I'm a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America After 20 Years… (1997)

I've read most of Bryson's books and thoroughly enjoyed all of them. This commentary on his return home to the United States after 20 years of life in Britain is no exception. Bryson has a wonderful way of seeing through the pretentiousness and silliness that afflict human cultures (and, these days, American culture in particular) and some of the columns published in this book have a bit of an edge. All in all, however, this is a gentler, kinder Bill Bryson than I am used to reading. The laughs came through as expected and I read it in a sitting. Lovely book. Highly recommended, especially for those who take themselves too seriously. ( )

Bryson at his finest, I'm laughing so hard my head aches. ( )

Another ex-pat looking down on America. No thank you. ( )

"People have become so habituated to using the car for everything that it would never occur to them to unfurl their legs and see what they can do."

Having read and loved Notes from a Small Island and Down Under, I dutifully collected all of Bryson's books... this one is a collection of columns he wrote for a British newspaper after returning to the USA with his family, having left it as a young man.

Bryson pokes fun at nearly every aspect of life in the US - wranglings with immigration, the fact that no one walks anywhere, statistically aberrant accident rates, guns, diners, obesity, motels (there are several chapters on motels, actually), baseball, basketball, the local Ivy League college - everything. As I'm used to, it was generally funny with occasional snorts of laughter (to be suppressed on public transport).

Bizarrely, or perhaps just unexpectedly, Bryson appears much more positive about his time in the UK than the prospect of being back in his homeland - while the purpose of the column is clearly to be amusing to UK readers, week after week Bryson lampoons his new, re-adopted country. At first this makes a non-US reader feel rather smug but after a while I felt a bit bad, like hearing someone bad-mouth their other half. Given that the writing was intended to be episodic, it can come across as mildly repetitive, and eventually his negative tone (while often funny) can grate.

Probably not to be recommended to people who live in the USA and like it there. ( )

Received an old, decrepit copy on request from BCL. It seems to be collection of columns Bill Bryson wrote about his move from England to US. I always maintain Bill Bryson is funny in parts. Some of his columns about America's love of rules, love for idea of convenience (half the convenience products are actually inconvenient, drive-in window takes more time in queue than going in and eating, no one walks etc etc), inefficiency, love to sue anybody and everybody, general stupidity and dumb instructions, too many choices that complicate etc. That Miss Alabama's stupid speech also figures in one of the columns.

I had fun in initial columns - initial being after page 39 (pages before that were missing in the library book)- meaning I laughed a lot. Later I got used to the drift and was reading just out of curiosity.

Book is replete with things we already know of but it was interesting to read so many funny anecdotes to support it. ( )