Wednesday, March 22, 2006

Just a Geek, by Wil Wheaton

Just a Geek: Unflinchingly honest tales of the search for life, love, and fulfillment beyond the Starship Enterprise, by Wil Wheaton

My second geek book in a row, but this one was a much more pleasant experience! Where it took me a couple of weeks of effort to digest the dry prose of Leading Geeks, the dry wit found in Just a Geek was consumed in a couple of hours. This is the story of how a waning celebrity came to terms with himself and started his second career.

There are some great Star Trek anecdotes here, good vision into what happens behind the scenes at cons. He also talks about various auditions and acting gigs—an enlightening look at world that is completely foreign to me. In my favorite vignette he describes an amazingly harsh imaginary response to an insulting audition:

“I’ve been working my ass off to give you this performance, and even though I can tell that you’re not interested in me at all, I’m going to fucking do this, okay? ... So why don’t you all just lighten the fuck up, and respect the fact that I came in here to do this stupid song and dance for your noncreative asses?!”
Well, that’s not exactly true. I said something more like, “Oh. Well, thanks for seeing me,” and I walked out of the room.

Priceless stuff, and exactly the kind of diatribe I carry on in my own mind constantly but never have the balls to say. One of these days...

While most of the stories are related to Wheaton’s acting career, the writing takes center stage here. I enjoy Wheaton’s blog and was curious how his style would translate into a full-length book. Quite well, as it turns out, although a fair portion of the text comes directly from his online entries. He carries the narrative well, though, stitching the stories behind the blog together fairly seamlessly. To use an analogy, if the blog was a DVD, this book would be a commentary track. Unlike many commentaries, though, this one rocks!

First Sentence:
On a hot June afternoon in 2000, I joined my best friend Darin for lunch at one of our teenage haunts, Old Town Pasadena.

No comments:

Search This Blog