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The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid: A Memoir
 
Manufacturer: Anchor Canada
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A wonderful memoir for baby boomers
 
Review Date: October 16, 2007
Reviewer: Linda Bulger, Penn Yan, NY
I always enjoy Bill Bryson's travel books (NOTES FROM A SMALL ISLAND, A WALK IN THE WOODS) and his books on language (THE MOTHER TONGUE).

THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THE THUNDERBOLT KID is a memoir, and since Bryson and I grew up in the same decades, I found a lot to like in this book. His writing is always funniest when it's personal and self-deprecating, and his stories of himself as a child are vastly entertaining.

But this book is more than memoir or a string of funny stories about his childhood. Bryson captures the time and place -- 50's small-town America -- and serves those "simpler times" up with affection. In those pre-minivan days a bicycle was a kid's ticket to ride; the movies were a gateway to the world; and a costume, whether the Thunderbolt Kid or Annie Oakley (am I saying too much?), was the passport to bravery and adventure.

I thoroughly enjoyed THE THUNDERBOLT KID, and probably would have enjoyed it no matter which decades were mine. Maybe it's a book of particular interest to the first wave of Baby Boomers, but the humor and whimsy of its presentation are wonderful counterpoint to its well-researched social context.

You're bound to laugh out loud at this book. If you like laughing out loud, then by all means read THE THUNDERBOLT KID.
where is the time machine
 
Review Date: August 20, 2009
Reviewer: Martin Berthiaume, st john's
I've just reread this book a few weeks ago
Bill Bryson has written some pretty good book and some less than stellar one ; this one goes straight into the first category.
His depiction of America 1950/1960 as good as it ever gets but on top of this , his description of what is life for a youngster to grow up into this ,what seem to be the most fantastic time to grow up, just exceptionnal.
At the same time that you will be smiling and laughing you way trough the book , it makes you feel so unlucky that you weren't born into Desmoines 60 years ago.
Finishing up with that book , I could not get on with life without reading another Bryson from my librairy ...unfortunatly I picked "the lost continent" next ...which is ,without a doubt< the worst book the man has written. A good antidote
One of the truley funniest books you will ever read.
 
Review Date: January 16, 2010
Reviewer: H. A. Ely, Goderich, Ontario
In spite of the title, and on a freinds recomendation I read this book while driving back from Oklahoma City to Canada. Right from the get go it was so perfectly hilarious that I fell off the seat laughing and snorted beverages up my nose twice. The humor is of that old style that we seldom see anymore. The author does not resort to fart jokes or body fluids for titilation, but relys instead on clever wit, intelligent observations, and perfect comic timming to deliver a what I hoped would be endless tour of the growing up in America. We vist the 60s in small town Iowa ..That darkly innoccent time .. and relive the ludicous ironies of the nuclear age in North America. Mr Bryson has packed in his tour in some of the flat out funniest stuff I have come across and all because it is so real and so helplessly ridiculous..
The 50's, larger than life
 
Review Date: October 9, 2008
Reviewer: Jack Blatant, Ontario, Canada
I must confess that I find Bill Bryson very enjoyable, although at times I think that he does go on a bit. At his best, Bryson is laugh-out-loud funny, and this book contains many such moments.

Bryson is always prone to exaggeration for effect, and he succeeds in making the 1950's loom extremely large. In this case, his technique is quite effective, as he really does seem to capture the spirit of a time period. Although I was not born until the early 1970's, I feel that with Bryson's help I have managed to catch a taste of what must have been a wonderful, bizarre, adventurous and strangely optimistic age. Well worth the read.

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