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The OK End of Funny Town
A fastidious pet robot with a knack for knitting. A soporific giant pitching camp in the middle of a city. A mysterious mime whose upcoming performance has the whole town on edge.
The stories in Mark Polanzak’s BOA Short Fiction Prize-winning The OK End of Funny Town stitch fantastic situations into the drab fabric of everyday life. Polanzak delights in stretching every boundary he encounters, from the academic focus on practical learning at the New Community School, to the ever-changing tastes of diners in search of the next big trend in local cuisine.
Wondrous yet familiar, The OK End of Funny Town excavates the layers between our collective obsession with passing fads and our secret yearning for lasting connection.
The stories in Mark Polanzak’s BOA Short Fiction Prize-winning The OK End of Funny Town stitch fantastic situations into the drab fabric of everyday life. Polanzak delights in stretching every boundary he encounters, from the academic focus on practical learning at the New Community School, to the ever-changing tastes of diners in search of the next big trend in local cuisine.
Wondrous yet familiar, The OK End of Funny Town excavates the layers between our collective obsession with passing fads and our secret yearning for lasting connection.
- GenresShort Stories
200 pages, Paperback
First published May 5, 2020
1 person is currently reading
151 people want to read
About the author
Mark Polanzak
10 books8 followersMark Polanzak is the author of the BOA Short Fiction Prize-Winning collection, The OK End of Funny Town, forthcoming May, 2020 from BOA Editions, and the hybrid fiction/memoir, POP! (Stillhouse, 2016). His stories have appeared in The Southern Review and The American Scholar, and anthologized in Best American Nonrequired Reading. He is a founding editor of draft: the journal of process and a contributor to the podcast, The Fail Safe. A graduate of the University of Arizona's MFA program in fiction, Mark teaches writing and literature at the Berklee College of Music in Boston. He lives in Salem, Massachusetts.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
April 17, 2020
Vintage travel brochure headlines separate the tales in Mark Polanzak's wildly imaginative story collection, The OK End of Funny Town. Sections like "Travel to Fantastic Places!" and "Witness Magical Things!" deliver, as promised, 19 weird and wonderful stories that are as captivating as they are discomfiting. Readers "Meet Fabulous Strangers!" in the opening story, "Giant." Townspeople are delighted when a giant moves into their village. "It wasn't an emergency to anyone. It was awe-striking," the narrator says. Their bonhomie turns to exasperation, however, when, after weeks of attempted communication and friendly gestures, the giant shows no inclination to return their overtures and, indeed, seems pretty ungrateful. "He has not thanked us for the food. He has not apologized for trampling our parks and gardens and recreation areas.... He has not offered any help of any kind." The village soon realizes that the giant is as unremarkable as they are. "If he were of normal size, he would be completely uninteresting."
The title story, "The OK End of Funny Town," is one of the "Fantastic Places." The hapless narrator unsuccessfully tries to fix his "arrow-thru-the-head-gag." Determined to find another gag, he tries riding his unicycle on an oil slick and a bed of thumbtacks, and finally waves down a cab filled with clowns. How or why Funny Town became so is never explained, but the author hints at how the narrator arrived there. He tries to tell the cabdriver a joke starting, "There's this guy who moved to Funny Town after his fiancée left him at the altar... he wishes he could cry again, but he can't because it's impossible in Funny Town." The driver, unsympathetic, says, "We're all crying on the inside, man." More evidence of desperation, including a suicide note that says, "He's going to kill himself because he's no good for this place. He's only a minor joke, not anything that the town would miss," creeps into this bizarre, circus-like world. But this is Funny Town, so, as the narrator raises a gun to his head, "A flag bursts out from the nozzle. It reads: BANG."
The remarkable revealed as unremarkable, the ridiculous covering up despair--these themes permeate Polanzak's tales of needy robots, menacing mimes and people on the perimeter. The stories range from the frankly surreal ("A Proper Hunger") to the heartbreakingly real ("How You Wish"). Visiting this tragicomic world, which won the 2020 BOA Short Fiction Prize, will reward those looking for an exciting and original new voice in fiction.
-reviewed for Shelf Awareness 4-13-20
The title story, "The OK End of Funny Town," is one of the "Fantastic Places." The hapless narrator unsuccessfully tries to fix his "arrow-thru-the-head-gag." Determined to find another gag, he tries riding his unicycle on an oil slick and a bed of thumbtacks, and finally waves down a cab filled with clowns. How or why Funny Town became so is never explained, but the author hints at how the narrator arrived there. He tries to tell the cabdriver a joke starting, "There's this guy who moved to Funny Town after his fiancée left him at the altar... he wishes he could cry again, but he can't because it's impossible in Funny Town." The driver, unsympathetic, says, "We're all crying on the inside, man." More evidence of desperation, including a suicide note that says, "He's going to kill himself because he's no good for this place. He's only a minor joke, not anything that the town would miss," creeps into this bizarre, circus-like world. But this is Funny Town, so, as the narrator raises a gun to his head, "A flag bursts out from the nozzle. It reads: BANG."
The remarkable revealed as unremarkable, the ridiculous covering up despair--these themes permeate Polanzak's tales of needy robots, menacing mimes and people on the perimeter. The stories range from the frankly surreal ("A Proper Hunger") to the heartbreakingly real ("How You Wish"). Visiting this tragicomic world, which won the 2020 BOA Short Fiction Prize, will reward those looking for an exciting and original new voice in fiction.
-reviewed for Shelf Awareness 4-13-20
June 4, 2020
While there are currently only 9 user ratings for Mark Polanzak's short story collection, The OK End of Funny Town, I don't agree with the high rating which the book currently has. Out of the 19 short, borderline flash fiction, stories I found only 3 to stand out and hold my interest.
The first was Giant, where if written somewhat differently could have been a bedtime nursery story for children. The story tales of a giant who just wanders into the town center one day. There he stops and takes a rest, and not really going anything else. It's a fun read to see the townspeople, focus on what to do with the large person in their way, and then how it turns into the new normal for them.
Next is Complicated and Annoying Little Robot. In the story the main character finds that what he thought would be a compliant helper robot toy, is actually pretty annoying and condescending. The robot is brash with the man when giving him instructions on how to open up jars, and follows him around the house assuming he's just going to make a mess. We eventually see their attempt at coexistence come to a head.
Finally, A Proper Hunger, which actually is quite brilliant. Polanzak uses common restaurant themes focused on freshness, being locavore, and simply having a lobster tank by the front door-- and takes things to the extreme. This fun romp of comedic heightening puts patrons in the kitchen, then in the pasture fields, and then even on the hunt for their dinner.
Besides these, the other stories didn't' work for me. While I never felt like I connected with them, did find them to be somewhat experimental an untraditional in how the story was told, there isn't one thing in particle that left me unenthused about the author's collection of stories. Besides the three above, it just wasn't for me.
The first was Giant, where if written somewhat differently could have been a bedtime nursery story for children. The story tales of a giant who just wanders into the town center one day. There he stops and takes a rest, and not really going anything else. It's a fun read to see the townspeople, focus on what to do with the large person in their way, and then how it turns into the new normal for them.
Next is Complicated and Annoying Little Robot. In the story the main character finds that what he thought would be a compliant helper robot toy, is actually pretty annoying and condescending. The robot is brash with the man when giving him instructions on how to open up jars, and follows him around the house assuming he's just going to make a mess. We eventually see their attempt at coexistence come to a head.
Finally, A Proper Hunger, which actually is quite brilliant. Polanzak uses common restaurant themes focused on freshness, being locavore, and simply having a lobster tank by the front door-- and takes things to the extreme. This fun romp of comedic heightening puts patrons in the kitchen, then in the pasture fields, and then even on the hunt for their dinner.
Besides these, the other stories didn't' work for me. While I never felt like I connected with them, did find them to be somewhat experimental an untraditional in how the story was told, there isn't one thing in particle that left me unenthused about the author's collection of stories. Besides the three above, it just wasn't for me.
October 13, 2023
The blurb about this book made me think it would comprise some amusing stories with quirky characters -- stuff that is amusing in the moment, but doesn't leave a huge impression after one is finished. Instead, I was pleasantly surprised at the relatability between the author's fictional world and the real one. A lot of great parallels to draw here. Clever ways of making bigger points through unusual (but effective) storytelling approaches. On top of that, I also really enjoyed Polanzak's writing style. Will definitely be returning to this one down the road.
August 19, 2020
I’ve never quite read anything like OK End of Funny Town. Each story feels like I’m being airdropped into a specific moment of time, events that bowl me over and leave me to ponder their meaning. Each story makes the familiar feel absurd, and the absurd feel familiar.
Polanzak is a master at observing human behavior, and applying it to extraordinary situations. We have all witnessed the crest and crash of social trends and fads, so when we see a town’s infatuation and subsequent disillusionment towards the giant that becomes its newly defining landmark, it somehow feels like something we’ve witnessed before. We’ve all seen relationships fail from lack of compatibility, so it feels equally familiar when it’s between a human being and their newly obtained pet robot.
Many of the stories tap into otherwise intangible and implacable feelings in a very poignant and striking manner. One of the stories, in fact, was dedicated to this very phenomenon: “The New Community School,” which gave lessons on the highly-distinctive feelings that grasp us at intermittent and unexpected points in our lives. Another one of my favorites was “Camp Redo,” in which middle-aged adults could recreate the experience of being thirteen (complete with frolicking instead of walking, for optimal authenticity), also recreating the bittersweet moment in which childhood innocence comes to an end. The titular “OK End of Funnytown” features a clown who becomes aware of his surroundings and yearns for genuine connection in a world where everything is a joke. In “Test,” a pretentious artist literally reduces his newest fling to a test of his commitment to emotional chastity, convinced he must sever all human connection in order to devote himself to his craft.
These stories are absolutely hilarious, but also tap into oft-unexplored emotions and leave the reader feeling as raw as a crab without its shell – in a good way. The defamiliarization they impress upon the reader, making us comprehend the world as if it were an alien landscape, also encourages us to perceive ourselves and our own world anew.
I finished reading The OK End of Funnytown weeks ago, and I already want to return to it for a second go-around with fresh eyes. I highly recommend this collection for its wit, creativity, and emotional brilliance.
Polanzak is a master at observing human behavior, and applying it to extraordinary situations. We have all witnessed the crest and crash of social trends and fads, so when we see a town’s infatuation and subsequent disillusionment towards the giant that becomes its newly defining landmark, it somehow feels like something we’ve witnessed before. We’ve all seen relationships fail from lack of compatibility, so it feels equally familiar when it’s between a human being and their newly obtained pet robot.
Many of the stories tap into otherwise intangible and implacable feelings in a very poignant and striking manner. One of the stories, in fact, was dedicated to this very phenomenon: “The New Community School,” which gave lessons on the highly-distinctive feelings that grasp us at intermittent and unexpected points in our lives. Another one of my favorites was “Camp Redo,” in which middle-aged adults could recreate the experience of being thirteen (complete with frolicking instead of walking, for optimal authenticity), also recreating the bittersweet moment in which childhood innocence comes to an end. The titular “OK End of Funnytown” features a clown who becomes aware of his surroundings and yearns for genuine connection in a world where everything is a joke. In “Test,” a pretentious artist literally reduces his newest fling to a test of his commitment to emotional chastity, convinced he must sever all human connection in order to devote himself to his craft.
These stories are absolutely hilarious, but also tap into oft-unexplored emotions and leave the reader feeling as raw as a crab without its shell – in a good way. The defamiliarization they impress upon the reader, making us comprehend the world as if it were an alien landscape, also encourages us to perceive ourselves and our own world anew.
I finished reading The OK End of Funnytown weeks ago, and I already want to return to it for a second go-around with fresh eyes. I highly recommend this collection for its wit, creativity, and emotional brilliance.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews