Author: danecobain

Matthew Perry – Friends, Lovers, and the Big, Terrible Thing [REVIEW]

April 23, 2025
Authors P-T (By Surname)Non-Fiction

Title: Friends, Lovers, and the Big, Terrible Thing

Author: Matthew Perry

Type: Non-Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 259

Rating: 3.5/5

Listen, I’m about as much of a Friends fan as your average millennial, and I’ve always found Matthew Perry to be an interesting guy because he was public about his struggles with alcoholism and substance abuse and I always hope that addicts will manage to get clean.

That’s why I picked up this book when I saw it going free at a book exchange.

For me, it was a mixed bag, although I guess I liked it more than my buddy Al from Big Hard Books and Classics, who said that he no longer considers himself a Perry fan. There are pros and cons to it, with the biggest pros being that it’s an interesting enough memoir from a guy who lived an unusual life and it’s written with a decent amount of sardonic humour.

The biggest downside is that Perry comes across as a little whiney. As Alan Johnson from Peep Show would say, it was all, “Poor me. Poor me. Pour me another drink.” It often felt like Perry was trying to invent excuses for his addictions, blaming hardships that are no worse than those faced by anyone else. But maybe that was just me.

Anyways, it was still an interesting enough read, and one that I’d recommend picking up if the concept intrigues you. You’ll probably find something there that you like, so yeah. There’s that.

Learn more about Friends, Lovers, and the Big, Terrible Thing.

Romesh Ranganathan – Straight Outta Crawley [REVIEW]

April 16, 2025
Authors A-E (By Surname)Non-Fiction

Title: Straight Outta Crawley

Author: Romesh Ranganathan

Type: Non-Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 247

Rating: 4/5

First thing’s first – if you don’t know who Romesh Ranganathan is (he’s a British comedian), you’re probably not going to enjoy this quite as much as you would if you were a Romesh fan going into it.

Part of that is because Straight Outta Crawley is a memoir, and so while there’s a ton of comedy in it due to the fact that Romesh is an inherently funny guy, it’s also going to help if you want to know a little bit more about what makes him tick.

Straight Outta Crawley gets its name from the fact that Romesh is a huge hip-hop fan, and he even made it to the finals of a UK rap competition. He talks about all of this stuff in the memoir, as well as how he went from being a teacher at a secondary school to being one of the UK’s premier comedians.

Romesh’s sense of humour is pretty similar to mine, which made his memoir a hell of a lot of fun to read, and I also love the fact that he’s a fellow vegan. He even talks about that in a couple of places, but not in a way that feels preachy or condescending.

All in all then, it’s definitely one I’d recommend reading. It’ll make you smile and there’s not much more you could ask for.

Learn more about Straight Outta Crawley.