), freeing yourself from constraints, and passing the lesson along.

I still like the seagull photos, but they seem a wee bit less magical to me now than they did then. Maybe this is because I’m more cynical as a full-grown person, or maybe this is because I’ve spent a lot of time on photography in the intervening years. Still, I’m glad I have the book, and that I reread it as part of my keep-sane-until-vacation reading list. [Yes, I'm really behind in posting reviews, that this is going up only now.]

This book is outrageous.

That is pretty much the point: consider the subtitle. It’s full of unreal colors, plastic, toys both super creepy and super cute, and weird portrayals of animals. It dishes out nostalgia (anyone else remember sharp-edged inflatable toys?) and it will make you laugh.

The real secret of the book isn’t the dubious pleasure of looking at the bizarre toys or oddly anthropomorphized animals, but in the captions. Oh yes, the unexpected zing of what passes for narrative amid supersaturated ultra-cuteness:

If you open an umbrella near a pony, it is likely to startle and stomp you to death. Ponies are far less enchanting when you are beneath them, being crushed by their hooves.

…and of course, Chester the 13-Striped Ground Squirrel Who Will Distract You and Then Drive a 16-Penny Nail Into the Back of Your Neck.

Well, late at night, armies of ferrets, who are in pay of the Easter Bunny, swarm into chicken houses everywhere and steal as many eggs as they can.

This book has, is cuteness that can (and does) cross the line over into repugnant, but is fascinating for it. Recommended in small doses, unless you crave a crazy kitsch factor, in which case go ahead and overdose with this.

This is a novel about OCD and math.

Yes, really. It’s also about growing up, mortality, and risk. And small town eccentrics, the limits of family bonds, and how you should never put a sharp ax in a second grade classroom.

Bender can pull all this off because weird stories are what she excels at. At first this novel seemed a bit much — imagine eating something very tasty, but very rich or very sweet — because I’m used to Bender in morsel-sized amounts, not multi-course fair. But her story came together, in its strangeness and obsession and wonder.

Bender is so crisp and spare and oddly sharp, I think short stories suit her style better. So while I prefer her in short form, I do think this novel is worth your time if you are a fan of oddball fiction. Mona Gray, inspirational but unbalanced math teacher to small children, is not to be missed.

I bought this book because George Saunders said it was funny.

Okay, that isn’t the only reason, but it did seal the deal for me. I was in the mood to try a new to me author, and came across this book. It looked interesting — short stories, which I’ve been drawn to lately; it seemed odd, something else I like; and then when I read the blurbs, there was George Saunders saying “I would characterize him as a dangerously funny writer.” Also, when I went to flip through the pages, I came upon this:

Henry and his mother returned home from Wednesday-night prayer meeting to find an enormous owl eating sausage biscuits out of torn sack on the kitchen counter.

Dark humor and fugitive owls? I was in.

The eight stories in this book, ranging from two pages to a novella in size, are pretty funny. In that terrible, the world is messed up, these poor saps, geez that isn’t going to work out kind of way. In a laugh or cry or possibly both sort of way, which is what I’d expect if George Saunders thinks it’s funny. It’s hopeful, too, only the hope isn’t the most immediately obvious thing. He does have characters unexpectedly die of a snakebites in the first thirty page or so, after all.

If you are looking for good and twisted short stories without crossing the line into bitter darkness, Pendarvis is for you. Recommended.