Customer Reviews

Hilarity Ensues

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I'll give him this: Tucker entertains. His stories are for the most part well written, and his third book is a fun and easy, albeit frivolous read. As usual, a good chunk of the book is just emails to and from his friends, some dating back years. That, coupled with multiple pages dedicated to his "sexting" with his core fan base, i.e. immature and insecure teenage girls, sort of undermines his claim of being a prolific writer.

Tucker is at his best when he writes about his friends' various idiosyncrasies. The chapter about his friend Hate was by far the funniest, containing some exemplary wit.

He is absolutely at his worst when he gives life advice. The "wisdom" he imparts is shallow, hackneyed, and hardly conducive to forming good character. At one point in the book, he suggests that kids shouldn't listen to anything their parents say, that they should just follow their own rules and the hell with the norm. So, when your dad preaches the importance of virtues such as loyalty, honor, fortitude, and honesty, just ignore the old man. Very rebellious, Tucker! This is painfully cliched and unenlightened advice.

By far the most disturbing chapter is on Miss Vermont.

It reveals a vindictive, pathologically narcissistic, and petty side of Tucker. He takes extreme pride in destroying a young, innocent girl for absolutely no good reason. He comes off as border-line sadistic in challenging Miss Vermont to write her version of events. Miss Vermont didn't want stories about her private sexual encounters published on the internet (who would?), yet Tucker takes delight in revealing intimate details about their relationship. Worse, he hides under the first amendment to justify his actions. Tucker fancies himself as a champion of free speech, when the real story is Tucker's cowardice in continuing to taunt a girl, whose privacy he had already shamelessly violated. Tucker feigns indignation at Miss Vermont's hypocrisy--her preaching chastity on the one hand, and not living up to it on the other. And that is apparently good enough reason for Tucker to go after her with a religious like fervor. He almost exudes moral righteousness that comes off as incredibly petty, creepy and vengeful. In short, the Miss Vermont story makes him look really small, vindictive and cowardly.

Hilarity Ensues is a fun read--with the salient exception of the Miss Vermont chapter--but it belies Tucker's delusion that he has grown or that he is an exceptional writer. He is still petty, at times bitter, and never particularly insightful.

Vacuous, juvenile, narcisstic babble. Target audience is teenage virgins with zero life experiences. Judging from the blogger scribbling attempts at plot development, dynamics, or even the most basic coherency...one would assume that is who wrote it.

Here's a synopsis of a typical groundbreaking "hilarious" story. Author goes somewhere with loser friends. Like a catty girl, he makes snarky comments about them constantly, while bragging about himself. Story is a yawnfest, so he exaggerates it into an epic legend. Insert love interest; an overweight, ugly girl. He insults her with lines he thought of over the last six months, while writing the book. Add a token gross event, or a lame fart joke. Scene ends. Soon thereafter, he sends dirty sex/insult texts to another girl; probably large, and with no self-esteem. Then he offers scholarly advice on life. I kid you not.

Oh. One glaring little problem. It's not funny. No hilarity ensues. No token knee slap. Not even a grin. It's as if the book itself is the joke, if not the unintentionally hilarious, misplaced arrogance. I mean really, really bad.

It is pretty well established by now that tucker max makes up and/or buys stories from other people. This should not be viewed as anything but fiction. There are multiple interviews of this joker that expose him as a fraud. His 15 minutes is more than up, and it is time for him to grow up and stop tainting the collective conscious with his tales of douchebaggery.

no thriller. Nothing that hilarious, I think the word is out and the jig is up. Made up stories pretending to be real are hilarious. Until people realize they're made up stories. His first book was funny though.

Wow some of the other reviewers moaning! It's Just a fun book with Laughs if you have that sense of humour and entertaining even if some of it washes over your head.

My Daughter bought this and I read it after her and found it amusing and relevant.

Yawn. A piggy, overaged frat boy giggles and titters over his encounters with a bunch equally piggy women. This stuff wasn't funny when he was a frat boy, and it's more than a little creepy now that he's an overweight, bloated, sad thirty-something. This guy is going to be the forty or fifty year old barfly in some tawdry joint slurring into his cheap bear about how he porked some sad old slobby bimbo one day. His parents must be so proud...

I haven't put this book down since I've owned it. Another great book by Tucker Max and is a must read if you have read the other ones.

It appears this book is the book with the leftover stories. I wish Tucker would've put stories in chronological order because the stories jump all over time during the last decade. First two books I felt had a subtle message being sent with the book, but this one does not have one. On a postive note I got some laughs out of the book.

I have to say from the top, that I had never read any of Tucker's books before. I laughed until I cried the whole way through, and maybe that's because I wasn't familiar yet with his sense of humor.

In a big picture sense though, Hilarity Ensues says a lot about Tucker as a writer and a lot about our culture. Tucker's similies and analogies are on par with those that belong to CS Lewis, and his scene-setting is better than the James Patterson type garbage that pollutes most of our bookstores.

You'll enjoy this book if you have a sense of humor and you'll hate it if you don't. Of course it's in the humor section, but this is really a collection of stories about capitalism, friendship, living in the moment, counting your blessings, and knowing your strengths and weaknesses.

And that brings us to the biggest truth that "Hilarity Ensues" illustrates: There are four kinds of people in this world. Tuckers, Hates, Miss Vermonts, and Bunnys.

You may disagree with that assessment, and you may be right. The problem is, it's the Tuckers of the world that tell the best stories. Those that tell the best stories are the ones that document history. The world will be remembered according to their accounts.

Saving the best for last, this part is an excellent addition to this trilogy. This book promises drunken debauchery and ridiculous antics and surely does not disappoint. With questionable behavior, situations, and material you will be transported to earlier and more exciting time in your life. Trust me, I literally had flashbacks and déjà vu concerning my college career--I now remember why that time was the time of my life! This book truly goes above and beyond the two previous, and it definitely makes a statement by itself. You would think this book would be mediocre in terms of writing, however, it is eloquently and ingeniously written, making the most boring situation hilarious and entertaining! However, as a disclaimer, I will say this is not for the saint or faint at heart (this definitely contains some mature content, however, it certainly does not subtract from the storyline one bit). With that being said, every time I open this book, I laugh by butt off. Seriously, even I want to learn CPR now! I literally can not believe he did half the things, however, they are amazing stories. The pictures also add a certain personal and special touch to the story. Trust me the hilarity truly ensues after the first two, and continues to echo this novel! 5/5 stars!