I read Dad is Fat for my book club and, as a group, we reached several conclusions.
- If you have children, Gaffigan is really funny.
- If you don’t have children, he’s just “meh."
- While reading the book is okay, listening to Gaffigan read his work is much better. If you can, choose the audio.
-We all love how adoringly, respectfully, and admiringly Gaffigan speaks of his wife. I, personally, will be crushed if, five or ten years down the road, we find out they actually hate each other and are just pretending for the book.
My favorite two essays are “Dogfight," where Gaffigan expresses dismay at people who, upon hearing he’s just had a baby, exclaim, “Oh, you just had a baby. Yeah, we just got a puppy.” He can’t think of another situation in which you would compare a human to an animal and it’s okay, but I just adopted my dog Max, and he’s the first thing I thought of when I read the Gaffigans had just had their fifth. Go figure. “Toddlerhood," where Gaffigan challenges the Fisher-Price laboratories to develop something as fun for a toddler as a ninety-nine-cent roll of toilet paper is my other favorite. I can relate…Max loves unrolling toilet paper!
Dad is Fat is refreshingly wholesome, charming, and honest, yet still laugh-out-loud funny.