Brooks on Books: Jean Shepherd

If you don't recognize the late Jean Shepherd from his radio work or his short stories, surely you recognize his most famous creation. Turner Broadcasting's holiday staple "A Christmas Story" was based on Shepherd's work and narrated by the man himself. Many of the elements of that Xmas favorite--the Major Award, the attempt to decode the message on a Little Orphan Annie broadcast, and the epic quest for a Red Ryder BB gun--are found in Shepherd's 1964 book, "In God We Trust, All Others Play Cash."

Many of the short stories in this volume originally appeared in magazine form, but Shepherd constructed a framing device where he is a New York writer returning to his hometown in Indiana. He bellies up to the bar run by his childhood friend Flick, and their conversation reminds the narrator of a variety of stories of growing up in a Midwestern small town in the Depression.

These stories are full of vivid detail and often laugh-out-loud funny. Anyone who loves "A Christmas Story" will enjoy seeing those classic scenes play out on the page. Anyone who saw the less memorable 1994 film "My Summer Story" will also recognize some of the material and wonder again why it didn't work so well in that movie. But everyone can appreciate Shepherd's wry commentary as he pokes fun at Midwestern mores and rituals like bowling, car appreciation, and fishing. Using his narrator persona, he also sends up New York--with a bit more edge. He is visiting his hometown appreciative of what he's returning to even as he feels grateful for having escaped it. He teases East and Midwest, but the affection he has for his boyhood Indiana is clear.

Though the book is a lot of fun, it may be a mistake to plow through it as I did. Now, I happened to be in a situation where I had two hours of waiting and nothing to do BUT plow through to the conclusion. I enjoyed finishing it. But Shepherd's style is a bit overwhelming, and I think it loses its impact if you see it in large continuous doses. After a while, the purple prose, the self-conscious hyperbole (I think every other story involves an event that is "still remembered to this day"), and the frequent use of capitalization to identify something with mock importance as a Big Thing are effective devices, but probably more so in short story format.

However, I still enjoyed this book, and now I'm motivated to seek out Shepherd's other work. Radio was apparently his true calling, and I'd like to hear his efforts in that medium. After all, his gift as a storyteller is clear even from his narration in "A Christmas Story." It's easy to imagine Shepherd reading the text of "In God We Trust" to you...and it's hard not to think the experience would be just a little bit better if he were.