Greetings From Jamaica, Wish You Were Queer (Amazon book review)

This review is from: Greetings From Jamaica, Wish You Were Queer (Paperback)

One of the principles I live by is "never really take back-cover blurbs seriously," so when I read the "Warning: This Book May Have You Laughing Out Loud in Public" blurb in Mari SanGiovanni's debut novel "Greetings From Jamaica, Wish You Were Queer," I (a) rolled my eyes in the universal "yeah, right" expression and (b) took it as a challenge to read it and not laugh, be touched, or even be turned on just a little bit.

Aside from a few books by Dave Barry and Douglas Adams' five book Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy trilogy, I don't, as a rule, read too many comedic novels. Either I never have time to do so, or when I do, I don't find them very funny.

Good thing, then, that I came upon a copy of Mari's wonderfully zany novel about an attractive, witty, bright, talented, if somewhat eccentric lesbian writer, Marie Santora, whose zany Italian-American relatives get even zanier when our very "outed" heroine inherits her grandmother's estate (even though the two really didn't get along too well).

This windfall comes just as Marie's relationship with Jess, her less-than-faithful lover, is unraveling; unhappy where she is and wanting to make her dreams of becoming a Hollywood screenwriter come true, the youngest member of the Santora clan realizes that her inheritance will now allow her to move to California and pursue not only her literary dream, but also the woman of her dreams, a well-known television actress named Lorn Elaine.

First, though, she'll take the highly eccentric Santora clan (her lesbian sister, straight brother, her aunt, and her love `em-but-they-drive-me-crazy parents) on an all-expenses paid vacation to Jamaica to soothe whatever hurt feelings there may be over the fact that she - and no one else - inherited Granma's entire estate.

Even though there are a few bittersweet riffs on the nature of relationships that all of us can identify with, "Greetings from Jamaica" is, in the best of ways, a hilarious romantic comedy with no other agenda than to entertain and make the reader smile while following the lovable, quirky Marie in her twin quests to deal with her crazy Italian family and capture the heart of the girl of her dreams. It's really excellently written, and I really did find myself laughing out loud at times. (With witty asides such as "What does one wear to her first penis-viewing? Despite my late-night investigation, Tiger Beat held no clues," how could I not laugh?)

Although the novel deals with Marie's sexuality and has a few (tastefully and sometimes even humorously-described) sex scenes, Greetings from Jamaica, Wish You Were Queer is, at heart, a warm and wacky look at what SanGiovanni describes as "siblings, Sicilians, and celebrity stalkers...money, mothers, and wayward meatballs" that will appeal to most readers (at least those who won't be offended by her sometimes risque humor), and not just members of the gay community.