Woody Allen can be funny sometimes. I like his work when he writes coherently: 'If the Impressionists Had Been Dentists', 'Fine Times: An Oral Memoir', and 'The UFO Menace' were all amusing to me. Unfortunately in most of pieces in this book, the humour relies on the insertion of unexpectedly incongruous phrases or nouns (for instance, "...a comely New England schoolteacher whose specialty is baking bread and then placing it on her head")- and unless there is a clever double meaning, I don't find that inherently funny.

I also find Allen's fixation on sexual pursuit to be a bit off-putting. It's the theme of much of his writing, and it gets boring after a while.

I read the first half of this and then just skimmed the rest.

To be donated to the truly enormous, truly fabulous CBC/Calgary Reads Annual Big Book Sale. Will be available for sale, at an incredible bargain price, along with over 100,000 other secondhand books, May 8-11, 2020 at the Calgary Curling Club. Proceeds to a great cause- the promotion of children’s literacy in our community.