The Average American Male: A Novel (Paperback)

by Chad Kultgen (Author)
Key Phrases: hot bitch, other bitch, suck your cock, Beverly Center, Gwen Stefani, Marie Osmond (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
The nameless narrator of this dismal debut is a cynical 20-something living an empty, oversexed existence in L.A. He gets laid more often than he masturbates, plays video games, goes to the gym, sizes up every bitch in sight and, understandably, hates Casey, his vapid wannabe-actress girlfriend who tricks him into agreeing to marry her. He is not happy about this. Adding to his reluctance is his burgeoning "relationship" with hottie Alyna, a UCLA student who-just as Casey is an exaggerated caricature of What Men Don't Want-is the Dream Girl who likes video games and porn-style sex. (Also, Casey has a "fat ass" whereas Alyna has a "perfect ass.") [...] Despite the book's purported "brutal honesty," the premise is essentially: guys like sex and dislike cuddling.
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Review
"It's so primal, so dangerous, it might be the most ingenious book I've ever read." -- Josh Kilmer-Purcell, New York Times bestselling author of I AM NOT MYSELF THESE DAYS

"[A] brilliant send-up of the way ...the male point of view has been misrepresented by militant feminists." -- Toby Young, New York Times bestselling author of HOW TO LOSE FRIENDS AND ALIENATE PEOPLE

"[B]uy Chad's book. It's a blueprint of how the mind--and penis--of a typical American male works." -- Maddox, New York Times bestselling author of THE ALPHABET OF MANLINESS

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Harper Perennial (March 13, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061231673
• ISBN-13: 978-0061231674
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (85 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #12,286 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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  #23 in	Books > Entertainment > Humor > Self-Help & Psychology
  #35 in	Books > Entertainment > Humor > Love, Sex & Marriage
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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Seething/hilarious social/sexual commentary, April 2, 2007

By	Cardinal Jukebox "bing bong!" (San Francisco, CA) - See all my reviews

Relentlessly cynical and f***ing funny. One of Kultgen's accomplishments is that he has created a tale that has a crunchy, amusing coating, a creamy, despair-filled center, and is topped with a fine drizzle of uncomfortable truth. You may not see yourself as the Average American Male, but no heterosexual man can deny having had at least some of the same thoughts cross his mind. Some reviewers have complained that the character in the book is one-dimensional and does not really represent the average American male. Sorry, but most men are narcissistic, sex-obsessed s***-bags. I would know. In an case, pretty much ALL the characters are sexual caricatures. The total focus on sexual relations is the point. Some reviewers have found this book to be crude and mean-spirited. And yest, it definitely is both those things. But, what drives the book is an underlying sense of despair and emptiness in the main character's life - his existence has been boiled down to the pursuit of sex and playing video games. With nothing to care about except "blowing a load," the Average American Male is doomed to boredom and dissatisfaction. This is not only a commentary on sexual relations, but the emptiness of American culture in which Sex and Money is the national religion.


Long story short: this is not a pleasant tale. But there are moments that will make you laugh at loud, and it will make you think about what it means to try to find love and fulfillment in these modern times.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "Sex, Lies, and Video...Games", April 10, 2007

By	Stanley H. Nemeth (Garden Grove, CA United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This is one brilliant book. Its spirit recalls Aristophanes, who, in "Lysistrata," ridiculed ancient Athenian men because they were apparently obsessed with something silly, war, but in fact devoted to something even more ludicrous, sex. We post-moderns are still sentimental about sex; Aristophanes and Kultgen aren't.

Kultgen, like his Greek predecessor, sees that Aphrodite in particular often has one big satiric smirk on her face. His unnamed hero wages a species of war when he plays competitive video games, but he lives more for sex 24/7, even though his comically grotesque desires inevitably result, as experience has always taught, in necessarily diminished rewards.

Kultgen, happily, is an equal opportunity offender. Not only does his witty, knavish hero come in for a finally satirical drubbing, but so do the other serial polygamist characters, who include a variety of contemporary straight men and women, along with assorted gays and lesbians. All of them lead hilariously limited lives, for none of them is able to raise his or her head above the belts of the nation. This book is less the send-up of modern feminism some reviewers have indicated than it is a send-up of the low, finally empty values of all the characters.

The hero lives in a narrow world that has, he sadly recognizes at the end, "no escape." Kultgen, as I read him, is gently suggesting the comic emptiness of the world view that all his younger characters share. The only positive value in their world is "bluntness," a trait distinguishing both the narrator and his paramour Alyna. Certainly, such bluntness is preferable to the whiny manipulativeness of the vulgarly too eager-to-marry Casey and her horrible family. At the same time, the narrator and the more sophisticated Alyna are merely just a boy-man and a girl-woman. They are, Kultgen slyly intimates, nevertheless the finest products of modern American child-raising.

Years ago, Dostoevsky in "Notes From Underground," said of his central character that "such persons as the writer of these notes not only may but must exist in our society, taking into consideration the circumstances under which our society has generally been formed." Kultgen is asking his readers to look at the stunted, even if witty, men and women in his novel and contemplate what comic monsters we "caring" American parents have inadvertently wrought.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Weekend Read, April 15, 2007

By	William V. Jensen (Prior Lake, MN USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

With my wife out of town for the weekend, I couldn't think of a better book to consume me in my "down" time. In fact, if anything, "The Average American Male: A Novel" made me feel a bit guilty because I too am "average" in my experiences. Call it a cathartic experience, but I laughed out loud through nearly every chapter. And as every "Average American Male" knows, we've all experienced the lead character's life in some way or another. The story line was sexy, thoughtful, erotic, humorous and frankly...quite delightful. The author - Chad Kultgen - could be the next Nicholas Baker.