I Love You More Than You Know

Book #6 on my list this year was Jonathan Ames' I Love You More Than You Know, a collection of essays published between 1998 and 2005.

This is a anthology that's very hit-or-miss. There are a few great pieces like the superb "Everybody Dies in Memphis" (previously published in The Insomniac Reader) and "I Called Myself El Cid", but there are also some self-absorbed clunkers like "'Tis the Season for Halitosis" and "My Wiener is Damaged". Taken on the whole it's a decent read although I found it a bit disappointing in comparison to the other Ames works I've read.

I do have to give Ames kudos though for this hilarious insight addressing the current plethora of Jonathan writers, a coincendence that I'm sure has thrown more people than just me for a loop:

"So I've destroyed my name with the things I've written, and what's made it worse is that there are so many young writers named Jonathan, with whom by comparison I suffer terribly, furthering the damage I've already done to myself. There's Franzen, Lethem, Dee, a Brit named Coe, and this new young writer Safran Foer...I have to say with all these Jonathans running around, it's like we're the Brothers Karamazov, and I see myself as the sickly, subnormal brother who is always wandering off into the black Russian forest and is found screwing sap holes in trees." -- Jonathan Ames "Self-Sentenced My Life as a Writer the Last Few Years"