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One Last Thing to Do Before I Die
ONE LAST THING TO DO BEFORE I DIE by Steven Drew Goldberg is a thought-provoking and comedic novel that explains why Max Wiseman, a rich and successful lawyer in Manhattan, would want to kill himself. It also answers why before committing suicide he decides to travel across the country to find Derrick Frankenmeyer, the person he hated most in his life. The story is told in the first person through Max's disillusioned eyes, his razor sharp wit, his keen social observation, and his hysterical intolerance for ignorance and immorality. It will make you laugh out loud and think about what is truly important in life.
388 pages, Paperback
First published January 21, 2010
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
April 17, 2010
GOD DAMN IT! I should have known better. The reason I read this book at all was because I received an e-mail from its author offering to send me a copy and hoping that I might post a review on Amazon. He claimed to have chosen me as a recipient based on my review of "Then We Came to the End", and suggested his book would make me laugh out loud and think about what is important in life. The cover blurb makes the same claim.
His e-mail wasn't obnoxious and I don't think someone should be faulted for trying to drum up a little internet publicity. And over on Amazon.com people seemed enthusiastic. So I e-mailed him that I would read and review the book, but that I would get my own copy. I was really hoping it would be great so that I could give him a helpful review.
Max Wiseman (get it?) is a successful Manhattan prosecutor with a problem. He is constitutionally unable to rise above life's minor irritations. The entire book is told in the first person from within Max's head. The book's fundamental conceit is that Max has become so disgusted with life, and with human behavior, that he has decided to kill himself. But before he does he is going to fly across country to kill the kid who made his life miserable at Camp Pokahiney when he was 10.
This structure immediately creates certain expectations in the reader: that Max's encounters with random strangers on the road will lead him to meaningful growth, personal fulfilment and give him the strength and wisdom to go on; that instead of Max killing the bully, they will reconcile and achieve a weepy camaraderie, etc etc. These expectations remain largely unfulfilled. I can't actually decide whether that's a point in the book's favor or a mark against it, but there's not too much evidence of growth or the attainment of self-knowledge. Max starts out as a hypocritical jackass and pretty much ends the same way. Though the author sprinkles in a few episodes later in the book whose obvious purpose is to provide evidence of growth, they don't ring true.
As the narrative progresses, from his first run-in with airport security screening through assorted bouts of nastiness with employees at the airline, car rental, hotel checkin, hospital, redneck bar, post office, family restaurant, we are presented with a wearying roster of instances wherein Max demonstrates yet again his inability to take heed of the advice not to sweat the small stuff. Inside Max's head, everything is a big deal; every minor inconvenience or perceived lack of bubbling enthusiasm on the part of a customer service rep is a major affront. So he is regrettably prone to escalating normal, tedious interactions to unpleasant screaming rants. He never explicitly screams "Do you know who I am?" at his hapless targets, but that sense of entitlement is never far below the surface. This makes Max's alleged disillusionment with human behavior a bit hard to take. Apparently his disappointment doesn't extend to his own behavior - early on in the book the author takes 4 pages (count 'em, 4) to express Max's disgust about another passenger's acting up when a flight delay is announced; fifteen pages later a drunken Max is berating the airline's customer service rep at the top of his voice, with no apparent consciousness of the irony. The author clearly views Max as a kind of likeable everyman, apparently not realizing that the character he is describing is a completely unsympathetic, supercilious, anti-social jerk. The ongoing transcript of Max's thoughts make it clear that his fundamental attitude towards other people is a kind of sneeringly hostile superiority, which combines with his poor impulse control to lead to another unpleasant outburst, which then feeds back to confirm his jaundiced worldview. It's all very exhausting, because most of these blowups are about nothing at all. The occasional decent actions that the author plonks in towards the end of the book ring false, because Max never manages to rise above his utter negativity about the everyday details of life, or to realize his own role in the creation of his hellish existence. So that's pretty tedious.
That last paragraph makes the book sound truly awful. But it's not actually all that bad. At times it's pretty funny -- anyone can relate to Max's internal reactions to the indignities of modern travel; the problem arises when he loses control. You can sense the author is well-meaning; unfortunately the character he has drawn is not the character he thinks he's drawn (or meant to draw). He is also a poor judge of when to stop, throughout the book he repeatedly develops a given idea or joke at far greater length than necessary. Either he thinks the reader is a moron, or he can't help himself (undoubtedly the latter). There's an earnestness there that is kind of admirable, but there's also a kind of naivete which derails the portrayal of his main character and which contributes (IMO) to an underestimation of his readers.
Not that the folks over at amazon.com care one way or another. The 8 out of 8 readers who gave the book a five-star rating obviously share none of my reservations. They found the book uplifting and funny as all get out.
And who knows? You might too. I have my curmudgeonly image to protect, to I'll give it 3 goodreads stars (which would be 4 stars over on Amazon). That third star is awarded, however, out of a conscious need to encourage beginning writers.
Additional minor gripes: the inclusion of a wise old black taxi-driver, an entire scene in a redneck bar in Dallas culminating in a drunken brawl, a drunken encounter with two standard-issue redneck Texas lawmen, a stereotypically bigoted Southern waitress, beatific good Samaritans who happen to be salt-of-the earth family farmers struggling to save the farm from the evil bankers, an infant sentenced to crib death merely to illustrate the cruelty of fate. Can you spell "c-l-i-c-h-e"? Also, although "illogicalness" is apparently a valid word, it is a very ugly one. I mention this only because of how often it appears in the text.
P.S. It didn't help that I was reading this book in parallel with David Lipsky's "Although of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself", his account of a road trip with David Foster Wallace. A travel companion whose charm and wit contrast dramatically with Max's self-absorption and lack of empathy.
His e-mail wasn't obnoxious and I don't think someone should be faulted for trying to drum up a little internet publicity. And over on Amazon.com people seemed enthusiastic. So I e-mailed him that I would read and review the book, but that I would get my own copy. I was really hoping it would be great so that I could give him a helpful review.
Max Wiseman (get it?) is a successful Manhattan prosecutor with a problem. He is constitutionally unable to rise above life's minor irritations. The entire book is told in the first person from within Max's head. The book's fundamental conceit is that Max has become so disgusted with life, and with human behavior, that he has decided to kill himself. But before he does he is going to fly across country to kill the kid who made his life miserable at Camp Pokahiney when he was 10.
This structure immediately creates certain expectations in the reader: that Max's encounters with random strangers on the road will lead him to meaningful growth, personal fulfilment and give him the strength and wisdom to go on; that instead of Max killing the bully, they will reconcile and achieve a weepy camaraderie, etc etc. These expectations remain largely unfulfilled. I can't actually decide whether that's a point in the book's favor or a mark against it, but there's not too much evidence of growth or the attainment of self-knowledge. Max starts out as a hypocritical jackass and pretty much ends the same way. Though the author sprinkles in a few episodes later in the book whose obvious purpose is to provide evidence of growth, they don't ring true.
As the narrative progresses, from his first run-in with airport security screening through assorted bouts of nastiness with employees at the airline, car rental, hotel checkin, hospital, redneck bar, post office, family restaurant, we are presented with a wearying roster of instances wherein Max demonstrates yet again his inability to take heed of the advice not to sweat the small stuff. Inside Max's head, everything is a big deal; every minor inconvenience or perceived lack of bubbling enthusiasm on the part of a customer service rep is a major affront. So he is regrettably prone to escalating normal, tedious interactions to unpleasant screaming rants. He never explicitly screams "Do you know who I am?" at his hapless targets, but that sense of entitlement is never far below the surface. This makes Max's alleged disillusionment with human behavior a bit hard to take. Apparently his disappointment doesn't extend to his own behavior - early on in the book the author takes 4 pages (count 'em, 4) to express Max's disgust about another passenger's acting up when a flight delay is announced; fifteen pages later a drunken Max is berating the airline's customer service rep at the top of his voice, with no apparent consciousness of the irony. The author clearly views Max as a kind of likeable everyman, apparently not realizing that the character he is describing is a completely unsympathetic, supercilious, anti-social jerk. The ongoing transcript of Max's thoughts make it clear that his fundamental attitude towards other people is a kind of sneeringly hostile superiority, which combines with his poor impulse control to lead to another unpleasant outburst, which then feeds back to confirm his jaundiced worldview. It's all very exhausting, because most of these blowups are about nothing at all. The occasional decent actions that the author plonks in towards the end of the book ring false, because Max never manages to rise above his utter negativity about the everyday details of life, or to realize his own role in the creation of his hellish existence. So that's pretty tedious.
That last paragraph makes the book sound truly awful. But it's not actually all that bad. At times it's pretty funny -- anyone can relate to Max's internal reactions to the indignities of modern travel; the problem arises when he loses control. You can sense the author is well-meaning; unfortunately the character he has drawn is not the character he thinks he's drawn (or meant to draw). He is also a poor judge of when to stop, throughout the book he repeatedly develops a given idea or joke at far greater length than necessary. Either he thinks the reader is a moron, or he can't help himself (undoubtedly the latter). There's an earnestness there that is kind of admirable, but there's also a kind of naivete which derails the portrayal of his main character and which contributes (IMO) to an underestimation of his readers.
Not that the folks over at amazon.com care one way or another. The 8 out of 8 readers who gave the book a five-star rating obviously share none of my reservations. They found the book uplifting and funny as all get out.
And who knows? You might too. I have my curmudgeonly image to protect, to I'll give it 3 goodreads stars (which would be 4 stars over on Amazon). That third star is awarded, however, out of a conscious need to encourage beginning writers.
Additional minor gripes: the inclusion of a wise old black taxi-driver, an entire scene in a redneck bar in Dallas culminating in a drunken brawl, a drunken encounter with two standard-issue redneck Texas lawmen, a stereotypically bigoted Southern waitress, beatific good Samaritans who happen to be salt-of-the earth family farmers struggling to save the farm from the evil bankers, an infant sentenced to crib death merely to illustrate the cruelty of fate. Can you spell "c-l-i-c-h-e"? Also, although "illogicalness" is apparently a valid word, it is a very ugly one. I mention this only because of how often it appears in the text.
P.S. It didn't help that I was reading this book in parallel with David Lipsky's "Although of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself", his account of a road trip with David Foster Wallace. A travel companion whose charm and wit contrast dramatically with Max's self-absorption and lack of empathy.
May 3, 2010
Whether you think Max Wiseman is a likable or deplorable character is almost a secondary topic in this richly woven thematic story. It's not a simple matter of like or dislike, agree or disagree, but rather a philosophical journey towards understanding and ultimately, acceptance. The main character is a vessel through which greater questions and self-reflection of both individual and universal shortcomings of society emerge. In this contemporary novel, a pro-suicide argument is made and based on the character's perspective, seems to be a rational and appropriate ending. Also, the incorporation of media's influence on culture is cleverly used and supports Earl's theory that this generation's depression or disillusionment stems from images of how we think things should be, rather than how things truly are. In addition, through the tedious and outright hilarious preparations and travels leading up to the last thing Max must do before he dies, certain realizations come to light. Human beings in general are cliché. We tend to repeat behavior, respond and speak in particular ways and patterns whether we want to admit it or not. We have the propensity to be self-righteous and hypocritical. Even though most of us would like to change, we seldom will and if we do, it will not be terribly drastic because it is not in our nature or habit. To deny this is naive and irrational. Sure, we can give money to a charity and recycle, but most people during their lifetime will not experience a grand epiphany, and if they claim to, they will make only subtle changes. This is a truth most of us can live with, but Max cannot. In this story, change takes place and slight epiphanies occur, but nothing so monumental that it ultimately changes Max's course or perspective of the world. Some might find this disappointing, but I believe it lends credibility to Max's argument (he is a lawyer after all), and further cements his decision. Although some readers may want an alternate outcome, I applaud Goldberg for sticking to the right and only final course for this particular character. Besides, it's the first book in a long time that actually made me laugh out loud!
Recommend to readers who are fans of Chuck Palahniuk and A.M. Homes (This Book Will Save Your Life).
Recommend to readers who are fans of Chuck Palahniuk and A.M. Homes (This Book Will Save Your Life).
April 27, 2023
RICK “SHAQ” GOLDSTEIN SAYS: “GFY AIRLINES (SEE NOTE 1) THE POST OFFICE, HOTELS, RENTAL CARS AND THE GOLDEN RULE”
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Max Wiseman is a successful thirty-eight-year-old Assistant United States Attorney in New York City… he was raised by his Father to always practice the “GOLDEN RULE”… and he has made up his mind to kill himself! Oh yea… there is also one major thing he has pledged to do before he kills himself… and that is… (Though he practices the “GOLDEN RULE”) … to kill Derrick Frankenmeyer first. Frankenmeyer is the person he hates more than anyone he has ever known in his entire life. The reader will learn later on that Derrick absolutely tortured Max at summer camp when Max was “ten years and eleven and a half months” old… and the bullying continued relentlessly including on Max’s eleventh birthday and beyond during that seemingly endless summer. This abusive and menacing behavior included punches in the arms and legs… being forced to eat a worm… rocks and sticks in his bed… finding his pillow hidden everywhere under the sun… and more. This caused long term… unrelenting damage to Max. (Besides the obvious dedication to the aforementioned murder to be completed before he killed himself.)
As the old saying goes: “IT’S THE JOURNEY… NOT THE DESTINATION”… and that’s the utterly intriguing and enjoyable trip the reader gets to go on with Max… as he heads out on his odyssey to kill Derrick and then himself. This book succeeds and entertains on many different levels… and that in itself makes this such a unique book among the myriads of books on the market place. If you’re an experienced heavy duty business traveler like I am… you will literally fall in love with the author and applaud his every word *AND THOUGHT* as he absolutely rips apart and ridicules the airline industry… as they justly deserve. His scorching arrows hit nothing but bulls-eye’s dripping with sarcasm as he describes employees… especially “Fanny” at GFY Airlines. (NOTE 1: The “G” stands for “GO”… THE “Y” stands for “YOURSELF”… and the “F” stands for… I can’t tell you… or from personal experience this site wouldn’t publish my review… but I have faith that you can figure it out!) If you’ve ever been greeted by an unfeeling airline employee who refuses to look you in the eye when they ask how they can help you… and after they refuse to help you… with their number one excuse being “that’s our policy”… and you ask why… and it’s “because” it’s their policy… and then they ask if there’s anything “else” they can help you with… and you say… “HOW CAN YOU HELP ME WITH *ANYTHING* ELSE… WHEN YOU HAVEN’T HELPED ME WITH ANYTHING YET?” There are times the author says these things directly to the employees and other times it’s his razor sharp parenthetical-humor-inner-voice speaking. If for no other reason than the author describing his inner-voice’s snappy repertoire… this book was a blessing to me. I at least now know that I am not the only one with this inner-voice that becomes unhinged with the ludicrous way a paying customer is treated by the airlines. The same goes for hotels… the post office… and other members of the so called “service” industry. The author deftly handles everyone that comes his way in this mesmerizing trip to final redemption.
Intermixed with the tasty well deserved barbs… are bits of humanity that catch you off guard and are so beautiful and touching that tears were brought to my eyes. An interchange with a “shuttlevanbus” driver Earl makes Max consider thoughts besides the murder/suicide… but never stops him from his life plan. If the potential reader connects with the author and his inner-voice like I did… you will almost become one with the human being that merges between the character… author… and inner voice. Max gets “illusioned”… disillusioned… beat up… urinated on… laid over… delayed… misinformed… and for the first time in his life… eats chicken fried steak… goes in a Wal-Mart… goes in a pickup truck… and yet has time for moments of clarity such as:
“I STARED OUT OF THE WINDOW WITH MY CHIN RESTING ON MY HAND AND WATCHED THE HASHED LINES ON THE HIGHWAY SPEED BY, EACH ONE APPEARING AND THEN DISAPPEARING IN AN INSTANT. FOR SOME REASON THIS MADE ME THINK ABOUT HOW FLEETING LIFE IS AND HOW, WHEN COMPARED TO THE AMOUNT OF TIME THE EARTH HAS EXISTED, EACH ONE OF OUR LIVES IS NO MORE THAN A BLIP IN HISTORY, LASTING EVEN SHORTER THAN ONE HASHED LINE ON THE HIGHWAY FLASHING BEFORE MY EYES. EVEN SO, THAT BLIP IS FILLED WITH SO MUCH PAIN AND HEARTACHE AND DISMAY AND FRUSTRATION AND HELPLESSNESS THAT I WONDERED WHY MORE PEOPLE HADN’T ARRIVED AT THE SAME CONCLUSION THAT I HAD—THAT THE BLIP WASN’T WORTH SEEING THROUGH TO THE END.”
I do an awful lot of reading and I can’t remember the last time I read a book that so seamlessly combined outrageous humor… heartfelt pathos… brilliant fiction and non-fiction… and provided companionship to “my” inner-voice… so it realized it wasn’t alone.
NOTE 2: FULL DISCLOSURE- Though I don’t know the author and have never met him. He contacted me after reading some of my reviews on the web and thought that I would enjoy this book and sent me a copy to review it. If you check my personal profile… integrity is what I try to build my life around… so when I say this is a great book I mean it with all my heart.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Max Wiseman is a successful thirty-eight-year-old Assistant United States Attorney in New York City… he was raised by his Father to always practice the “GOLDEN RULE”… and he has made up his mind to kill himself! Oh yea… there is also one major thing he has pledged to do before he kills himself… and that is… (Though he practices the “GOLDEN RULE”) … to kill Derrick Frankenmeyer first. Frankenmeyer is the person he hates more than anyone he has ever known in his entire life. The reader will learn later on that Derrick absolutely tortured Max at summer camp when Max was “ten years and eleven and a half months” old… and the bullying continued relentlessly including on Max’s eleventh birthday and beyond during that seemingly endless summer. This abusive and menacing behavior included punches in the arms and legs… being forced to eat a worm… rocks and sticks in his bed… finding his pillow hidden everywhere under the sun… and more. This caused long term… unrelenting damage to Max. (Besides the obvious dedication to the aforementioned murder to be completed before he killed himself.)
As the old saying goes: “IT’S THE JOURNEY… NOT THE DESTINATION”… and that’s the utterly intriguing and enjoyable trip the reader gets to go on with Max… as he heads out on his odyssey to kill Derrick and then himself. This book succeeds and entertains on many different levels… and that in itself makes this such a unique book among the myriads of books on the market place. If you’re an experienced heavy duty business traveler like I am… you will literally fall in love with the author and applaud his every word *AND THOUGHT* as he absolutely rips apart and ridicules the airline industry… as they justly deserve. His scorching arrows hit nothing but bulls-eye’s dripping with sarcasm as he describes employees… especially “Fanny” at GFY Airlines. (NOTE 1: The “G” stands for “GO”… THE “Y” stands for “YOURSELF”… and the “F” stands for… I can’t tell you… or from personal experience this site wouldn’t publish my review… but I have faith that you can figure it out!) If you’ve ever been greeted by an unfeeling airline employee who refuses to look you in the eye when they ask how they can help you… and after they refuse to help you… with their number one excuse being “that’s our policy”… and you ask why… and it’s “because” it’s their policy… and then they ask if there’s anything “else” they can help you with… and you say… “HOW CAN YOU HELP ME WITH *ANYTHING* ELSE… WHEN YOU HAVEN’T HELPED ME WITH ANYTHING YET?” There are times the author says these things directly to the employees and other times it’s his razor sharp parenthetical-humor-inner-voice speaking. If for no other reason than the author describing his inner-voice’s snappy repertoire… this book was a blessing to me. I at least now know that I am not the only one with this inner-voice that becomes unhinged with the ludicrous way a paying customer is treated by the airlines. The same goes for hotels… the post office… and other members of the so called “service” industry. The author deftly handles everyone that comes his way in this mesmerizing trip to final redemption.
Intermixed with the tasty well deserved barbs… are bits of humanity that catch you off guard and are so beautiful and touching that tears were brought to my eyes. An interchange with a “shuttlevanbus” driver Earl makes Max consider thoughts besides the murder/suicide… but never stops him from his life plan. If the potential reader connects with the author and his inner-voice like I did… you will almost become one with the human being that merges between the character… author… and inner voice. Max gets “illusioned”… disillusioned… beat up… urinated on… laid over… delayed… misinformed… and for the first time in his life… eats chicken fried steak… goes in a Wal-Mart… goes in a pickup truck… and yet has time for moments of clarity such as:
“I STARED OUT OF THE WINDOW WITH MY CHIN RESTING ON MY HAND AND WATCHED THE HASHED LINES ON THE HIGHWAY SPEED BY, EACH ONE APPEARING AND THEN DISAPPEARING IN AN INSTANT. FOR SOME REASON THIS MADE ME THINK ABOUT HOW FLEETING LIFE IS AND HOW, WHEN COMPARED TO THE AMOUNT OF TIME THE EARTH HAS EXISTED, EACH ONE OF OUR LIVES IS NO MORE THAN A BLIP IN HISTORY, LASTING EVEN SHORTER THAN ONE HASHED LINE ON THE HIGHWAY FLASHING BEFORE MY EYES. EVEN SO, THAT BLIP IS FILLED WITH SO MUCH PAIN AND HEARTACHE AND DISMAY AND FRUSTRATION AND HELPLESSNESS THAT I WONDERED WHY MORE PEOPLE HADN’T ARRIVED AT THE SAME CONCLUSION THAT I HAD—THAT THE BLIP WASN’T WORTH SEEING THROUGH TO THE END.”
I do an awful lot of reading and I can’t remember the last time I read a book that so seamlessly combined outrageous humor… heartfelt pathos… brilliant fiction and non-fiction… and provided companionship to “my” inner-voice… so it realized it wasn’t alone.
NOTE 2: FULL DISCLOSURE- Though I don’t know the author and have never met him. He contacted me after reading some of my reviews on the web and thought that I would enjoy this book and sent me a copy to review it. If you check my personal profile… integrity is what I try to build my life around… so when I say this is a great book I mean it with all my heart.
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