A Bowl of Fruit, a Whale in the Woods [Paperback]

Russel Like (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Greg Fisher finds a pair of glasses in his apartment that, he discovers during a fit of existential boredom, allows him to travel through paintings to alternate realities. It stops being fun and games, though, after Greg jumps into a German expressionist painting and lands in a totalitarian world governed by Ceausescu, who rules by means of mind-control hats. Ceausescu's soldiers start taking over other worlds, including ours. Greg and an alternate-world researcher, a painter so afraid of cults that he has people fill out a questionnaire before he'll talk to them, a man who lives by finding change on the sidewalk, a woman prone to lightning strikes, and a biologist must save all the worlds affected by Ceausescu. Their successful strategy is brilliant, but it comes almost too late, for the mind-control devices have spread throughout most human-populated worlds and have followed Greg and company to a world on which giant squids compete over the best eggplant recipe. Full of spectacularly odd worlds; frantic, bumbling adventure; and triumphant world-saving. Regina Schroeder
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Product Details

• Paperback: 268 pages
• Publisher: Brunswick Galaxy Press (September 5, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0966103912
• ISBN-13: 978-0966103915
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.1 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,053,235 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the Genre's Best-kept Secrets..., June 18, 2004

By 

hikeeba_com (Tallahassee, FL USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Bowl of Fruit, a Whale in the Woods (Paperback)

Perhaps, the planets are aligned improperly or his hair is the wrong texture or people prefer the taste of Coca-Cola to RC.... Who knows why Russel Like has not gotten the attention he deserves? The only question we can really answer is, should we read his books? If you didn't answer with a resounding "yes," it can only be because you haven't read one. In a genre where humour is generally laid on in a lumpy layer of slapstick and puns, Like's books are in a class by themselves. Funny, wicked, clever, thought-provoking, and wildly imaginative -- A BOWL OF FRUIT, just like AFTER THE BLUE, is a comic delight. His characterss would seem absurd if they weren't so much like the people you sit and the dinner table with on holidays. Or, maybe they are more like the people you pass on the street and feel an urge to follow, merely because of something they were mumbling. Like's books give off the same kind of allure, and, if you are smart, you'll follow wherever they lead.

5.0 out of 5 stars I Read Him When, June 11, 2004

By 

Matthew Corry (Hackettstown, NJ) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Bowl of Fruit, a Whale in the Woods (Paperback)

I feel as if I've gotten in on the ground floor of something that's going to be huge! When Russel Like inevitably collects his first "best book" or "best movie" award, I'll be able to say, "I read him when."

If you like science fiction and/or humor, then you MUST read, "A Bowl Of Fruit, A Whale in the Woods." If you don't like science fiction and/or humor, you should read it anyway, because Russel Like simply uses the genre as an opportunity to look at - and more important, to show his readers - everyday occurrences in delightful new ways.

Image what Dave Barry would be like in a slightly awry alternate reality, and you have a glimpse of what Like is like in "A Bowl of Fruit."

Enjoy!

5.0 out of 5 stars Wild, whimsical, eccentric, and uproariously funny!, May 18, 2004

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Bowl of Fruit, a Whale in the Woods (Paperback)

His career uninspired and his personal life unrelentingly tedious, Greg Fisher started to mess around with a special device that would embroil him with alternative realities. Author Russel Like has an original, somewhat quirky, and always entertaining flair for writing the kinds of stories that are so easy to pick up and so hard to put down! A Bowl Of Fruit, A Whale In The Woods is especially recommended for science fiction and fantasy fans who like their tales wild, whimsical, eccentric, and uproariously funny!