I Love You More Than You Know: Essays (Paperback)

~ (Author) "I woke up from a disturbed night's sleep with my sinuses clogged and aggrieved..." (more)
Key Phrases: more than you know, New York, New Jersey, Jack Kerouac (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Novelist and humorist Ames writes: "My whole oeuvre has become one big dysfunctional personal ad," and this uneven collection of essays often feels that way. Ames (Wake Up, Sir!) informs readers several times of his height/weight vital stats. He is straight, but with a pansexual horniness that leads to inopportune erections, sordid encounters with prostitutes and an s&m session with a dominatrix and her transsexual boyfriend that makes him late for a play date with his son. He forthrightly, indeed obsessively, discloses details of his chronic rectal itch, his "explosive episodes of Irritable Bowel Syndrome" and every other gross bodily eruption and excretion that plagues him. And there's a note of self-deprecatory preening as Ames marvels at the young lovelies he still manages to attract and the other celebrity writers he hangs with on his book tours. Sometimes Ames's trademark combination of (literal) bathroom gags, hipster grotesquerie and neurotic free association achieves an inspired synthesis of confessional humor, but with overuse its hilarity and freshness decays into a lazy reliance on shock effects and embarrassment laughs. When Ames manages to wrench his gaze from his navel (and other orifices) and connect with outside reality, his prose sparkles with offhand comic insights. Photos.
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Product Description

Jonathan Ames has drawn comparisons across the literary spectrum, from David Sedaris to F. Scott Fitzgerald to Woody Allen to P.G. Wodehouse, and his books, as well as his abilities as a performer, have made him a favorite on the Late Show with David Letterman. Whether he's chasing deranged cockroaches around his apartment, kissing a beautiful actress on the set of an avant-garde film, finding himself stuck perilously on top of a fence in Memphis in the middle of the night, or provoking fights with huge German men, Jonathan Ames has an uncanny knack for getting himself into outlandish situations. In his latest collection, I Love You More Than You Know, Ames proves once again his immense talent for turning his own adventures, neuroses, joys, heartaches, and insights into profound and hilarious tales. Alive with love and tenderness for his son, his parents, his great-aunt — and even strangers in bars late at night — in I Love You More Than You Know Ames looks beneath the surface of our world to find the beauty in the perverse, the sweetness in loneliness, and the humor in pain.

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Grove Press, Black Cat (December 16, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 080217017X
• ISBN-13: 978-0802170170
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #274,125 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Run Out and Get It, February 5, 2006

By	Joe Canniff (Mokena, IL) - See all my reviews

The cover of I Love You More Than You Know seems to suggest that the author (pictured in underpants, fedora, wing-tips shoes and suit case) is running away from something. A few chapters into this book of wonderfully crafted essays there is the realization that he is trying to outpace his own neuroses. The essays are hiliarious and poignant accounts of the author trying to make sense of his own sexual, scatalogical and emotional foibles. I Love You More Than You Know is written in a smart prose style that, I feel, is without peer. I would highly recommed the book for a quick lighthearted laugh out loud funny read, that leaves the reader more hopeful than despairing on the human condition.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Mr. Ames Strikes Again!!!, January 24, 2006

By	M. Cuglietta (Tampa, FL) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Jonathan Ames is one of the great writers of our time and this book is just proof and proof again. There is no reason why David Sedaris is on the bestseller list and not Jonathan Ames.
This book is a collection of essays, sort of a poor man's Curb Your Enthusiasm, or a poor man's Sex in the City.
Buy this book as an introduction to the brilliantly sick mind of Jonathan Ames and then get the Extra Man by Jonathan Ames. By far his best novel.
And the price, $14 for 250 pages! I really dont see how you could go wrong!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Amusing, but not what I had expected, July 23, 2006

By	Boss Drum (Denver, CO) - See all my reviews

Ames' essays are filled with an honestly and sentimentality that makes him endearing and impossible to dislike. He is an everyman who is not afraid to articulate his quirks and shortcomings - ultimately he is someone whom we can all relate to on some level. Many of the essays are just a handful of pages and are simple reflections on events in his life.

While I enjoyed my journey getting to know Mr. Ames through this book, it was not a sad moment to wave goodbye as I finished the final page. While many of his stories brought a smile to my face, there were many that just didn't work. Scattered throughout the book are attempts at amusingly funny, prophetic, page-long, small print entries for a future dictionary ("Pleasant Bowel Syndrome", "Pro-Semitism") that are neither funny nor amusing. One essay is a mock self-interview where he inadvertently insults himself such that he storms out and the interview must take place via an email exchange with himself. There were no "laugh out loud" moments for me in this book and, in my opinion, attempts at wittiness mostly fell flat.

Ames is a fair read but is not on par with folks like David Sedaris, Sarah Vowell or Augusten Burroughs.