The Financial Lives of the Poets: A Novel

Having just finished Beautiful Ruins, I couldn't wait to get my hands on another Jess Walter book. The first half of The Financial Lives of the Poets was a delight, -- beautifully written, at times hilarious, and so topical. I loved the cynical, beaten down, yet slyly humorous voice of the narrator, the journalism references, the evocation of the recent financial meltdown with all its villains and struggles. The poetry was wonderful, too. But midway through, I thought the novel really jumped the shark. The plot veered from gentle satire to something over-the-top, and the tone grew darker.I'm still a huge fan, but this book didn't quite fulfill the expectations I had at the outset.

Walter hilariously captures postmodern-finance, late-housing-bubble America and its desperate delusions of wealth and entitlement. The Financial Lives of the Poets is a fast-paced, culturally literate story about becoming an adult and accepting -- even appreciating -- the corresponding responsibilities and limitations. The book especially rings true for business reporters who chronicled the mania, who saw the end coming, for the crowd and for their own careers -- but couldn't stop rooting for everything to hold out just a little longer.

Because of the bargain price, I've discovered Jess Walter and will happily pay more for the next book of his that I buy. Great satire and good story. Coincidentally I am in the 3rd season of "Breaking Bad" (doing a catchup on netflix) and I would call this "Breaking Bad" Lite.

Jess Walter writes here in the tradition of James Thurber, E. B. White, and Peter DeVries. This is one of the very best books of 2009, at once a mid-life crisis novel, a work of social and political criticism, and a comic romp.

The prose is constantly engaging, witty throughout, sparkling here and there with gems of insight, fresh and delightful turns of phrase, irony within irony. The story is built around the economic downturn and the ensuing consequences that rain down on individual families, a parable for our time. There are several surprising twists in the plot. Don't read reviews that will give them away, but wait to discover them in the book.

The picture on the face of the dustjacket is of a man in free-fall toward the dark land below against the sunset-orange of the October sky. Fittingly the narrative takes place in October, traditionally the month of market crashes and Halloween. It is much more attractive than the the store picture suggests, a treat to behold, easy to open and easy to read.

When the awards are passed out for best novels of the year, this one should be on the short list.

I found this novel to be without direction and, frankly, boring. Couldn't find anything redeeming about it and deleted if from my Kindle. I find it hard to believe this was written by the same author as Beautiful Ruins.

Walter uses current events to stage many of her novels, and maybe the currency of this one was what made me like it less. Lost job, home about to be foreclosed -- what good can come of that? And not much does in the novel.

After finishing Beautiful Ruins, I was excited to read more from Jess. His voice and writing style is witty, creative and hilarious but the premiss was a little too far fetched and depressing really. I was hoping for a better ending....

The nickname was the most entertaining part.
You can take that to heart.

I'm not into novels about drugs and spineless men,
but then again...

This book group selection.
Was not at my direction.

And the poetry in this book
Like mine is not worth a second look.

The wit and intelligence of Jess Walter is so vividly on display here with this now slightly dated 2009 manifesto of big America screwing the little guy, that I'd not only recommend it to readers who are interested in serious but yet vexingly clever fiction along with the sheer construct of language, but also to those who enjoy the beauty of cynicism and the dripping irony that's pervasive in literally each sentence. Walter's ability to carry forth with the depths of desperation, capitulation and despair on so many fronts while maintaining a contiguous relationship with the reader borders on brilliance. We all seem to descend into the mire with him.

Matthew Prior is our late 40s protagonist...suddenly out of work with two children to support along with an indifferent and possibly unfaithful wife and a father who's sliding quickly into dementia. We initially follow as he, at first, earnestly attempts to "right the ship," searching for work while looking for a mortgage extension. Explaining that his first goal was to start an online business blog superimposed with creative poetry, we know intuitively that we're dealing with an above average intellect. In fact this is Walter's point I believe...taking smart, above average middle-america and showing how still disturbingly close "we" all are to financial ruin. The obvious take with this work though is Walter's splendid ability to meld this despair into a rollicking story full of diverse, hilarious but nevertheless fallible and believable characters. You'll be quaking with laughter as you turn the pages to see what Matt's up to next.

For anyone who's not experienced Jess Walter's work, please take it from me that you need to drop what you're reading right now and pick up any one of his growing body of works. I myself still haven't read his acclaimed masterpiece, "Beautiful Ruins" but what I have read thus far convinces me that we have a major talent on our hands and one who should be read from first publication to last. Yes, he's that good!

There are some brilliant pages in this book, in addition to many very good, many mediocre and "just ok" pages. Initially I thought it was jus a superficial little funny story, but around the middle of the book I realized that the author had much more serious intentions and worked very hard on some pages, delivering some serious reflections on the American Dream etc. The last 70 pages of the story dissolve into nothing and actually invalidate the points made previously, but I don't want to go into the details and tell anybody how it ends. The intention to end on a hopeful note after all the trouble seems just an easy way out, almost a proscribed way to finish ("how can it end any other way?"). The end was a disappointment for me. It felt flat.

I started The Financial Lives of the Poets because I loved Jess Walter's latest novel, Beautiful Ruins, so much. Matt Prior is in the middle of a mid-life crisis, which through his own choices, rapidly escalates to a mid-life catastrophe. He quits his job as a newspaper financial reporter to create poetfolio.com, a web site that combines investment advice and poetry. That goes over as well as a realistic person might predict, but it's also just the tip of the iceberg. Matt's wife is having a text/Facebook/in person affair with a guy from Lumberland after she has filled their garage with crap from eBay and failed to resell it, and his senile father has to move in after losing everything to a stripper. Matt is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy and foreclosure, when he meets Skeet and Jamie one night at the local 7-11. They introduce him to designer marijuana, and Matt gets the brilliant idea to cash in his miniscule 401(k) and use the proceeds to buy and sell marijuana. This is how he will dig himself out of his financial chasm, but this plan also goes as well as a rational person might predict.

Matt is an interesting protagonist, very well-written by Walter. One of the most interesting things about him is that he seems to be quite aware of the financial, emotional, and bureaucratic messes that he (and our society) have made, yet he goes on making increasingly desperate decisions. Walter doesn't write Matt as hapless, so we cheer for his indomitability while shaking our heads at his incompetence. Ordinarily a character like this might irritate me, but Jess Walter's amazing writing made this a pleasure to read. Matt does learn a lesson that we should all take notice of: "The edge is so close to where we live."

I was strangely attracted to this book in part because the main character is so foolishly annoying and also because Walter's writing style is like a long running poem that pulls me along. It was sort of like sitting on a train moving at a speed just fast enough that you can't jump off without hurting yourself. The protagonist does monumentally stupid things like get high with dangerous characters in the middle of night when he should be home with his family because he is just a few days away from getting his house repossessed, but the way Walter portrays his hopeless and somewhat witless view of life, getting high with thugs sounds about as logical as anything else he could do. I found myself not wanting anything bad to happen to this guy, even though he pretty much deserved it for being such a putz. ". . .I went out for milk and ended up baking my wounded skull."

The plot was funny and pathetic at the same time, and the tone of the book skated just enough above hopelessness to make me want to keep reading. ["I remember my mom's underwear. . .we folded those things awkwardly, like fitted sheets. We snapped them like tablecloths."] I prefer the quirky story to the linear and neatly tied up one. The style of "Financial Lives" reminded me just a little of "An Arsonist's Guide to Author's Houses in New England" because the main character, Matt, makes terrible decisions that bring bad results and you just know things are not ever going to really get any better. He goes to the lumber store to see his wife's former flame because she is trying to rekindle that relationship on the side. Of course one wants the person a spouse is flirting/cheating with to be a loser, but after Matt's encounter with Chuck as a pretend customer who wants to build a tree house for his kids, Matt can truly see why his wife is attracted to this guy. Chuck is in shape, he has a job, and he knows how to do guy things like build a tree house for kids.

Walter's "Financial Lives" carries its energy like a bleeding person who keeps telling you funny things even though you're sure he's going to fall over any moment, but you can't stop laughing under your breath. No matter how bad things get for Matt, he doesn't seem to let himself take it for the seriousness it deserves. It's maddening and compelling. This book is for those who prefer their literature to be character driven and with stylistic energy.

Author Jess Walter applies his acerbic wit and sharp observations to the plight of a middle aged guy wallowing in the financially unraveled world of 2009. Matt's timing was exquisite: buying a house at the top of the bubble in an inappropriately upscale neighborhood, sending his kids to a private school, quitting what was a safe job at the time, following the advice of financial and real estate self-styled experts touting clichéd truisms, riding his sinking stock portfolio to the abyss, and, most significantly, starting a financial advice website written in poetry (you have to read the book!) Of course, all of these factors lead to a multitude of bad choices, bred from his desperate attempts to save his house and teetering marriage.

Walters disgust with the economic system ultimately responsible for these events is palpable. Although the tale is infused with humor, scathing and otherwise, the intensity of his barbs leaves one with the sense that we're reading a political scream reflecting the author's personal views. At this point in time the anger seems a bit over the top or dated, especially given the self pity Matt expresses and the obviously foolish choices made. But again, Walters' humorous approach saves all.

Financial Lives has a point of view made palatable by wickedly funny writing. You'll laugh out load in spots and nod knowingly at others.

Walter is a writer who writes completely human characters into his books. They may be different from you and me, but their actions and motivations have a lovely inner logic. You can watch the desperation and belief that there must be a way back to the good life of the main character in this book lead him from one bad decision to another. Some of them are not even really bad decisions as much as foolishly just playing along.

Set at the start of the financial downturn, the main character is a typical financially overextended urbanite. His desperate need to keep the family home, car etc and not fail the people he loves leads to some fairly questionable decisions. Dealing with kids, creditors, possible infidelity of his partner, and a refound interest in recreational drugs exposes to us the essentially nice, but slightly ineffective nature of the character.

Amongst the plot and story are numerous moments that will just make you burst out laughing. I had heaps of questions from friends and strangers as to what I was laughing at, most of them read a bit over my shoulder and laughed as well. Its really good satire and I look forward to diving into his next book.

Jess Walter makes us look at facets of our own character that may be not the best bits, but look at them fondly, even if we might wish to change them.

Jess Walters is one of this generation's most talented writers of modern literature (think Hemingway, E.B. White, Erwin Shaw).And in much the same vein, one has to appreciate--or at least tolerate--true literature in general to enjoy this entry. It is witty, full of trendy verbage, unique metaphors and anecdotes. But the subject matter is slice-of-life, and a miserable one at that. Of course, that's what literature is all about. Walters delves into Matt Prior's mid-life crisis in an era of layoffs, divorces, one-parent families, sociable drug addicts, and the like. Had anyone else tackled this subject matter, you would put the volume down after page ten. Walters holds you with his uncanny ability to narrate a dull story well enough that you can't wait to see what happens to the poor schmuck next. It is wordy, shockingly accurate, and self-absorbed. It's also very good, and most of the time, you don't know why you're enjoying it.
If you've never read a Jess Walters book, start with "Beautiful Ruins", his latest delivery which, in my opinion, shows he is approaching the top of his game. It has a plot, loveable characters, exotic locales: everything this book doesn't have. Of course, once you're hooked on Walter's writing style, you'll be searching for all the old books too, just like me. He is a writer that MUST be read, despite what he writes about, and regardless of whether you come away from the experience with a warm and fuzzy feeling. That's was Hemingway's schtick, remember? It'll work for Walters too.

Jump in with both feet and read this witty, darkly comic tale of financial, moral and marital ruin. Matt Prior is a former newspaper reporter with a mortgage in forbearance (six days until eviction), two boys at a private school, and a wife contemplating an affair, when he encounters a couple of potheads at the 7-11 store and gets sucked into their world. Oh, and his father is senile and has to live with them. The story is interspersed with poetry, which Matt aspired to write when he quit his reporting job and started a financial poetry business, inspired as he is by stock averages and the promise of high returns. Matt, like many of us, was living closer to the edge than he realized, and the fall was easy. My favorite line: This meeting is as predictable as coffin shopping.

Things go from bad to worse before the end of the book, but I won't wreck the ending for you here.

A former financial journalist decides to branch out into a new, innovative field - financial news presented in poetic form! Unfortunately poetfolio.com doesn't take off and leaves him with a mountain of debt. Couple that with his wife's eBay addiction, his weeks of unemployment, and the financial crash of 2008 and he soon finds himself 1 week away from eviction from his dream house. At a loose end one night, he encounters some stoners and begins to think about dealing weed to get out of his immediate cash troubles. Add to this his wife pursuing an old high school crush via Facebook, his dementia-ridden father who was bilked out of his savings and house by a stripper and her boyfriend, and the perils of the drug dealing world, and you have "The Financial Lives of the Poets".

I loved Jess Walter's book "Citizen Vince" and followed it immediately with "The Zero", a more experimental difficult read that I failed to finish and which put me off Walter for a bit. I'm glad I came back to check out his latest though as it was a fantastic novel with some excellent characters and a brilliant storyline. I particularly enjoyed/cringed at Matt (the main character) and his wife Lisa's strained marriage as the tension between them builds and the distance between them grows. It felt very real and was the first time I'd seen some of the less positive effects of Facebook reflected in a novel. Matt's encounters with the drug dealers was also interesting with a paranoid lawyer thrown into the mix making for lively conversations.

I would ignore the Nick Hornby blurb which claims that it's an hilarious book as it really isn't. Some of the scenes are light hearted and a bit silly but overall it's a serious novel. This isn't a bad thing though as the writing is top notch, the story doesn't need gags to keep the reader interested, and the characters are wonderfully realised to keep you invested in what happens to them. Matt's relationship with his dementia addled father is particularly touching. Also the ending is remarkably good, Walter showing he is a writer who can write all aspects of a novel brilliantly, beginnings, middles and ends, a rare thing in writers.

One of the best novels I've read all year, original, well written, imaginative, with great characters, a fast moving and interesting story. I can't recommend this higher to anyone looking for a good book to read.

The Financial Lives of Poets is the story of Matthew Prior, a newspaper reporter who quit his job to start a financial website written in poetry. Seriously. Not surprisingly, this venture has failed, and Matthew now finds his marriage less happy than it once was, his father (in the early stages of dementia) living with them, his sons wishing for electronics, their house on the verge of foreclosure, and himself increasingly desperate.

This novel took me on a roller coaster of a reading experience. I absolutely adored the first few chapters. I was reading it in public and could not stop myself from laughing out loud. The narrative began smart, funny and fresh, as when he describes the uniforms his sons wear to Catholic school:

"I think these uniforms wouldn't be so bad if they didn't make the kids all look like bank tellers on casual Friday or the employees of a discount airline or--like me..."

Throughout the book, the hilarious observations share space with thoughtful musings on life and love:

"Our marriage was typical, I think; we deluded ourselves that it was made of rock-solid stuff, but there were trace elements of regret, seams of I-told-you-so, cracks of martyrdom."

The book began delightfully, but it soon descended into a satire so dark it was sometimes depressing. The push and pull between funny and dire fell out of balance for me at times, and I enjoyed the middle part of the book less than the rest. Even while I was not enjoying it completely, I still couldn't put it down, which is more a testament to Walter's writing than storytelling ability. I also laughed out loud more with this book than with any other in recent memory.When the story didn't move me, the writing still did. By the end, I was back on board with the story too. I may not have ended up loving it as much as I did in the early chapters, but I'm still glad I read it, and I think it's a solid, if not slightly unbalanced novel. It's certainly not for everyone, but I'm glad I read it, and I will look forward to more Jess Walter novels in the future.

This book definitely isn't for everyone, but I recommend it to fans of smart, dark humor and those who don't mind a little raunch with their literary fiction.

I have to admit, a novel titled The Financial Lives of The Poets is not something I would normally rush to read. Why would I care about finance and poets? But since people I respect raved about this book, I gave it a try.

I'm so glad I did! Jess Walter has written a dazzling story of a young suburban family in the throws of the national economic crisis that threatens not only their financial stability but their very existence as a family unit.

Matt left his job as a business writer at a newspaper to follow his dream- a website devoted to financial news, with advice columns written in poetry. Even in the best of times, this sounds like a risky venture. Matt and his wife Lisa take another mortgage on their house to invest in the company, and then the housing market crashes.

Matt goes back to his job at the newspaper, only to be laid off when newspapers begin to lose advertisers and readers. Lisa works at a boring job she hates for little money and expresses her dissatisfaction by buying collectibles that she hopes to resell on Ebay. Now their garage is filled with boxes of junk she is unable to unload.

Their house will soon be in foreclosure, and their children will be forced to leave their lovely Catholic school and go to the dangerous neighborhood public school. Matt's father, who suffers from dementia, has moved in with them after he met a stripper who stole all of his money, and Lisa is contemplating an affair with her old boyfriend. What's a man to do?

After Matt meets up with some young potheads at the 7-11 one night, he becomes enmeshed in their lives. He hangs out with them hoping to forget his troubles. Eventually, as sometimes happens when under the influence of pot, a plan is created that Matt hopes will solve his money problems.

The author writes well for his characters. The disintegrating marriage of Matt and Lisa is sad to watch.
"We're in a perpetual stalemate here; lost. I can see how we got here- after each bad decision, after each failure we quietly logged our blame, our petty resentments; we constructed a case against each other that we never prosecuted. As long as both cases remained unstated, the charges sealed, we had a tacit peace; you don't mention this and I won't mention that, this and that growing and changing and becoming everything, until the only connection between us was this bridge of quiet guilt and recrimination."
While Lisa and Matt fall apart, Matt's relationship with his dad is so touching. Anyone who has someone in their own family with dementia will relate to Matt and his dad, the loving patience Matt shows his father, the loss of a once-proud man's self-reliance.

Fans of Jonathan Tropper's This Is Where I Leave You should run to get this book. As a woman, I find this glimpse into the male psyche fascinating. (The cover is even reminiscent of TV's Mad Men opening credits with the falling man.) Matt's poetry is cleverly sprinkled throughout the book, adding an extra dimension for the reader. Walter's look at the economic crisis through the prism of this one family is an emotional, poignant ride.

Like many other readers, I bought this book because I absolutely loved Beautiful Ruins. Unfortunately, this book doesn't come close to the quality level of the other book. It was very depressing, and the main character started out so unlikable that I almost didn't finish it. I stuck with it anyway and the last quarter of the book it got better. There were some funny moments, but nothing that was laugh out loud funny as some other reviewers have stated. Overall, a decent book, but I would pass on this type of story in the future.

This was an enjoyable read & once I picked it up, I zipped through it much more quickly than I expected. Matt Prior is the narrator & I have to admit that at first I felt he was self-indulgent (I didn't care that that was the point), I didn't much like his wife either (I loved the children & Matt's father) but somehow I was pulled in & felt that I wanted everything to work out for he & his family eventhough he was making decisions high on the epicly stupid list. The main of the story takes place over a series of days as the foreclosure of the Prior's house looms & when Matt's plan finally goes completely off the rails, I was just relieved. I was rooting for the family to lose everything except each other because I couldn't take the crazy anymore.

Though satire, I must say that this pulled at my heart a bit. It felt a little crazy but I cared what happened to the characters. The ending was happier than I expected & I enjoyed that as well. Jess Walter certainly didn't disappoint.

Reason #269 why you should try authors you've never heard of: you might miss out on a book like this one! About six pages in, I knew I was going to LOVE this book. The sense of humor (smart yet sophomoric, sarcastic yet self-depreciating) is what roped me in, and despite the bleak prospects faced by our "hero" Matt Prior (crumbling marriage, unemployment, impending foreclosure, demented dad), I found myself giggling to myself on almost every page. This is laugh-out-loud recession novel that reminded me (in the best possible way) of Jonathan Tropper, who is also a master at mixing humor and tragedy while keeping things real. This was a delight of a book that hit the sweet spot of what I look for in contemporary fiction. I'm so glad to get to know you, Jess Walter! I look forward to reading what else you've written... if it is half as good as this book, I know I'll love it!

Wandering through the aftermath of the housing bubble, the protagonist of Jess Walter's very funny book offers us wry and achingly honest commentary on everything from the death of newspapers to the transportation choices of drug dealers. For example, he confides in us that he is little disturbed that his pot dealer drives a Nissan Maxima - the same car he himself drives.

Our narrator knows of what he speaks - he's an out of work newspaper reporter, on the verge of losing his house and his wife, (she's taken to hours of solo Facebook-ing with handsome old classmates,) when he suddenly finds himself getting high with some burnouts at the local mini-mart. Next thing we know, he is off and running on a scheme that he hopes will set everything right.

The author, Jess Walters, is a very sly satirist. As the hero acerbically dispenses his hilarious wisdom throughout the story, we become his ally even as we marvel at his naivete. More important though, Walters makes one heckuva statement on our ability to deceive ourselves over and over and over again.

The plot is a bit derivative of some mainstream popular culture right now, and Walters does flinch - he veers into sentimentality now and then, especially as the book moves to its close. But its a really good novel that taps into the way we live right now better than most movies, books or television seem to be doing.

After finishing and falling in love with Jess Walter's New York Times Bestselling novel "Beautiful Ruins" recently, I'm happy to say that "The Financial Lives of the Poets" did not disappoint. "The Financial Lives . . . " is Walter's fifth novel ("Beautiful Ruins" being his sixth) and tells the story of journalist Matt Prior, who quit his job as a business reporter to start a website in which he was going to give stock market advice in free-verse poetry. Unfortunately, along comes the financial meltdown of 2008 and Matt finds himself unemployed and in dire straits. Facing bankruptcy, his mortgage upside down, his marriage in crisis, Matt turns to . . . something illegal. The story is by turns hilarious and heart-breaking--and often both at once. Walter's prose is high-energy, lyrical and it's no coincidence that he created a protagonist with a poetic bent. This exhilarating book probes the depths of human fate, relationships and modern life in America and comes up smiling and breathing deeply. Walters is one of the best and most agile novelists writing in this country today.

I bought this after reading Beautiful Ruins which is by far one of the best novels I've read this year, hoping for more of the same. Financial Lives is, at least through the first half, not that: it's a full-on farce with a hysterical plot line and comical (sometimes tragi-comical) characters. I don't often laugh publicly on planes while reading, but couldn't help myself with this compact and witty novel. In the end, though, the book turns out to be a very insightful portrait of the stresses of marriage, loaded down with kids, aging and ailing parents, an aging and ailing parent in the house, and serious financial problems. When all the laughs subside, though, Walter's portrayal of this modern marriage under siege did bring me back to the more mature and richer writing of Beautiful Ruins, so I got what I came for, and a lot more along the way. Highly recommended.

Synopsis:
Successful throughout his life, Matt Prior finds himself in the unexpected position of being unemployed, deeply in debt and weeks away from losing his home. Things have been difficult at home and he can't bare to tell his wife the true state of their finances. Matt continues with the everyday life - caring for the children, applying for jobs, negotiating with their mortgage lender, and the usual household chores. When one late night, Matt discovers a possible solution - wacky and dangerous though it may be - to solve their financial hell, he decides to give it a go.

Review: In Jess Walter's The Financial Lives of the Poets, Matt Prior goes on a hilarious and absurd adventure triggered by today's financial crisis. Matt has his own crooked logic that will leave you chuckling, whether he's plotting ways to sabotage his wife's flirtation with her high school boyfriend or eke revenge against M_ who laid him or finding ways to reassure his father during his slow descent to senility. A fun and crazy ride - highly recommended!

Publisher: Harper (September 22, 2009), 304 pages.
Review copy courtesy of TLC Book Tours.

After reading BEAUTIFUL RUINS, I had to read another Jess Walter book. THE FINANCIAL LIVES OF THE POETS was the perfect choice. In this novel, Walter manages to turn a bad situation into an hilarious social commentary. While buying a nine dollar gallon of milk at the local 7-eleven, our hero Matt runs into a couple stoners who provide the perfect straight men for Walter's smart, edgy narrative. No spoilers here, you have to read this to find out why Matt earns the name "Slippers," and how Matt gets the lumber to build a tree fort for a yard without a tree. The narrative is so packed with witty banter, absurd circumstances, and laugh-out-loud humor that it might be easy for some readers to miss the author's brilliant take on our current financial disaster. But it's there, right beneath the poignant story of a marriage and a family in the midst of the nation's worst fiscal crisis since the depression.
Thin Places

For everyone who put their faith in the American dream, the bubble that would never burst, this book is for them. Matt Prior - the desperate narrator of The Financial Lives of the Poets - is truly everyman...a basically good person who is now scrambling to stay marginally solvent in the wake of the huge financial crash.

Matt hasn't had it so good recently: he left a dying career in journalism (in one of the most scathing and accurate indictments I've read about modern-day newspapers) to develop a whimsical website using free verse poetry to dispense financial advice. Needless to say, not a huge market.

On top of that, his shopaholic wife is on the verge of an affair with her hunky ex-boyfriend. His father, suffering from dementia, is sitting in the midst of his living room with the plaintive question, "Do you know what I miss?" The answer is inevitably either chipped beef or The Rockford Files. His two young sons may need to give up private school and enter a public school that's the equivalent of the Iraqi combat zone. Oh, and have I mentioned that Matt's accountant has just told him that he has "fiscal Ebola?

He truly does. Based on bad financial advice to go for forbearance, a $31,000 balloon payment to the mortgage company is overdue, leading to almost immediate foreclosure. Small wonder, then, that Matt is attracted to two young stoners whom he meets in the 711 and cooks up a scheme...why not sell pot at a profit to get himself out of the hole?

Yes, it sounds humorous - and it is. But Jess Walter revs it up a notch and addresses all the Matts in the world. Matt ruminates, "It's almost as if Lisa and I deserve this. Or believe we do. And I don't think we're alone. It's as if the whole country believes we've done something to deserve this collapse, this global warming, this endless war...We've lived beyond our means, spent the future, sapped resources, lived on the bubble."

At the end of the day, the blistering wisecracks and hold-on-to-your-seat twists and turns are secondary to the lesson imparted: that life is not meant to be fair, that our fantasies of what life "should" be is nothing compared to what really matters. Another recommended book that mines these themes: The Pursuit of Other Interests by Jim Kokoris.

I think readers always have the "where did you get your idea" question running through their minds when they're reading a book. But, really man, how do you come up with financial poetry? Then how do you turn financial poetry into a book about a suburban dad who decides after endless economic hits to become a drug dealer with some dudes he meets outside 7-11 while picking up milk for his kids breakfast.

I was explaining "The Financial Lives of the Poets" to my husband last night when I finished it and had to say "I know it sounds nuts but it's a great book". How can you not love a story about a newspaper business reporter who quits his job to launch a financial poetry website (WT....) only to find out the idea won't fly (really??) then gets stuck in the endless whirlpool of today's economic crisis? Then while trying to figure out a way to save his house and his way of life, becomes a drug dealer. This story never went where I thought it was going and I loved every minute of it. It made me laugh and think and there's not much more you can ask for in a book.

The copy I have happens to be a PS edition which has extras at the end of the book including the incident that inspired to story. More and more books I'm getting are the PS editions and I have to say I love them. I really like being involved in what went into creating art. I love good dedications and acknowledgments too. I love feeling like I'm in the know of what goes on behind the pages of books I love. I hope more and more publishers come out with these editions. As for Jess Walter, I think I'll be checking out his other works and if he ever does decide to start up a financial poetry website I may just have to check it out. (Full disclosure: I received this book free from Harper Collins)

In all honesty, the title of this book, the cover too... this would have been a book that I more than likely would have passed on if I had seen it in the book store. I am here now writing this review telling you not to do that! When Matt Prior loses his job he finds himself wallowing in reruns of The Rockford Files and becoming more paranoid about his wife's on line flirtations.... when Matt winds up with an opportunity to sell drugs to help out his financial woes, at this point only days away from losing his home and pulling his kids out of a private school... he jumps into a humorous look at what people will do at the breaking point.

I would say in today's world of economic uncertainties this book is surely a timely fictitious story of riches to rags... to living with the knowledge that it is possible to take a deep breath and live within our means... even if our means isn't what we had hoped and dreamed. There are more important things than money, big homes, and two cars.... and Matt Prior takes the long way around to finding this out.

Jess Walter is fast becoming my favorite writer. I started with BEAUTIFUL RUINS, my favorite novel of 2012, then rewound back to OVER TUMBLED GRAVES, LAND OF THE BLIND, CITIZEN VINCE, RUBY RIDGE and now this hilarious yarn of how not to survive the recession. In the first 30 or so pages, Walter had me roaring with laughter at his anti-hero's antics which begin with a foray to 7-11 for milk. And it just takes off from there. He does get a little long-winded at times and the action stalls occasionally, but overall it's a breezy, trippy read. As with RUINS, Walter has a knack of wrapping up his stories with a lovely bow that feels earned instead of contrived. Terrific stuff.

After reading Jess Walter's most recent novel 'Beautiful Ruins' and being very, very impressed by it, I was interested to read more, and picked up 'The Financial Lives of the Poets' his 2009 novel about a man dealing with the fallout from the financial crisis. It's another fine piece of writing, combining strong social/political damnation of our current political/business system with satire, funny characters and whip smart writing. The plot gets a little hard to believe at points, but it's such a fun read that you are willing to give it a pass. Highly recommended. Mr. Walter is 2 for 2 with me, I may have to try another of his novels!!