Is that any way to have fun? How would your mother feel if she knew you were doing this? She’d cry. She really would. And that’s how you know it’s fun. Anything that makes your mother cry is fun. Sigmund Freud wrote all about this. It’s a well-known fact.

I am feeling a little grim about the world these days, so I thought I’d read something funny. Were I a better man I’d probably have read some Wodehouse, but I listened to the little guy on my left shoulder and bought the cheapest P. J. O’Rourke I could find.

Disclaimer: The ideas and opinions expressed in this book do not necessarily represent those of the reviewer, this blog, or of real persons, living or dead.

When you read the late P. J. O’Rourke, you are guaranteed two things – hilarity, and offense. Republican Party Reptile is probably one of the extreme cases in his oeuvre, because this is National Lampoon-era O’Rourke, young and iconoclastic and frequently stoned on something. Nothing – absolutely nothing – is immune to a joke, including lots of things we (rightly) no longer consider funny. This is how it was in the ‘80s. Deal with it.

In this series of essays, written for various publications, O’Rourke writes about a wide variety of subjects. A condensed history of the world. A user report on the drug Ecstasy. A cruise through Soviet Russia with an earnest group of American lefties. A hostage situation in Beirut. A trans-continental road trip in a Ferrari. Sex acts in moving cars (this one deserves a special content warning). Men’s hats (I particularly liked that one). And finally, an epic history of the author’s own life, recast as a medieval war chronicle. For some reason.

Some of these essays have aged better than others. Some are frankly offensive and could never be published today. (Evangelical Christians come in for a single insult. I believe O’Rourke softened his views later in life.) One detects the subtle influence of various chemical stimulants, legal and illegal, from time to time.

But it was funny. Republican Party Reptile made me laugh. Most of the subjects of ridicule had it coming. Lots of cautions are in order for language and subject matter.

Drugs are a one-man birthday party. You don’t get any presents you didn’t bring.