Topper

It is, by this time, a cliche: boring business dude meets a manic pixie dreamgirl who shakes up his days, keeps him up all night, teaches him about love, and then passes into the great beyond. What makes this book still feel marvelously fresh is that the MPDG isn't all that wacky, she's married, and she's already dead at the start of the book. Other than drinking mind-bending Prohibition-era quantities of booze, the adventures themselves are amazingly simple. Topper and his ghost companions enjoy several good meals, but otherwise they spend the summer mostly sleeping rough, swimming in rivers and the Atlantic, canoeing, reading [b:Ulysses|338798|Ulysses|James Joyce|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1428891345s/338798.jpg|2368224] show more aloud, and just digging the beauty of nature. There is singing and dancing, even a little brawling, but it's so charmingly bucolic. After all, if Topper gets up to 25 MPH in his car it feels fast and dangerous, and it no doubt was since roads were iffy and there were still a lot of farmers with horses about.

I was worried about Topper's wife. Needlessly. Smith is a writer who can produce the banter of Coward, and also spend a lot of time telling us how Topper feels about his cat. I knew it was going to have a happy ending, but I didn't know the ending would be so perfect. The overall effect is charming, but never twee. Highly recommended. show less

In Topper, or, The Jovial Ghosts, by Thorne Smith, we meet Cosmo Topper, a bland banker in 1920s New England; his life is dull, and his wife Mary wants to keep it that way. Indeed, Cosmo's only real connection is to his cat, Scollops - until, that is, he takes a notion to buy a refurbished car, an automobile that was damaged in an accident that took the lives of its previous owners, George and Marion Kerby. No sooner does he get behind the wheel, however, than Cosmo realizes that while dead they might be, the Kerbys are very active ghosts indeed! And they are bent on, first of all, having fun and secondly, turning Cosmo's world upside down....Topper was published in 1926 and as such it has the faults of its time in terms of sexism, show more racism (of which there is actually very little, but that's mainly because there are very few scenes involving non-white characters) and basic mayhem, fueled by copious amounts of liquor, Scotch in particular. At the same time, it's very funny and makes some very arch observations about American society at that time, most of which aim to point up the hypocrisy of the era. Smith wrote a second Topper book, and in the 1930s there were three quite successful movies (which, if I recollect, typified the "screwball comedy" of that decade) based on his tales, but this is where his characters get their start. Keep in mind that the casual "-isms" of its time didn't generate the outrage then that they do now, and you may quite enjoy it. I found the constant drinking a bit wearing, but otherwise would recommend it. show less

There was a time when people didn’t have instant entertainment, when they weren’t fed what to think or feel. Before easy and cheap access to television, before radio, before movies ... okay, “talkies” ... there was little to entertain themselves. Books helped. And the readers still had to think. I found a copy of Topper Takes a Trip in an antique store, bought it, and though I’d seen the movie (it was entertaining, sue me), thought I should read this first.

Rich language. Mr. Smith sure had a way with words. Vivid imagery with stately descriptions. Now, I’m not sure if Smith ever drank because he exaggerated mightily the consumption of the milquetoast Cosmo Topper and wild, if generally ... dead ..., friends. Comical show more adventures, risqué in a way that seems a surprise for a book published in 1926. We need not be naive to think that people weren’t risqué, but in print? Regardless of its entertainment value, I can’t forgive Cosmo Topper his, um, spirit-ual indiscretions...but this book was written for a different era. Not that it was forgivable then, but that is just the way things were written. I might watch the movie again to compare, and I expect I’ll read the sequel soon enough. show less

Cosmo Topper is an odd duck and his story is an even goofier one. After hearing about a young couple tragically killed in a car accident he sets out to buy their automobile from a mechanic. He has never driven a car and so obviously he doesn't have a license. Despite all that, something prompts him to hide the purchase of the car from Mrs. Topper as well as keep secret the subsequent driving lessons he needs in order to operate the motor vehicle. But the trouble really begins when the ghosts of George and Marion Kirby, the couple killed in the accident, start haunting Mr. Topper and their old vehicle. For lack of a better word they are troublemakers, materializing at will and causing general mayhem. Things turn scandalous when Mr. Kirby show more leaves his wife. Vixen Marion is left to haunt Mr. Topper by her playful self. show less

Great escape literature. It's not art, so it doesn't need criticism. An enjoyable exploration of what has since come to be known as midlife crisis.

Cosmo Topper is a bored New York banker with a wife who has taken to permanent dyspepsia (indigestion). Until he buys a car and learns to drive. It's the car in which George and Marion Kerby, an unconventional, party-loving young couple, lost their lives one night when they hit a tree. When Topper out of curiosity drives by the tree, George and Marion in their ghostly form, join him in the car. Topper's life is never the same. It's a good story, if aimless much of the time, and the humor is enjoyable if not laugh-out-loud funny.

Absolutely delightful. Must read the rest of these. While in some ways this was considered scandalous, it certainly seems innocent today, and what man hasn't fallen in love with a ghost? This modern era farce has a sweetness and innocence lacking in a post-modern era characterized by violence and overt sex. Smith uses an interesting motif in this book that he did not use in "Gods". Keep your eyes open for it.