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- [00:01]
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- [00:35]
Kate Gibson
Hello, everybody. It is Thursday. It is the bookcase. And today I'm really excited. We have a very happy, very funny bookcase, a very diversionary bookcase. And so you pick the right episode to tune into for the first time or the right episode to reacquaint yourself with our brilliant podcast. I am Kate Gibson, and I guess the other guy should chime in too.
- [00:56]
Charlie Gibson
Well, that's enough. We're ready to wrap it up. That's the full half hour. I'm Charlie Gibson, Kate's father, and this is the Bookcase with Kate and Charlie Gibson. This book this week is a diversion. It's Dave Barry. Dave Barry is a, simply stated, a very funny man. And he has proven that over years and years and years of columns written for the Miami Herald. His year end summation column is one of the funniest things ever when he goes back over the history of the year month by month. But he's written so many books. And this one, it's called Class Clown. It is just out how I went 77 years without growing up and he never has. He has a wonderful childlike approach to humor, but in many respects, it's very, very good social commentary. I just love what Barry has to write. And so if you're looking for a diversion, if you're looking for something very different, that will make you laugh. And it made Kate laugh and it made me laugh. You want Class Clown by Dave Barry?
- [02:04]
Kate Gibson
I've been laughing at Dave Barry since I first picked him up. I think I first picked him up when I was five or six years old. And I think until I read this book too. Cause I hadn't read a lot of his more reflective columns. But I think until I read this, I had just assumed he must have had the happiest happy go lucky life on the happiest happy go life planet. But you can't live 77 years as Dave Barry has without life coming at you in a big way. And life at some point has come for Dave. He lost his mother to suicide. He lost his his father at a relatively early age. You know, he worried about his kids like every parent does. And yet he is that funny all the Time, even with all of the amazing things that he faced. And I have to say, listeners, if you are one of those people that is concerned about the way you look in public when you read, if you want to look like a dignified, smart person when you're.
- [02:56]
Charlie Gibson
I know what you're going to say. I know what you're going to say.
- [02:58]
Kate Gibson
This is not the book for you. You giggle like. You have to giggle like a hysterical person. And. And I. I read it in my backyard and I got texts from my neighbors saying, what's so funny? Because I was reading so loud, I was laughing so loudly. I mean, if you were going to read this on the subway, people will think you have an imaginary friend who's telling you funny stories. I don't know. It's just. It's not a book you can read with dignity because you have to laugh at his amazing, amazing writing.
- [03:23]
Charlie Gibson
And as I said last week, your mother wouldn't read it in bed because she was worried that her laughter would wake me up. And it. I'm sure it would have, because I'm.
- [03:31]
Kate Gibson
Sure it would have.
- [03:32]
Charlie Gibson
It really is fun to be with somebody who's reading a book that's very, very funny and listen to them laugh. What party are you in? What did you just read? And you get that way with Class Clown. And in our conversation, Dave Barry, as always, is very amusing, this book. To describe it, if I could summarize it, it's, this happened to me in life, and then I wrote a column about it. And here's the part of the column that you like. And this happened to me in life, and then I wrote a column about it. And he will tell you, as we talked about, that it's not easy being a humor writer and that the discipline of writing, you need to be as precise as you would if you were writing a novel, that humor writing depends on good writing, good writing style.
- [04:21]
Kate Gibson
He has a meter. He has a meter. He has timing. I mean, when you read him, you think, oh, gosh, he's just a naturally funny guy who just dashed off this unbelievably funny thing. But he is meticulous. I mean, I remember when we talked to him about his novel, and we said to him, you just made this up as you went along. And he's like, nope, I'm a meticulous plotter. And not only is a meticulous plotter, but I think he's a meticulous wordsmith. I think he really does sweat whether or not to use the word weasel or armadillo. And which is funnier. I mean, there's a craft to what he does. And if it's possible for Dave Barry to take anything seriously, I think he takes his craft seriously.
- [04:59]
Charlie Gibson
Yeah. I remember I was talking to Diane Sawyer once, of course, who was married to Mike Nichols, and she was telling me that Mike would say, there are words that are funny. And when I read something from Dave Vary or when I listen to comedians, New Jersey gets a laugh. I don't know why the state of New Jersey always gets a laugh that Ohio doesn't. I don't know. Anyway, that's one of the mysteries of life to me.
- [05:26]
Kate Gibson
Maybe it has to do with the national parks made out of tires. I don't know.
- [05:31]
Dave Barry
But.
- [05:31]
Kate Gibson
But you're right. There are things that conjure up funniness. And he is amazing at. At conjuring all of those things up. As I say, I genuinely believe that he is a craftsperson. He is a meticulous craftsperson.
- [05:45]
Charlie Gibson
You will have fun reading this book, and you'll have fun listening to our conversation with Dave Barry, which starts right now. Dave Barry, it is so much fun to have you back in the bookcase. I am delighted you've taken the time, you know, at the beginning of Class Clown, your new book. There's the list of also by Dave barry, and there's 45 books. I counted them, but never a memoir. So let me try to put myself in your head as you approached writing this book. This is dangerous.
- [06:21]
Kate Gibson
This is dangerous.
- [06:22]
Charlie Gibson
Well, I've got some lessons to impart after 77 years of writing and. And then you wrote mostly a serious first chapter about your upbringing and your parents, and then you got to chapter two, and you thought, oh, to heck with it. Let's just go back to being funny. Now. Do I read you right as you approach this?
- [06:41]
Dave Barry
Yeah, pretty much. I was a little concerned about, first of all, writing a memoir in the first place. Like, I talk about this a little in the introduction to the book. Like, when, you know, you start to write a memoir, you're like, if you're me, anyway, you're thinking like, well, does anybody really gonna care? Did I really have that interesting a life? And I was comparing myself to Barbara Streisand, whose memoir I was big when I was writing this. And she talks in there about how, you know, it's 970 pages of famous things and famous people, and she writes it. Like, my favorite single moment was she writes that she had, you know, she had a phone call with Warren Beatty. Like, who doesn't? And then she said when she hung up the phone, I was thinking, did I, did I ever sleep with Warren? Maybe. I don't remember. And I'm thinking, like, I, I, I can't compete with it. I know that I never slept with Warren Beatty. Beatty. I can, you know, not that he, you know, didn't want to. But no, obviously I never had anything with Warren. Let's just squash that rumor right now. But my point, I, like, first of all, am I famous enough? But then the second question, which you're sort of alluding to there is, I did want to, like, at least talk somewhat seriously about where I got started, who I was when I was a kid. And I thought, well, I'm going to just be serious a little bit and start the book that way. I hope that's okay with, because I'm used to just writing, joke, joke, joke, joke, joke, joke, joke. And I didn't do that in this case, so.
- [08:09]
Kate Gibson
Well. And I'm wondering, is it because you did your childhood, you wanted to talk seriously about your mom and dad, and then you hit puberty, and you can't not be funny when you're talking about puberty. Do you then just, you can't.
- [08:21]
Dave Barry
Yeah, yeah, I, And I only recently hit puberty. I want to stress that. Yeah.
- [08:26]
Kate Gibson
Congratulations on your voice change.
- [08:28]
Dave Barry
Well done.
- [08:29]
Kate Gibson
Well done.
- [08:29]
Dave Barry
I was a late. Big reason why I became humor person is that I was very late developer and like, I didn't have anything going for. I had no, I had. I, I still don't have any hair on my forearms. Look, it's. I'm waiting for that to kick in. So, like, you know, when you're a kid and you're like, all your friends are growing up and you're still like the kid, you know, like, you become Mr. Wise Ass, which is what I did.
- [08:54]
Charlie Gibson
You know, I wondered, as you approach a memoir, where does a wonderful, wonderful sense of humor come from? And it did, in your case, come from your folks. What a gift.
- [09:04]
Dave Barry
Yeah, both my parents were funny people. My dad was more of a dad dad joke kind of humor. Gentle, very gentle, loving humor. My mom was exactly where I got my sense of humor. I mean, I've known that forever. She just always was funny, even when there was nothing, you know, like normal people would not be funny. When my dad died, we had service, obviously, and. But the burial was just the family. You know, it's a sad moment. And then we're walking away from my dad's grave and my mom is on my arm, the rain is coming down and we're weeping. And she looks down and reads a couple of gravestones. And she goes, so that's why we don't see him around anymore. It's like, well, even in that moment, you know, in that moment, see, she made it. And we all laughed because, like. And my dad would have appreciated that. Joke is one of the reasons he loved my mother. But she was like, really just. There was never a thing in our family that we could not find humor in. And that that's where it came from for me.
- [10:08]
Kate Gibson
Is writing how you make sense of the world or is humor how you make sense of the world? Not that those two are mutually exclusive.
- [10:15]
Dave Barry
Well, both are true. Humor is how I make my mortgage payment. But no, but no, you're right. And you raise a good point. In the cases where I wrote, okay, my dad, I wrote a column when he died and was very sad. My mom committed suicide. That was the other side of my mom's dark side. She suffered from depression. I think that may have had something to do with her sense of humor. I don't know. But in both of those cases, I wrote about it because I kind of had to write about it to just get it out of me. I really wrote. I don't usually write for myself. I write to make people laugh. That's what I want to do. But in that case, yes, it was to sort of make sense of how I felt about it. If I put it down, the words. But to your point, when. When I've written, and it's only a couple of other times have I written serious things. My son was in an accident. I wrote about that. When I write those things, I'm always surprised by the response I get. Because I think people only like me when I'm funny. Because that's the way you are when you're a humorous. You think that's why people like you. That's why you are a humorous. To make people like you and to hide who you really are because you think you're terrible secretly, you know I'm revealing the whole humor thing.
- [11:24]
Charlie Gibson
Class clown. The title of the book gives you a pretty good hint of what's coming. But it's probably wrong for me to prompt you to tell stories. But this all.
- [11:34]
Dave Barry
But I'm gonna start.
- [11:35]
Kate Gibson
Well, I'm gonna.
- [11:35]
Charlie Gibson
That's right. This all goes back to Pleasantville High School. A well named school. I love that. And your friend Lanny Watts. And the two of you joined the school's fencing club. What happened?
- [11:49]
Dave Barry
Yeah, yeah. Oh my God, Lanny. He was the perfect person for me to meet in high school. We were both just such wise asses. I mean, we existed to make fun of things and to screw around with things. There was a fencing club, which I think was the coach of the fencing club. I think was the French teacher. Naturally. Naturally. And Lanny and I, like, all right, we're going to join the fencing club. Is it cause we're interested in fencing? Of course not. We want to mess around with the fencing club. So we go to the. You know, the fencing club. And the other guys in the fence club are serious about fencing. And then there's Lanny and me, and they. They give us, like, some little basic instruction on how to stand and what to do. And they had actual epis or whatever they're called. And so trying to do that with the guy, you know. And then Lanny runs out of the room. And I don't know to this day where he got a trombone, but, you know, there were trombones around. It was high school, they had a band. And he came back in and he goes. Goes after his guy, thrusting the, you know, the. The thing out the slide at the guy. And then. And then, of course, that we were kicked out of the fencing club. I was. He was kicked out for a tromboning, which is illegal, and a fencing environment. And I was kicked out for falling down on the floor laughing at lan. But I just. I loved those times. I was.
- [13:15]
Kate Gibson
And Lanny got kicked out for tromboning, which he was. Trombon foul, which is a fencing foul.
- [13:21]
Dave Barry
I don't know if it is these days. They may have modified the rules. You know how it is with sports. Anybody gets an edge, they. They make it legal.
- [13:29]
Kate Gibson
The last time that we had you on, we talked about timing and how important you. And how hard you work on timing in your fiction. Now, having taken. I've taken down a lot of your nonfiction in the past, but now having read your memoir, I'm interested. Is timing the same in nonfiction as it is in fiction? Like, you really do sort of sweat whether you're going to use armadillo, squirrel, or weasel like that. Really, you are a meticulous writer, because I think you are. I think that's a mistake that's easily made. You know, I hear people say, nate Bargetzi makes comedy look so easy. And I'm like, oh, he works hard.
- [14:05]
Dave Barry
Well, you. You picked a brilliant example of a guy has so clearly honed his craft and picks every word so dutifully and times it so beautifully. He's. I think the Best comedian alive right now. He's amazing. But yes, timing is just as important in writing as it is in speaking. Maybe, maybe more. And you have to be careful. I mean, I don't think you've probably had a million writers on. There's no good writer who doesn't spend a lot, a lot, a lot of time on little tiny things. I mean, that's what makes it in the end work. It's not just flowing out of you. If it is, it's probably, you know. Well, I was going to say diarrhea, but that seems. But the, but the verbal equivalent.
- [14:49]
Charlie Gibson
But I was very impressed. You spent some time in your early career in the serious pursuit of teaching writing to business people. And it taught me that you really do follow strict rules of writing and the discipline of writing, even if the purpose is to be funny. That you, that you really. I hate to say you're a serious writer about humorous things.
- [15:15]
Dave Barry
Oh yeah, you have to be. I mean, honestly, just as we were saying, you can't be a stand up comedian if you don't work hard at stand up comedy. You can't be a comedy writer if you don't write. Work hard at the writing part of it. I did have this weird seven year stint where I was teaching effective writing seminars for business people. And that wasn't humor writing, clearly. I mean, they're business people. But because I look like I was nine years old, I grew a mustache to look older, but I looked like a nine year old with a mustache. But I was supposed to get up in front of like a room full of. And these were like, you know, engineers, chemists, accountants. They were taking this class because they worked for some company that wanted them to write better. But they weren't writers. They were, they did something else. And here was this nine year old with a mustache getting in front of them and telling them how to write business letters. And I was telling them accurate things. I mean I was. But to establish any authority whatsoever, I had to. I did two things. I learned to be funny in front of a group of, you know, talking about a boring thing in front of group of people who expected to be bored. But I also had to learn a lot about writing. Cause I always just knew what to do. But here I had to tell like some PhD chemist who was writing about some chemical reaction. I don't know anything about why his sentence needed to be changed the way I was telling him.
- [16:37]
Kate Gibson
You write in this book a lot about how you respond to your readers. And one of the things that I really Loved is how you managed to sort of embrace the haters and say, it's okay that you hate me. And here's a column about it. I'm wondering, is that, is that something that you came to or right away when you started writing the column, you're like, oh, I love the haters. Or did somebody sit you down and say, don't let the haters drive you crazy. You just, you just take them on?
- [17:03]
Dave Barry
No, it came to me when I started writing humor. I wanted everybody to just love me. But then the more I did it and when I became like a big, big time columnist with my column was in 500 newspapers. So like millions of people are reading it. I learned that you just can't. They're not all going to love you. There is nothing you can say. There's nothing you can say, including that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. That's not going to piss somebody off, you know, and if you're going to let that get you down as a columnist, you are not going to make it as a columnist because there are always going to be haters. So two things. First of all, most of my readers did like me, and that was great and I love them. And I got a million great ideas from. But I learned to really enjoy savor the hate mail because it was, it was not only sometimes hilarious, like if I would write, almost everything I wrote was inaccurate. I would like, as everybody knows, Abraham Lincoln invented the light bulb and been like. And I would get angry, you idiot. Abraham Lincoln didn't invent the light bulb. Benjamin Franklin invented the light. You know, they were. A lot of my hate mail was more inaccurate than I was, you know, or it was just like ridiculous. Like I'd say, as we all know, the Leaning Tower of Pisa is in. Is in Paris, France. And people. No, it's in, it's in, it's in Italy. And I would write it back and say, well, I'm sorry, you're mistaken. It's been moved to Paris.
- [18:22]
Kate Gibson
Is that where Mr. Grammar came from? Did Mr. Grammar come from letters? Where it was like, I'm sorry, you incorrectly used the comma. Did you just say, okay, then to heck with it. I'm going to write the worst grammar column. Worst grammar advice column on the planet.
- [18:36]
Dave Barry
Mr. Language Person.
- [18:37]
Kate Gibson
Mr. Language Person.
- [18:38]
Dave Barry
Yes. Yeah, it sort of came. Well, first of all, it came from William Sapphire, really. You know, he wrote this wonder. He wrote a really great column I think was called on Words or something. But I was like, I'm going To be the William Sapphire for idiots. So I wrote this Mr. Language Person column, you know, which is full of advice, and every single thing in it was wrong. Sometimes there would be 10 things wrong in a single sentence. That's how wrong Mr. Language Person was. And the hate mail that I got for that was my favorite of all hate mails because often it would be an English teacher, which was terrifying. Sure, they would, like, send me back my column, you know, which they clipped out of their paper, which was like, literally nothing but mistakes. It was like 87 errors in it, and they would have circled one. I suppose you call yourself an expert, Mr. Like, I would correct my one mistake. And you. So anyway. But then I could write whole columns about just the hate mail I got. Like, I wrote that Neil diamond made one, one mistake. I love Neil diamond, don't get me wrong. But I. I made fun of one song where he says, I am. I said to no one there, and no one heard it all, not even the chair. And I think, Neil, Neil, you could have. You could have done better on that lyric. The chair can't hear you because it's furniture. But anyway. And I got all this hate mail. But that means I could write another column about the hate mail I got and where they. I wrote numerous columns that were based entirely on hate mail I got for previous columns. It was. It was a wonderful form of recycling.
- [20:13]
Charlie Gibson
Don't you really want to, in the end, say to people, lighten up, folks.
- [20:17]
Dave Barry
Lighten up more and more every day. Charlie, do I want to say that? Like, we're in crazy times, but we're all old enough to know that we've been in crazy times before. You can't just keep going. This is it. You know, you just can't live your life as if it's all over now. There's no point. We're just done. No, you know, life's going to go on and hug your kids and. And, you know, it's not like, don't care. It's just like, don't stop finding the humor in things, you know?
- [20:48]
Kate Gibson
What was your writing process like when you put together a column? Did it take two days? Did it take a week? What was. Walk me through a week in the Life of Wend Wrote a column. What was your process?
- [20:58]
Dave Barry
Well, I get an idea from somewhere sometimes just purely out of desperation, and it is the most painful thing. And I. I'm still going through it regularly. You start with like, okay, that might be funny. And then after, like, a day, you're like, this is not Funny at all. But I've invested a day in it. I have no choice. I have to go forward. And, you know, it's so. Like, it is the exact opposite of what people assume it is, you know. Oh, funny thing. Here's a funny thing. Another funny thing is occurring to me now. Not at all. It's like, whoa, that's not funny at all. What can I. God, what can I. Why did I think this was funny? And so it's very slow, joke by joke, pulling them out of your brain from somewhere, making them finally work. And then it slowly comes together a little bit, and then it gets a little bit, and then it works out, but it's just this kind of ugly, painful process. And then, you know, when it's done, you feel, whoa, that feels good. Like, that was okay. It worked out, you know, and then you start all over again in the end.
- [22:07]
Charlie Gibson
This book, it seems to me, as I put it down, is a celebration.
- [22:10]
Dave Barry
Wait, you put it down?
- [22:11]
Charlie Gibson
Well, when I'd finished it. When I had finished it.
- [22:13]
Dave Barry
Because I'm gonna say couldn't put it down. I'm not gonna say you said exactly.
- [22:18]
Charlie Gibson
Well, I.
- [22:18]
Kate Gibson
No, you should put it. Grabbed it like a tambourine. When he was Dr. Would not let go. There, there. Let's get that. Well, there you go.
- [22:27]
Charlie Gibson
I read it over three or four days. So, yeah, I did put it down at some point. That would be a good blurb on a book. I put it down three or four times. But in the end. In the end, it's okay.
- [22:36]
Dave Barry
I was able to put it down.
- [22:37]
Charlie Gibson
But. But in the end, this book is a celebration of an unlikely life. Even as a kid, did you ever think my sense of humor might sustain me in life and. And I'll never have to grow up?
- [22:51]
Dave Barry
No. And that is. Thank you for that. Is really kind of the ultimate message of the book is that I had the most ridiculously wonderful life. I really have. It's been absolutely amazing. I have not done anything important with my life for the last 50 years. Just basically do whatever I want, write about whatever I want, meet wonderful people like you by making jokes. And if you had asked me when I was 10, you know, is that what you'd like to do? I would say yes. But When I was 10, it never occurred to me that you could do anything like that. I didn't know anybody who did anything like that until I was in my 30s. I really didn't think that was going to ever be me. I. You know, I was always doing something else, you know, as in the newspaper business, whatever. But I could just be funny. I could just make. Make jokes, but it's just the way it worked out kind of organically. That's what I ended up doing. I ended up being able to joke my way through life, which I think.
- [23:42]
Kate Gibson
That'S great, by the way. They don't say that at career day. They don't say you can just be funny and someday somebody will give you the keys to the Oscar wiener mobile so that you can pick up your son in middle school. Like, nobody does that.
- [23:54]
Dave Barry
Nobody ever says. I was explicitly told multiple times as a young man because I was a wise ass in school. You cannot joke your way through life, you know, but you can, it turns out. Yes, you can joke your way through life.
- [24:09]
Charlie Gibson
Our many, many thanks to Dave Barry. The book is class clown and it is both serious and it wouldn't be a Dave Barry book unless it was very, very funny. Thank you.
- [24:20]
Kate Gibson
Yeah, thank you.
- [24:21]
Dave Barry
Thank you. You guys are great. I love you guys.
- [24:23]
Charlie Gibson
So Dave Barry will ask you to stand by. We have some rapid fire questions. We'll be back in a.
- [24:35]
Lori Bergamotto
From ABC News and good morning America, I'm Lori Bergamotto. This brightly moment is brought to you by Macy's this Father's Day. Let Macy's be your guide to gifting dads. Embarrassing their kids is a time honored tradition, but Jevin Smith took it to a whole new level with his dancing dad school pickups. Smith has been busting a move for every school pickup since his daughter Jaina was in middle school, gaining fans among the students. But one dance performance stands out as bittersweet. It was the final father daughter pickup on Jaina's last day of high school.
- [25:12]
Kate Gibson
I just remember it being like, dang.
- [25:13]
Charlie Gibson
Like, this is the last time he's gonna come to my high school and embarrass me.
- [25:17]
Kate Gibson
And I started getting really emotional.
- [25:19]
Lori Bergamotto
What started out as a way to tease and delight his daughter has turned into a tradition they'll both miss.
- [25:25]
Kate Gibson
Embrace your parents. It's their way of showing you love.
- [25:28]
Lori Bergamotto
This brightly moment has been brought to you by Macy's this Father's Day. Let Macy's be your guide to gifting.
- [25:35]
Charlie Gibson
The new McCrispy Strip is here. Dip approved by ketchup Tangy barbecue, Honey mustard, honey mustard, Sprite, McFlurry, Big Mac sauce, double dipped in buffalo and ranch. More ranch and creamy chili. McCrispy strip dip now at McDonald's.
- [25:50]
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- [26:20]
Charlie Gibson
Appreciate some rapid fire questions for Dave Berry. Your guiltiest reading pleasure.
- [26:31]
Dave Barry
Oh, man. Guilty is reading pleasure. Well, I'm rereading Elmore Leonard. Does that count? That's not. He's good. So I shouldn't be. Feel guilty about that. Guiltiest reading pleasure. Like I read Twitter or whatever we call it now, which is like a waste of your life. I mean, it's a terrible waste of your life. And I'll, I'll get on there and like, I'm just gonna look and see what's going on and like four hours later I, you know, so that I, I'm going to stop right now because you made me feel guilty.
- [27:00]
Charlie Gibson
The first section you go to in a bookstore.
- [27:03]
Dave Barry
Oh, I go to the humor section and complain because they don't have any of my books there.
- [27:11]
Kate Gibson
Do you read more?
- [27:12]
Dave Barry
They love that, by the way, in bookstores. I'm just gonna. This is a little inside thing. If you've been on book tours over the years, you've heard stories from bookstore people. There are authors who will go to bookstores. And not only. This is like amateur hour, but don't ever do this. Authors demand, where is my book and why isn't it, you know, better placement? There are authors who will go to bookstores and rearrange the shelves to put their books in better positions. And if you think that when you leave the store that the bookstore people don't immediately put your book in the toilet, then you don't know nothing about nothing. So I don't remember what the question was. That's my, that's my answer to it.
- [27:52]
Kate Gibson
What are your vacation reads? When you go on vacation, do you pick up fiction or nonfiction?
- [27:56]
Dave Barry
I take a great big literary book and open the book and fall asleep with a, you know, like a pina colada. And don't read anything. It's so hard for me to read on vacation because I, like, want to just not want to relax.
- [28:09]
Kate Gibson
So we're talking like the song. I mean, what are the big times?
- [28:14]
Dave Barry
I'm kidding. I read the works of Marcel Proust in the original French. On vacation. That's what I do.
- [28:21]
Kate Gibson
We.
- [28:22]
Dave Barry
And, And I love, I love Everything by Marshall. I call him Marcel.
- [28:27]
Kate Gibson
Yeah, yeah, fair enough.
- [28:28]
Charlie Gibson
But he doesn't.
- [28:28]
Dave Barry
I call him just Mars. Hey, Mars.
- [28:30]
Kate Gibson
Hey, Mars.
- [28:30]
Dave Barry
What have you written lately, dude? Because I love everything by you in your original French, mon ami. I call him mon ami, mon dude, mon bro.
- [28:38]
Charlie Gibson
Do you say something to somebody when you see them reading one of your books?
- [28:43]
Dave Barry
Well, I've never had that happen.
- [28:46]
Kate Gibson
Never had that happen.
- [28:47]
Dave Barry
No. I see them read books by Carl Hiaasen all the time now. Every. I mean, it's very infrequent that you see a person anymore holding any kind of book anywhere because everybody is holding a phone. They might be reading your book on their phone or on their tablet. But people don't have books anymore. They don't carry them around. Well, I remember writing a column once, like this is in the 80s, I think, where like I remember getting on a plane and counting the number of people walking by me carrying John Grisham books. And it was like, they're not letting them on the plane unless they don't even ask for a ticket. Just a John. Do you. Wait, can I see your John Grisham book and your driver's license, please? You know, it was awful, but that didn't ever happen to me. No.
- [29:31]
Kate Gibson
Is there a lesser known humor writer that you recommend to everybody?
- [29:36]
Dave Barry
They're all lesser known.
- [29:41]
Kate Gibson
Oh, that's a good answer. I like that. We'll just leave that there.
- [29:43]
Dave Barry
No, I'm just gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna tout a book by my friend Carl Hiason, who's not lesser known. He's great. But he has a book coming out called Fever beach that's coming out the same day. Mine is May 13th and I haven't read it yet, but I'll bet it's hilarious because he always is top line.
- [29:58]
Charlie Gibson
Of your bucket list.
- [30:00]
Dave Barry
Oh, man. I would like to go to Australia because I think it's the only country in the world that may be as weird as Florida, just in terms of wildlife there. Pretty much everything there will kill you, and I'd like to see that.
- [30:13]
Kate Gibson
I, my best friend in the world lives there. And when I went there to visit her, she threw me a party. It's my favorite Australia story. She threw me a big party at a bar and a guy comes up to me goes, oh, can I get you a drink? And I was like, no, thank you. I actually don't drink. And he goes, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Can I get you like some beer or some wine then?
- [30:31]
Dave Barry
That's my kind of country.
- [30:33]
Kate Gibson
And I was like.
- [30:35]
Dave Barry
But, like, I've never met an Australian who wasn't basically like that. And I was thinking, they seem like just a fun group down there. They have the whole continent of fun people and giant poisonous snakes. What could you. What could you ask for?
- [30:48]
Kate Gibson
Yeah, exactly. That leads me to my last question. Florida. Did you fall in love with it or was it always just about the great material?
- [30:56]
Dave Barry
It's both. Both things. And I mean, it's just to say, in defense of my state, Florida, I love it. You know, like, there's a lot of crazy stories from down here. People make fun of us all the time. They, you know, they were idiots and everything. And I just want to say, in our defense, there are 23 million people in the state of Florida, and it is not fair to judge 23 million people because of the actions of approximately 21 million people.
- [31:22]
Charlie Gibson
Dave Barry, a national treasurer, as far as I'm concerned, a very, very funny man, a very funny book, and yet also, I think, a good memoir. So we couldn't recommend it any more highly. Dave Barry, the class clown. How I went 77 years without growing up.
- [31:38]
Kate Gibson
I must say that there are a few people out there that I feel like are my litmus paper on humanity. You know, if you don't think Dave Barry is funny, then I'm not sure I want to spend a ton of time with you. So. So the great Dave Barry, he is.
- [31:52]
Charlie Gibson
What do you mean by that? I'm curious what you mean by that.
- [31:55]
Kate Gibson
Oh, the lid. I just. There are. There are people that are so wonderful and humor that is so wonderful that I think they sort of transcend. That is not to my taste. I think Dave Barry transcends. His humor is not to my taste. He is a universal humorist. I think maybe if you don't find Dave Berry funny, then maybe you aren't particularly funny. No, but. But I mean, I. I do. I think his writing is. You know, it's not. I offend the right because I want to embrace the left. It's not I want to tick off the left because I want to embrace the right. It's just universal humor, and it's very funny. And for me, if you pick up a Dave Barry book and you don't crack a smile once, then, boy, I'm not sure I trust you. That's what I mean by litmus paper on humanity.
- [32:38]
Charlie Gibson
I remember your story about reading the book out in your backyard and neighbors coming over and saying, what's so funny? And I was the same way. I was laughing, laughing out loud. I have a book fact for you this week. I hope people were listening a couple of weeks ago when we talked to Olivia Pierce, who's one of the entrepreneurs who has started something called Bag Books, which is, if you were listening, a mobile truck. But the whole side comes down. Previous owners used it for musical concerts with the people standing on the side of the mobile van that folded down. And she and her partner have converted it into a mobile bookstore. And I thought that was unusual and it got me thinking about, you know, are there lots of mobile bookstores? So we asked Allison Hill, who is the CEO of the American Booksellers association, how common that is, and I was really surprised. What percentage of your membership are pop ups or mobile?
- [33:35]
H
The last few years we've seen so many people open bookstores as pop ups or mobile bookstores, which is really interesting and exciting in terms of the innovation in the industry. Right now, almost 4% of our members identify as a pop up or mobile bookstore. So they may be in another business. They may be in a small standalone location or a temporary location. We have a bookstore bike, we have bookstore buses, all kinds of different things.
- [34:04]
Kate Gibson
I love that. This is 4%. I love it. I would have said when you asked that question that it was very rare because when you think of a bookmobile or you think of a book pop up, you know, the first thing that comes up into my head is a black and white photo with like an old Studebaker with the headlights and the, you know, I mean, I. So I love the idea that this is on the rise. And for folks that may be considering opening a bookstore, what a great way to get started with a table at your church bazaar or, you know, or out of the back of your car at a school event. It's a great way of getting your feet wet and to find out if you really enjoy being a bookseller because once it gets into your blood, you can't get it out. So I, I do love the idea that people are experimenting with different venues and, and ways to introduce bookstores to their community. How cool is that?
- [34:51]
Charlie Gibson
I sort of got the sense that Olivia Pierce and her partner in the business is Katie Smith. I love the fact that the two of them saying, well, what'll we do next Saturday night? Oh, let's go out to the such and such with the bookmobile and see if we can't sell a book or two. Anyway, we thank her. Bag Books is the operation. It's in Richland, Washington, the Tri Cities area, out near Spokane, Washington. Next week we have Jay Ryan Straddle back with us, and I'm delighted. Our writer in residence, if you've been listening, in the past, we have talked to Jay Ryan and gotten a sense of how he's doing as he writes his fourth novel. And he's pretty close to done, I gather. Katie.
- [35:28]
Kate Gibson
Yeah, I love this conversation. You know, we've been talking sort of about the struggles of getting started, the struggles of launching a character, the struggles of knowing the high and low points of your character's histories as you, as you begin a novel where maybe your character is a little bit older. And I get this sense that he has, like, really hit a stride. And when we talked to him, he was almost finished. And so I, I, I can't wait for you guys to hear this conversation, because I really do feel this has been the evolution of writing a novel. And we're gonna try to take it with him, too, when he takes it out on the market and sells it. And I have no doubt that he will.
- [36:03]
Charlie Gibson
Yeah, he's been so successful with his first three books, and I was interested that as we've gone through this process of talking to him, that so much of the difficulty is at the beginning when you have to sort of get into the meter of what you're doing and what do I want to do with this character? And how is this character going to develop? In the last couple of times we talked to him, he has sort of hit his stride. He's at cruising speed instead of writing thousands of words that he knows he's going to have to reject, not put in the book. But it's educating him about the characters. But now he's really into it. He's got the characters established and he is moving along. And so it was, it's really heartening to talk to him. And it's, he's getting toward the end. I really look forward to the final stages of all this, but this is one more stage, one more very accomplished stage. We'll talk to Jay Ryan Straddle next week, the folks who make this podcast possible. And then a final word from Dave Barry.
- [37:00]
Kate Gibson
The Book Case with Kate and Charlie Gibson is a production of ABC Audio and Good Morning America. It is edited by Tom Butler of TKO Productions. Our executive producer is Simone Swink. We want to make mention of Amanda McMaster, Sabrina Kohlberg, Arielle Chester at Good Morning America, and Josh Cohan from ABC Audio. Follow the bookcase wherever you get your podcasts and be sure to listen, rate and review if you'd like to find any of the books mentioned. In this episode. We have them linked in the episode.
- [37:27]
Dave Barry
Description Final Thought Lighten up everybody. Just lighten up. It's gonna be fine.
- [37:39]
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