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One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories

B.J. Novak (Goodreads Author)

3.68 · Rating details · 41,092 ratings · 4,893 reviews

From an actor, writer, and director of the hit TV comedy The Office (US version): a story collection that was "workshopped" at comedy clubs and bookstores on both coasts.

B.J. Novak's One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories is an endlessly entertaining, surprisingly sensitive, and startlingly original debut collection that signals the arrival of a welcome new voice in Ame From an actor, writer, and director of the hit TV comedy The Office (US version): a story collection that was "workshopped" at comedy clubs and bookstores on both coasts.

B.J. Novak's One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories is an endlessly entertaining, surprisingly sensitive, and startlingly original debut collection that signals the arrival of a welcome new voice in American fiction.

Across a dazzling range of subjects, themes, tones, and narrative voices, Novak's assured prose and expansive imagination introduce readers to people, places, and premises that are hilarious, insightful, provocative, and moving-often at the same time.

In One More Thing, a boy wins a $100,000 prize in a box of Frosted Flakes - only to discover that claiming the winnings may unravel his family. A woman sets out to seduce motivational speaker Tony Robbins - turning for help to the famed motivator himself. A school principal unveils a bold plan to permanently abolish arithmetic. An acclaimed ambulance driver seeks the courage to follow his heart and throw it all away to be a singer-songwriter. Author John Grisham contemplates a monumental typo. A new arrival in heaven, overwhelmed by infinite options, procrastinates over his long-ago promise to visit his grandmother. We meet a vengeance-minded hare, obsessed with scoring a rematch against the tortoise who ruined his life; and post-college friends who debate how to stage an intervention in the era of Facebook. We learn why wearing a red t-shirt every day is the key to finding love; how February got its name; and why the stock market is sometimes just... down.

Finding inspiration in questions from the nature of perfection to the icing on carrot cake, from the deeply familiar to the intoxicatingly imaginative, One More Thing finds its heart in the most human of phenomena: love, fear, family, ambition, and the inner stirring for the one elusive element that might make a person complete. The stories in this collection are like nothing else, but they have one thing in common: they share the playful humor, deep heart, inquisitive mind, and altogether electrifying spirit of a writer with a fierce devotion to the entertainment of the reader. ...more

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Hardcover, 288 pages

Published February 4th 2014 by Knopf

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Feb 12, 2014 Jeanette (Again) rated it it was amazing

Shelves: all-fiction, short-stories, five-star-fiction, giggles, av

Nutty and Naughty. I Love the Way This Guy's Mind Works.

I'm hesitant to give any specifics because B.J. Novak relies on the element of surprise to carry these pieces. The fun of reading the book is in being unaware of what new ways he will catch you off guard from one story to the next. Many of these pieces are not stories, but more like scenarios. I envy Novak's ability to say "What if ____________", and then come up with a bizarre way of filling in the blank with something we all wish we'd tho ...more

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Nov 28, 2017 Miranda Reads rated it it was ok

Shelves: audiobook

So many stories packed into one book!

Normally, I try to write a little blurb or two about each short story in a collection but I have to draw the line somewhere. There's like 50 of them in here and I need to hold onto whatever sanity I have left.

Here are the most memorable ones:

The rematch -- Everyone knows the story of the tortoise and the hare, but not everyone knows about the aftermath. The hare was mocked relentlessly but swore that one day, there would be a rematch...

Dark matter -- An ...more

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Feb 08, 2014 Philip rated it it was amazing

Shelves: jordabecker-book-club, jordabecker-kyle, favorites

The first piece of legitimate literature for the ADD generation.

A fine piece of trickery: Novak makes us think it's a celebration of and homage to hedonism. A quick, light, funny read that's soon to be forgotten.

But it's not. There's depth and substance here. High-brow, artsy, pretentious humor wrapped in the ephemeral humor of ADD.

There's a poignancy and intelligence and, and, and... weirdness... in these stories that I haven't found anywhere else - and it's not dark humor. It's pensive humor ...more

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May 11, 2014 Emily rated it it was ok

Oh, BJ. I don't know what I was expecting with this collection, but this sure as hell wasn't it. Just about everything about this book bothered me. The stories were snarky, tongue-in-cheek, sardonic, sarcastic, biting. Yup, I think that about sums it up.

Every story was like a clever boy's "oh, wouldn't this be witty? oh, what if we did this- pushed this platitude as far as it can go?" (Really, the 'if I had a nickel for every time I spilled a cup of coffee' story was absolute crap). Some of thes ...more

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Feb 19, 2014 Jennifer rated it did not like it

If I could give this book zero stars I would. Obviously I'm missing what a lot of other people are getting with this. Somebody, please tell me what's funny here?? I get that he sees himself as a more elevated "intellectual" humorist, and while a few if his ideas do have potential for hilarious insight, he never got past the idea, for me. At a certain point I was saying to myself, "Come on, there are so many funny places to go with this." But he didn't. And I didn't laugh once, out loud or otherw ...more

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Oct 28, 2014 Madeline rated it liked it

"The Walk to School on the Day After Labor Day

I was sad that summer was over.
But I was happy that it was over for my enemies, too."

Take a minute and examine your reaction to that quote, one of the shortest pieces (I can't in good conscience call it a story) in BJ Novak's collection of short stories. I imagine that your reaction was similar to mine when I first read it - you probably smiled a little, maybe did one of those almost-laughs where you just blow air out your nose, and thought, "Oh, th "The Walk to School on the Day After Labor Day

I was sad that summer was over.
But I was happy that it was over for my enemies, too."

Take a minute and examine your reaction to that quote, one of the shortest pieces (I can't in good conscience call it a story) in BJ Novak's collection of short stories. I imagine that your reaction was similar to mine when I first read it - you probably smiled a little, maybe did one of those almost-laughs where you just blow air out your nose, and thought, "Oh, that's clever" and then immediately forgot about it.

That's the experience I had reading this book, repeated for several dozen stories. There's nothing particularly bad about any of the stories, and I giggled a couple of times while reading, but that's about it. The collection isn't awful, but it's nothing special. It's funny, but a pretentious kind of funny, and it's clever, but mostly for the sake of cleverness. And most of the stories are not stories so much as they're half-baked ideas that needed more love and attention. Some of the stories were fun in an absurdist way, like the one about Johnny Depp deciding to crash his motorcycle in front of a Hollywood tour bus, and many of them read like first drafts of a stand-up routine - like "Chris Hansen at the Justin Bieber Concert," where Hansen explains to his teenage daughter the numerous reasons he can't go to the concert with her. Others are more like little snippets of larger stories, like "Julie and the Warlord," where a woman goes on a date with an African warlord and debates ethics with him. This story is a lot more fun if you mentally cast Mindy Kaling as Julie - in fact, I'm ashamed to admit that I spent a lot of the book searching for evidence that proves my long-standing theory that Novak and Kaling are soulmates and need to get married yesterday (in response to the question of whether it's creepy to ship real people: yes, yes it is).

Mostly though, I spent my reading time thinking about how much better these ideas would be in the hands of another writer. "Sophia," a story about a man who returns a sex robot after it falls in love with him, could have been masterful in Stephen Millhauser's hands. Sometimes they just fall flat: "One of These Days, We Have to Do Something About Willie" ended with an emotional gut-punch that didn't feel earned. And sometimes they feel like they've been recycled from somewhere else. "Kellog's (Or the Last Wholesome Fantasy of the Middle-School Boy)" reads like a script for The Office that got rejected for being too dark.

He's not great at forming full stories, but Novak excels at sharp humor and realistic portrayals of modern life - at its best, his writing resembles Dorothy Parker and her acidic one-liners, like here:

"The casino looked like a straight person's attempt to replicate what he thought a gay kid he bullied in high school would have designed."

and here:

"'Do you have any regrets, Grandpa?' asked the ten-year-old, solemnly, as if he imagined himself wearing a tie."

Did you do the blow-air-out-your-nose laugh again? Like I said - that's about the best you can hope for with this book. Reading it wasn't a waste of an afternoon, but I'm glad I got it from the library instead of buying it.

As an added bonus, please watch this trailer for One More Thing (because apparently book trailers is a thing now?) featuring BJ Novak and Mindy Kaling and tell me they aren't totally in love. ...more

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Jul 23, 2017 Clumsy Storyteller rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2017-reading-assignment, comedy, favorites, re-reading, short-stories

i love how random and unusual, weirdly funny his ideas are. this collection fun to read. Dark matter was my favorite, i think some of the stories had really deep meaning and hidden messages, and the rest were just random and silly.

“Do you think Johnny Depp should have driven his motorcycle off the mountain highway to his death? Why or why not?”

“If you love something, let it go.
If you don't love something, definitely let it go.
Basically, just drop everything, who cares.”

“why do u always post p ...more

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Mar 09, 2018 Whitney Atkinson rated it really liked it

Shelves: unhauled, read-in-2018, audiobook

3.5

I had like 20 pages of this left and decided to just finish it because I know restore me is about to take over my life lol.

I went into this thinking it would be a memoir, but it's actually a collection of short/satirical/witty/clever short stories. A lot of them interconnected, surprisingly. I enjoyed the majority of them, but there were some longer ones that just seemed to go on too long. I tried listening to this on audio, but the jokes were lost on me when I tried it that way, so I wouldn' ...more

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Dec 14, 2013 Robert Wechsler rated it liked it

Shelves: american-lit, stories, first-reads

I was attracted to this First-Reads giveaway because of my longstanding interest in English-language humor. I’ve edited five humor anthologies and several humor collections and humorous novels, and once wrote a volume of literary parodies. I take humor seriously.

What Novak does best is to find the sadness in humor. Too many younger writers think that humor is just about laughs. No, that’s jokes. In fact, the great American humor tradition isn’t really about laughs, although there are some. Smile I was attracted to this First-Reads giveaway because of my longstanding interest in English-language humor. I’ve edited five humor anthologies and several humor collections and humorous novels, and once wrote a volume of literary parodies. I take humor seriously.

What Novak does best is to find the sadness in humor. Too many younger writers think that humor is just about laughs. No, that’s jokes. In fact, the great American humor tradition isn’t really about laughs, although there are some. Smiles and thought are more what humor is after.

What Novak does worst is language. Most of his prose and dialogue are like the average American realistic novel: flat, workmanlike, lacking imagination or character.

It’s not that Novak himself lacks an imagination. His ideas are very imaginative. But once he has an idea, he imagines like a lawyer (as a former lawyer, I mean that descriptively, not disparagingly). He runs with his idea in an intelligent way, thinking of the possibilities inherent in the idea, choosing one or two, and then writing his humor piece or story (I don’t mean that he does this consciously).

Many “idea humorists,” as I call them, take an idea exactly where I would take it if I thought about it for a minute or less. Novak is much more imaginative, creative, and thoughtful than that. But, most of the time, his ideas are still better than his execution. What’s missing, for me, is a playfulness of language, a freedom of thought, and a strong base in parody and satire.

I’m not the right audience for Novak, at least at this point in his career. He’s best as a dialogue-based storyteller, where there is no overriding idea. But as a literary fiction reader, I’m not pulled in by his flat prose, nor do I go for his sentimentality. And yet I was taken with the title story (for some reason entitled “Sophia”). I am put off by celebrity-based humor, but Novak did manage to do an excellent job with his Elvis piece.

In short, Novak is writing for a younger audience (I’m 59) and has offered a varied, intelligent, pretty consistent, sometimes moving collection of stories and humor pieces. It’s a good first effort.

On a different note, I’d like to respond to the book’s final piece, a satire about a fraudulent literary translator. The implication seems to be that literary translation is itself something of a fraud, that there really isn’t a reason to keep translating the classics for new eras and with fresh approaches. There’s nothing in the piece that suggests otherwise.

Novak includes excerpts from classics done in the past and then by Audetat, Novak’s fraud. They aren’t very different, which seems to be the point: it's just hype. At the micro level, translations are usually similar, and the differences can seem ridiculously minor or baffling: phrases switched around; one word instead of another, but meaning the same thing; or something inserted or taken out (which is “right”?). The important differences between translations are at the macro level.

Novak also suggests that literary translation is a linguistic act, that a fraudulent American translator is fraudulent with respect to his knowledge of foreign languages, and therefore might do to an English-language classic what he’s done to foreign-language classics. It’s easy to make fun of this. But it’s worth noting that when I studied literary translation many years ago, we started out translating classics from languages no one knew. There were two reasons: (1) everyone could start out translating the same thing, and (2) it taught us that literary translation is more a literary exercise than a linguistic exercise. With a few public domain translations in front of you, it’s amazing what you can do, without worrying about linguistic accuracy.

As a sad success story, this piece is instructive. But with respect to literary translation, it’s not. It simply supports typical misunderstandings. ...more

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Dec 06, 2015 Barbara rated it liked it

3.5 stars

B.J. Novak, the author of this collection of short stories, anecdotes, and random thoughts is probably best known for playing Ryan Howard on the popular TV series "The Office." He was also a writer and executive producer on the show and has appeared in a number of Hollywood movies.

Author B.J. Novak

Most of the stories in the collection are humorous and some are thought-provoking. One story that made me smile is called "The Something by John Grisham."

John Grisham

In this tale John Gris ...more

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Feb 15, 2014 Nathan Huff added it · review of another edition

One More Thing about this book...

I'll cut right to the chase. One More Thing simply isn't very good. The weird thing is that it's not because B.J. Novak is (what some people may think inherently) a bad writer. It's his apparent love for vignettes that scream 'laugh at me' when there's nothing funny in there. No one would hold it against you if you only laughed out loud less than a dozen times while reading Novak's debut. That isn't to say that it is wholly unlikable because there are stories tha ...more

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Mar 13, 2014 Stina rated it it was ok

Shelves: 2014

Either I am not smart enough to see how great this book is or it was not good. I'm leaning towards "not good", but that sounds smug. This book pissed me off while I was reading it and it has pissed me off more after I finished because I can't stop wondering why people love it.

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Mar 12, 2015 Crystal Starr Light rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: audiobook, book-club, big-heap-of-meh, i-should-know-better, so-boring-it-s-boring, drink-the-kool-aid, humor, are-we-there-yet

My book club chose BJ Novak’s book, “One More Thing”. I wasn’t able to attend the meeting where the books were chosen, but my guess is it was chosen because Novak was an actor in the American “The Office”, a pretty funny show (at least the episodes I’ve caught).

However…

There was a big problem as I…as I was reading…listening…

ERM! I was listening to this on audiobook, as story after story went by. The Planetarium. The…The…The heaven story. The Calendar story. The…the…

SNORF! Well, what was I saying ...more

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Jul 19, 2014 Carol rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, audio-books, short-stories

I'm always leery of short stories. I'm not certain if this is because I often don't get what the author is trying to say or if they are not meaty enough, often leaving me hanging and thinking, "What?". I needn't have worried with this collection.

Irreverent, inane, frequently laugh out loud funny, yet often so true they are sad, these stories are superior. Sometimes long commentaries and others, just one sentence says it all. My favorites of the bunch

The Rematch
The Something by John Grisham
The M ...more

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Nov 28, 2015 Heather K (dentist in my spare time) rated it it was ok

Shelves: not-a-romance-book, narrator-so-so, audiobook, fiction-literature, blah, at-my-library

Weird as hell... and not necessarily in a good way.

I have no idea what to make of this one. B.J. Novak tried very hard to be creative and funny, with creative, um, certainly being the key word. Some stories were amusing in a way, but most were just odd.

I didn't laugh, not once, and I think I was supposed to laugh. Maybe?

If you are interested in a collection of random thoughts in short story form, narrated by a series of "The Office" alums, then give it a shot. Just keep your expectations to a m ...more

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Nov 12, 2013 Lisa rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Not at all what you expect given the "I am a funny famous person I guess I'll write a book of stories that are pretty much all about me" trend right now.

People are going to disagree about this a lot, I think. I had no idea Novak was capable of such good writing but when he chooses to ditch the traditional and speak directly to the Twitter generation it's really going to piss off purists. I think it's much more interesting how palatable he makes reading so many bits and stories that point out you ...more

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Oct 21, 2013 Deandra rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: essays, favorites, favourite-authors, humour

I’m calling it: best book of short stories, 2014. Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, 2036. Homework assignments for kids everywhere, 2078. BJ Novak Day is a nationally recognized holiday (and the day kids look forward to because they don’t have to go to school and can stay home and read One More Thing), 2095. But enough about how great kids are going to have it in 60+ years from now. This book is seriously the best I’ve read this year. It comes out in February, so I can’t tell you to go b ...more

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Feb 21, 2014 Jenny (Reading Envy) rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: audiobook, short-stories, reading-envy-podcast, read2014

I was skeptical of trying this book but I kept reminding myself that B.J. Novak started as a WRITER not as an actor trying to be a writer. Right? Well that's how I talked myself into it. I'm so glad I did! There are sixty-ish stories in this book, varying greatly in tone, subject matter, and length.

My favorites include:
Julie and the Warlord
Sophia (the sex robot who falls in love)
The Beautiful Girl in the Bookstore (one of the shortest stories, with my favorite line - "She loved him, but she neve ...more

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Feb 06, 2014 Daniel Simmons rated it did not like it

One of the most irritating books I've read in a while. In part this is because the author is clearly an intelligent, think-outside-the-box fellow with a lot of good ideas. I just found the majority of these stories unstructured and smarmy, with lots of punchlines but very little payoff. What DOES excite my admiration is his use of dialogue, which is very natural. So: a better screenwriter than a story-scribbler, perhaps; I confess I've never seen an episode of "The Office."

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Feb 21, 2020 Angela rated it really liked it

Shelves: audiobooks

I really enjoyed probably 80% of the stories in this collection, but the 20% I didn't like, I REALLY didn't like. And, for the most part, those were the short one-liners that read like creative writing workshop students trying to be pithy and intellectual. While I understood the idea and impulse behind many of them, they're the kinds of thoughts that should just remain thoughts, because when you write them down and subsequently publish them, you kind of just sound like a pretentious asshole, y'k ...more

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Jan 06, 2014 Orsolya rated it really liked it

Shelves: folk-tales-short-stories, hollywood, own, library

You may not know who BJ Novak is. Good: more for me! In case you are curious though, Novak is an actor (the US version of “The Office”, “Inglourious Basterds”, and “Saving Mr. Banks”), comedian, writer, and producer. I also dare to add incredibly cute, sexy, intelligent… Okay, sorry. Back to the matter at hand. Novak demonstrates his writing chops in a unique way with a collection of stories in, “One More Time: Stories and Other Stories”.

“One More Thing” begins on a strong note combining humor, You may not know who BJ Novak is. Good: more for me! In case you are curious though, Novak is an actor (the US version of “The Office”, “Inglourious Basterds”, and “Saving Mr. Banks”), comedian, writer, and producer. I also dare to add incredibly cute, sexy, intelligent… Okay, sorry. Back to the matter at hand. Novak demonstrates his writing chops in a unique way with a collection of stories in, “One More Time: Stories and Other Stories”.

“One More Thing” begins on a strong note combining humor, wit, creativity, and intelligence, wrapped in symbolism which lays the foundation for the rest of the stories. Varying in length and composition style; each story has a strong individualistic narrative voice as Novak is able distinguish each character and story but yet maintain a smooth and cohesive strand. Naturally, some stories are more appealing than others but overall, “One More Thing” is inevitably strong.

Novak is a master at meshing laugh-out-loud moments with deeper philosophy. The stories make the reader think and contemplate layers of topics while also entertaining on the simplest level. Admittedly, “One More Thing” isn’t a masterpiece on the short story shelves but Novak’s text is rich, well-written, and best described as a creative voice for a younger generation.

Some of the stories in “One More Thing” feel too forced, striving too hard to be funny; while others are abrupt. There are a few instances when the reader feels the story is just beginning to propel but it instead ends quickly as though Novak wanted to continue but was reminded that this isn’t a full-length novel. Some readers may also be disappointed with some of the 1-2 page stories which are more like antidotes or thoughts in a narrative form versus a story with a strong skeleton. On the other hand, even these small musings are interesting and have depth beyond the superficial top coat.

One of the ‘cute’ characteristics of “One More Thing” is when Novak connects a former story with a latter one by either an event or character. This results in the stories feeling more novella-esque and results in a unique appeal to the text. Also striking is that each story is different (versus one main theme which can cause boredom in a short story collection); and yet “One More Thing” is not disjointed. For those readers who enjoy a dose of surrealism in short stories, Novak delivers with whimsy but not to the point where the narrative feels ‘fake’ or unnatural. Each story retains believability and is accessible.

A little over half-way through, “One More Thing” takes a bizarre turn leaving one to think, “You’re losing me, Novak!”. Perhaps the more odd stories should have been spread out versus clumped together. Also at this point, some readers may feel alienated by Novak’s jokes which are references my fellow LA residents and I understand but may be lost on others.

Unfortunately, “One More Thing” concludes poorly with one of the Novak’s weaker stories making for a conclusion which softens the impact of the work, overall. However, this blow is lessened with a particularly humorous “Discussion Questions” section and “Acknowledgments”. Make sure to read these!

“One More Thing” may not be the world’s best collection of short stories but is a fresh and unique voice which is relatable and yet thought-provoking. Novak proves he has writing skills beyond stand-up comedy and television. Clearly, Novak would prove quite well to pen a full-length fiction novel (do it, Novak!). “One More Thing” is 100% recommended for Novak fans and also for those readers who enjoy short stories appealing to a modern generation. “One More Thing” is definitely a notable debut from a skilled writer.
...more

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Feb 04, 2014 Alexandra rated it it was ok

I love BJ Novak and the shows he has starred in or been a writer for. So of course I thought I would love this book. It's really well-written. But I found it a little boring. I didn't find it very funny or entertaining. I can't figure out what I'm missing that everyone else seemed to love. I think maybe I'm just not a fan of short stories.

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Jan 02, 2017 Mariah Roze rated it liked it

This book was entertaining! It was full of short stories that had nothing to do with each other. Some of the stories I really enjoyed, others I didn't. The first couple stories weren't good, so it took me a while to get into this book.

I chose to read this book because the author was in the TV show The Office and I really enjoyed him :)

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Jul 09, 2015 Vonia rated it really liked it

Shelves: comedian, books-about-books, technology, novelty-and-humor, celebrity, books-about-writers, short-stories, all-time-favorites

Ashamedly, I am always stunned when a seemingly innocent actor/actress turns out to be quite the impressive individual with a stellar curriculum vitea. BJ Novak is one such actor. In my defense, the character I know him best as, The Office's gullible, awkward Ryan Howard, must have been played so well that I was, naturally, so easily led to believe otherwise. Other than his iconic character, he also wrote, directed, and produced for the show. He played roles in several wife-release films, the on Ashamedly, I am always stunned when a seemingly innocent actor/actress turns out to be quite the impressive individual with a stellar curriculum vitea. BJ Novak is one such actor. In my defense, the character I know him best as, The Office's gullible, awkward Ryan Howard, must have been played so well that I was, naturally, so easily led to believe otherwise. Other than his iconic character, he also wrote, directed, and produced for the show. He played roles in several wife-release films, the one most interesting to me being Inglorious Basterds alongside Brad Pitt. Notably, Novak is a Harvard alumni, having studied English and Spanish literature. Great trivia: http://www.boston.com/ae/tv/articles/...

Back to the material at hand! He is funny. No doubt about it. Add his intellect, apparent in his writing, reflected in his wittiness, and you have some damn good stories. I love intelligent humor above any other. Novak has it.

Not to say he is anywhere near perfect. Out near the breasts like Steve Martin and Ellen DeGeneres, even Demetri Martin (personal favorites). Some of his stories did not have me laughing at all, even smiling. Maybe a share of them referenced things I did not understand. But others still simply were not funny, though I could see where he was going with it.

My personal favorite were: The Rematch (The Tortoise & The Rabbit), The Man Who Invented The Calendar, & The Girl That Gave Great Advice (She only nods, provides options, then whichever the recurve of said advice hold onto, she had the right words to further encourage it, has specific head tilted/angles, etcetera).

Interesting ideas, concepts, stories that were not necessarily humorous: Wikipedia Brown & The Case of The Missing Bicycle, The Thing by John Grisham (Quitr accurate, referencing how all his titles are the same), A Great Problem To Have (Regarding the story behind the creator of the grade school arithmetic ? that discusses two trains meeting, traveling @ the same speed), Sophia (An A.I. Lover the protagonist returns for having feelings).

Another favorite, although not quite one of the stories, is the discussion questions. Awesomely amusing! ...more

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Feb 19, 2014 Kristen rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 2014

You guys.

This. Book.

I loved BJ Novak on The Office and Inglorious Bastards, have loved him in all miscellaneous roles, loved him in all of his interviews. It wasn’t the kind of love that prompted me to learn more about him (therefore it wasn’t true, alas), I was just wandering around in a “OH YEAH BJ Novak I love him he’s great super funny and seems cool” state.

Then, I bought this book.

One More Thing is a collection of stories, and a blend of “traditional” short stories, micro fiction, and hint ...more

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Feb 02, 2015 Gabrielle rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-2015, audiobook

The danger with short stories collections is that the ratio of hit/misses must be extremely high in order to avoid disappointment, or, in the case of my reaction to this book, a general lack of enthusiasm for it. "Meh" would be a good summary of my review.

The greatest strength of this audiobook is its use of its narration, both by Novak and by the guests/friends he invited to join him for the recording. The stories or characters that are attributed to them are a perfect fit, and Rainn Wilson's v ...more

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Feb 24, 2014 Jane Stewart rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: 5-star-other, humorous-essays

He’s quirky, clever. The best part is unusual ideas. My brain liked it.

This is 63 vignettes. Some are just a few sentences. Others are several pages long. Some are like random thoughts of the author. Some have a little story to them. Many times I laughed. Some times I just said “huh” at the end. The last story was about a translator that was beyond me. I didn’t get it. I probably should have reread it, but I didn’t, so I remain ignorant about the humor in that one. Overall I loved this book. He ...more

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Apr 17, 2014 Jessica Schwartz rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: audio, adult

I was disappointed by these stories...I wanted to like them more than I did. Some of the premises were really fun and fantastic, so full of promise, but they tended to lose momentum and peter out by the end. They often felt incomplete and pointless. The endings were often super gimmicky (don't get me started on the "discussion questions" at the end of a few). Some of the stories just felt like comedy bits--like jokes with punchlines. Overall, not my cup of tea.

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Feb 03, 2014 unknown rated it liked it

Shelves: 2014, short-stories

I probably enjoyed this 4 stars but I started to resent it at the end for being short stories. Stupid stories.

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Mar 21, 2014 Troy Blackford rated it really liked it

This, a collection of around sixty 'stories,' was a frustrating book. For the first forty percent or thereabouts, I was not enjoying it much at all. The quality of it came in fitful bursts, but there were enough stories here that I did not like at all to make me doubtful of enjoying the whole. Indeed, if you had told me even at the halfway point that I would be giving the book four stars, I would have been astounded.

But, I had to admit as I read more and more that the stories I did enjoy were ve This, a collection of around sixty 'stories,' was a frustrating book. For the first forty percent or thereabouts, I was not enjoying it much at all. The quality of it came in fitful bursts, but there were enough stories here that I did not like at all to make me doubtful of enjoying the whole. Indeed, if you had told me even at the halfway point that I would be giving the book four stars, I would have been astounded.

But, I had to admit as I read more and more that the stories I did enjoy were very moving, diverting, engaging, or amusing indeed. Sometimes, they even exhibited a combination of these qualities. I believe the overall effect is marred by the presence of subpar stories. You'll be riding a wave of emotion or respect for the intention of the author, and then then next 'story' (some are genuine stories, but there are often just a handful of sentences, representing more of a thought or dare I say it even a skit) would be throwaway, or at the very least not an appropriate contrast to the previous entry. Balance in a collection is excellent. Unartful choking off of the previously developed feeling is not.

I for one had no objection to the presence of the shorter pieces, when they were good. I found the format of this book to be sound. It's just that some of the pieces think they are more clever than they are. There is a really disparate quality level here. And I think you can place the blame for the collection being in the form it is at the feet of the current mainstream publishing industry. First off, it's amazing a collection of short pieces got published, as that's a form of writing that is not heavily represented these days. But the problem is that even these collections have to be 'novel-length.' You won't find novellas published singly by anyone who isn't Stephen King these days.

This collection would have been a sublime and powerful novella-length work that I would have gladly given five stars to. In fact, I suspect removing just fifteen of the pieces would have made this collection uniformly good, and taking out twenty or so would have made it genius. It's hard to express, if you haven't read it, why some of the pieces have such a net negative effect on the whole, but in my own estimation they did.

Novak is a writer who is not afraid to use celebrities as characters. At one point, even the aforementioned Stephen King (my favorite author) makes a cameo. The stories are really enjoyable for the most part, when they are. There's a lot of emotional stuff, hilarious stuff, and interesting stuff. There is also, unfortunately, a lot that is full of itself.

For example, we are forced to read a piece where the oft-muttered idea 'If I had a nickle for every cup of coffee I spilled, I'd be rich!' is taken to its extreme conclusion. We are supposed to be dazzled by the thought-power that went in to working out this concept, or something. But for me at least, it was jarring, placed as it was between two pieces that actually did something for me.

I think, what it comes down to, is character. Pieces focusing on people and their emotions or reactions to the world frequently had the power to move or dazzle. Pieces focused on witty concepts or turns of phrase, which merely used characters as pawns to advance the wordplay and/or concept, fell flat for me most of the time.

Anyway, this isn't the longest book in the world and I think you should at least try to give it a go. There's a lot of great work in here, along with some other stuff. ...more

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