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The Double Life Is Twice as Good: Essays and Fiction Kindle Edition

by
Jonathan Ames (Author)
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Jonathan Ames (Author)
6 customer reviews
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Kindle
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$11.99
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$1.29 $0.09
Length: 225 pages Word Wise: Enabled
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Product Details

  • File Size: 791 KB
  • Print Length: 225 pages
  • Page Numbers Source ISBN: 1439102333
  • Publisher: Scribner; Original edition (June 27, 2009)
  • Publication Date: July 14, 2009
  • Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
  • Language: English
  • ASIN: B002F0821C
  • Text-to-Speech: Not enabled
  • X-Ray:
  • Word Wise: Enabled
  • Lending: Not Enabled
  • Enhanced Typesetting: Not Enabled
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #322,432 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful
An Uneven, Almost Superfluous Collection
By Jeff the Zombie on February 22, 2010
Format: Paperback Verified Purchase
I'll admit it -- I picked up The Double Life Is Twice as Good: Essays and Fiction by Jonathan Ames because it contains the short story "Bored to Death," which formed the basis of the HBO series of the same name. I hadn't previously read any of Ames work, though I enjoyed the series and wanted to see how it differed from the original source material.

"Bored to Death" has the same basic premise as the TV show -- a writer gets bored and posts an advertisement as an "unlicensed" private investigator on Craigslist. He then gets called to work on a case and gets much more than he bargained for. Except in the case of the short story, it takes a much darker turn than its HBO counterpart.

However, outside of the inclusion of "Bored to Death," the rest of the book is an uneven mix of what can loosely be described as journalism -- including features on a Goth music festival, Marilyn Manson, Lenny Kravitz and New York City's Meatpacking District, among others -- personal essays, short stories, introductions and forewords from other books and old journal entries. It feels like a lot of it was added to pad out a short book, and the length is still on the extremely short side even with the extra material.

As with other popular essayists, Ames writes in the same voice in all of his work -- even the fiction. The personal essays and journalism are entertaining and sometimes funny, but the journal entries from Ames' youth are not particularly engaging and seem overly self indulgent. I'm also puzzled over the inclusion of two forewords that Ames wrote -- one for a graphic novel he scripted, another for a friend's book. Taken out of their original context, they don't really offer much to the reader.Read more ›
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A series of jabs rather than a knockout punch
By Sam Quixote TOP 1000 REVIEWER on October 17, 2013
Format: Paperback
Jonathan Ames is a writer whose work is very up and down in terms of quality - on the one hand you've got fine, fun fiction like Bored to Death and on the other you have an overlong, uninteresting comic like The Alcoholic. The Double Life is very representative of Ames' work with the essays and short stories collected here proving this dichotomy.

The opening selection, Bored to Death, is really good. A bored novelist called Jonathan Ames posts an ad on Craigslist pretending to be an amateur, unlicensed private investigator and begins getting cases. Originally appearing in the literary journal McSweeney's, this short story is also the basis for the HBO TV series Bored to Death starring Jason Schwartzman, Zach Galifianakis and Ted Danson, which is a supergreat show, though this original fiction is a lot darker than the TV series - which I thought was a nice surprise actually. Generally though the fiction in this book is pretty poor stuff. His Diary of a Book Tour isn't bad but the others tend to be just a couple of pages long and felt like it took as long to write as it did to read, they're just so insubstantial.

His non-fiction takes up most of this book and is definitely the highlight of this collection. His interview with Marilyn Manson was pretty great and once more showed MM to be a decent, down-to-earth chap who leads a pretty amazing life. Ames caught him in the aftermath of his divorce from Dita Von Teese and having just met Rachel Evan Wood with MM swooning over her - MM in love! Lovely. Ames even manages to drink MM under the table! His interview with Lenny Kravitz was similarly interesting - Kravitz seems like less of an interesting person but also seems like someone you could have a normal conversation with. And who knew he was celibate?!Read more ›
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Not one of Ames' best...
By Bloated Boy on September 17, 2013
Format: Paperback
I love most everything Jonathan Ames ever puts his name to. His style is very much his own and unlike pretty much any other writer out there. His prose is fantastic (Wake Up, Sir! is one of my all-time favorite books), as are his short story and essay collections, such as I Love You More Than You Know and My Less Than Secret Life.

The Double Life is Twice as Good, however, just isn't up to the standard of his other work. There are a few decent tales within: for example, Ames is asked to review a hotel in the Meatpacking District of New York and the story is rich with his trademark quirky humor and disarming candor. In addition, his interview with Marilyn Manson is both revealing and titillating.

Ultimately though, this collection has the feel of a work hastily cobbled together and rushed to the shelves and just feels undercooked, especially considering the aforementioned high standard of Ames' previous endeavors.
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