The Financial Lives of the Poets

Not another recession novel.

No, this is actually not another recession novel. Instead, The Financial Lives of the Poets is about that age-odd battle: desperate measures versus bankruptcy. It is fiction's Breaking Bad (US TV show about a chemistry teacher diagnosed with terminal lung cancer, who secures his family's financial security by selling crystal meth). The Financial Lives of the Poets is possibly the funniest book of the year.

We meet Matt in the midst of trying to avoid losing his house and his wife. His dad has Alzheimer's. His children are obsessive and emotional. His wife may be using her Facebook account to rekindle old romances. And his website, the one he left his secure well-paid job for, poetfolio.com where he offers financial advice in verse, is going nowhere. Meanwhile the banks want the house, the credit cards want their pieces of silver and Franklin wants a Nintendo Wii.

Desperation, and a chance burrito with local drug dealers, sends Matt into the murky world of weed-dealing, to help buy him time while he looks for a job. He can sell to middle-class businessmen like himself, making him a unique asset for his suppliers. Pity Matt isn't cut out to be a drug-dealer.

The Financial Lives of the Poets is very now, snappy, funny, filled with hilarious dialogue and brilliant representations of current zeitgeists. It's also very cleverly classic in its fish out of water slapstick tale. Written with bundles of energy and featuring some of the most manic comedy writing this side of Sam Lipsyte, The Financial Lives of the Poets just hit my top 5 books of the year.