The Time Machine Did It

Swartzwelder is a comedic genius who wrote some of the best Simpsons episodes sitting by himself in a diner and chain-smoking (when the diner banned smoking, he bought the booth and sat in it at home). You can see it in his first novel too; the whole thing is basically a series of excellent one-liners that surprisingly cohere into a plot, although that really wasn't necessary for the book to be enjoyable.

The jokes are pure and abstract, with almost no political or moral content—the opposite of 'clapter comedy' where the audience claps to indicate that they agree with you.

After receiving this slim volume as an early Christmas gift, I devoured it in one day—laughing my butt off throughout. As the cover so discreetly points out (this fact and the title are the only elements on the front of the book), Swartzwelder is better known as the author of 59 episodes of The Simpsons. The same twisted sense of humor that made the Swartzwelder years so hilarious is in full effect here.

Pretty much everything you need to know is right there on that minimalist cover: there is going to be a time machine involved, and Swartzwelder has proven himself to be a very twisted individual. 59 times, in fact.

The antics of Frank Burly, the world’s stupidest private investigator, found me searching for my Simpsons guide to see show more who penned Time and Punishment, the Treehouse of Horror episode where Homer inadvertently builds a time machine while trying to fix the toaster. It wasn’t Swartzwelder who wrote it, and maybe this is his way of getting back for not being invited to that party. Whatever his motivation, it’s a hit, and I’m looking forward to cracking open the next episode ... ’erm, book. show less

It was while listening to the DVD Commentary of the Simpsons circa Season 8 or so that I learnt that John Swartzwelder was now churning out novels. Suffice to say, I went "online" (as the young folks say) and ordered a copy of "The Time Machine Did It" from our friends at Amazon.

As other, wiser reviewers have noted, the book is about a time machine. And a dectective named Frank Burly. 'Tis a bizarre sense of humour this Swartzelder has but I found myself laughing laud and often as I read it. I then lent out to a number of miscreants I call my friends and they too reported laughing loud and often. Indeed, one of the people decided they would be better off owning the book and has no plans to return it. Nevermind, my revenge will be both show more sweet and mindboggling.

I've also started buying other Swartzwelder books and can report there are laughs to be had with those too. show less

Incredibly funny, but the plot is kind of lost in a near stream-of-consciousness of Burly's thoughts and the author's jokes. It was funny enough to work in such a short book, but probably a good thing it wasn't any longer.

This is a fun and absurd mix of science fiction and mystery. The plot is mostly a washing line to hang jokes on but the jokes are great. Lots of laugh out loud moments.

A book you can read within only a couple of hours and worth each minute of it. There's a laugh on pretty much every page.

This book consists of short sentences. And short paragraphs. Sometimes these end with a joke. But often they don't.
The author wrote episodes of “The Simpsons”. But this is like reading “Who Framed Roger Rabbit”. Maybe he wrote that too. Or it’s like a Road-runner cartoon only with less in the way of internal logic. So while I laughed quite often I got irritated more.

That’s all folks.