A SWEEPING SAGA OF ROMANCE AND ADVENTURE

When I see that description of a book for sale I move on to the next offering. Sweeping sagas of romance and adventure usually involve two impossibly attractive star-crossed lovers named Gabriella and Dirk jetting from continent to continent trying to right some grievous wrong done to one of them by some heinous corporate villain who's kidnapped Gabriella's physicist sister who holds the secret to the villain getting to dominate the world's governments and financial markets or some other such claptrap. And of course they move heaven and earth, rescue one another from certain death several times, have lots of hot sex and slay many dangerous thugs in order to rectify the situation before defeating the bad guy and living happily ever after in a seaside villa. No, thanks.

I'd almost rather read another Tom Clancy pre-fab spy thriller. Almost. But it's summertime now, and we all need to stock up on our light summer reading fare, and one of Clancy's cookie-cutter tales of implausible intrigue and mass slaughter knocked off by one of his assistants using his patented intrigue-novel formula just doesn't fit the bill. Steven King is out of the question too. Who needs a thousand pages of being creeped out on a balmy afternoon? That guy ought to be medicated or something. And forget the cascade of tell-all books by former officials of the Bush The Younger administration that explain everything about the criminal activities perpetrated by our government these past eight years except why they waited for a multi-million dollar book deal to spill the beans instead of standing up for what is right when all this stuff was going on and saving the nation much grief. That's like reading a book by Frank James blaming everything on Jesse but neglecting to say why he didn't stop him after his first murder and bank robbery and waited ten years to tell the story, after Jesse James was dead and their criminal enterprise went bust and he needed another huge payday.

So, what's on the reading list over here at the headquarters of bobcrespo.com? I'm glad you asked. Here's a short list of breezy summer reading you might like to get your hands on to while away your afternoons on your porch since the high price of electricity puts a crimp in your air conditioning budget and the price of gasoline sort of makes that road trip to the seashore completely out of reach. Consider these tomes:

THE WIT AND WISDOM OF DOCTOR PHIL, by Doctor Phil McGraw - The best thing about his book is that it's very short and has lots of pictures of Oprah in it; fat Oprah, medium Oprah, thin Oprah and back to the fat Oprah that America loves best. Doc Phil is all about the pandering.

THE CASE OF THE DISAPPEARING OZONE, by Al Gore - Mr. Gore, frustrated by the lack of world response to his book and his Oscar-winning movie about global warming, turns to the mystery genre to dramatize the problem. The best thing about it is that you can find it in the bargain bins, since it failed to sell very many copies in it's initial printing. In this gripping tale, Val Bore, a former Vice President of the United States turned private eye, lands the case of a lifetime when a beautiful but mysterious blonde shows up in his office telling an unlikely tale about her missing husband, corporate secrets and corruption and coverups at the highest levels of government. Follow the action as Val Bore skillfully runs down one lead after another, solves the case easily, names all the culprits, wins the Detective of The Year award but nobody cares, nobody gets arrested, nothing changes and he doesn't get any hot sex from the beautiful but mysterious blonde.

TRUMP: THE BOOK, by Donald Trump - Read all about Donald Trump and his adventures in media land, building tall buildings in a single bound, sweeping a series of airhead gold-digging bimbos off their feet, firing shallow yuppie apprentices left and right and acting smaller than anyone in history ever has who had all the advantages in life this man has enjoyed; born rich as Croseus, blessed with more publicity than Elvis Presley, living out his every dream in public and plastering his name in 40-foot high letters on every fifth tall building in the United States. On second thought, skip it. What is there left to know about Donald Trump? You won't hate him any less after reading 200 pages of his tiresome boasts. Maybe more, if that's possible.

MILLI VANILLI- AFTER THE FAKE MUSIC, by Milli Vanilli - Remember that pop duo that was big in the late 80's and early 90's? Well, don't feel bad, neither do most people. What distinguished them was their complete lack of distinction and the fact that they were stripped of their Grammy Award when it was revealed that they didn't do any of their own singing on their hit records and lip-synched their way through live performances. Apparently their thick German accents that made them sound more like a pair of Henry Kissingers than modern day Marvin Gayes finally betrayed them. One of them wound up dead of an overdose in 1998, either Milli or Vanilli, nobody really knows (or gives a rat's ass). Grippingly ghost-written by an anonymous writer, this little morality tale apparently fell on deaf ears as the recording industry continues to create fabricated pop stars who can't sing. Go figure.

SOME LIKE IT HOTTER, by Karl Rove - Mr. Rove, until now reticent to admit his role in shaping the policies of the Bush The Younger administration, documents his efforts to get the government to do nothing about greenhouse gas-emitting pollution and halting all official efforts at finding alternative energy sources to fossil fuels. Mr. Rove goes public now since it appears that a good chunk of his corporate profits and bribes will be going to defense attorneys since he decided to defy Congress and not answer their subpoena to testify about his shady activities in a non-elected and non-appointed job. Those Dream Teams of famous lawyers cost millions apiece. Having been squeezed out of the ultra-lucrative Hole In The Head Gang by gang leader Shotgun Dick Cheney, Rove has accepted the equally rewarding commission from Exxon-Mobile to write this rebuttal to Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" in which he extolls a rosy future of comfortably warm climates for the entire world (and shove it up Cheney's mechanized butt). The first chapter is entitled: "A World-Wide California" and it goes downhill from there. There are a lot of good laughs in there, though, even if they are unintentional, like when Rove insists that Bush The Younger was actually in charge of anything besides clearing the brush from Texas, an endeavor that would take many hundreds of lifetimes to accomplish, but one well suited to President Rain Man. Take your comedy wherever you can find it.

MIDDLE AGED GUYS FROM BROOKLYN RULE, by R.R. Crespo - This fascinating book profiles a sexy, handsome and witty middle aged musician and writer from Brooklyn named Bob Crespo. Alright, I made this one up, but what the hell, why can't I jump on the shameless self-promotion band wagon like everyone else? You can however, on this very page, click on my SONGS menu or the STORIES & ESSAYS bar and check out my work. This middle aged guy from Brooklyn is back in the studio recording some new songs (doing my own playing and singing, too, thank you very much) and they're coming out just fine, and I DO rule. When the lovely wife lets me, that is. In the meantime, enjoy your summer reading, folks.