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3.86 AVERAGE
3.86 AVERAGE
Billy Gillespie wakes up to find that he and his wife have switched bodies. Unfortunately, Billy’s wife had devious plans to kill him the previous night, but her plans have backfired and now her soul inhabits Billy’s dead body. Almost everyone in the town is affected by this Freaky Friday-esque swap and Billy and his neighbors are determined to get to the bottom of it.
I must admit, I did not like this story at all in the beginning. The dialogue is very southern and vulgar. In the first few sentences, Billy refers to his manhood as his “hog” (I have never been so repulsed by the word “hog” in my life). Fortunately, after a few more pages, I was able to laugh at the outrageous things these characters said and did. Overall, Muscle Memory was surprisingly enjoyable – completely ridiculous, mind you, but also very funny. I would recommend this to others.
Reviewed by Brittany for Book Sake.
I must admit, I did not like this story at all in the beginning. The dialogue is very southern and vulgar. In the first few sentences, Billy refers to his manhood as his “hog” (I have never been so repulsed by the word “hog” in my life). Fortunately, after a few more pages, I was able to laugh at the outrageous things these characters said and did. Overall, Muscle Memory was surprisingly enjoyable – completely ridiculous, mind you, but also very funny. I would recommend this to others.
Reviewed by Brittany for Book Sake.
Reading the premise of Steve Lowes Muscle Memory I knew I had to have it. Who doesn’t like a good body swapping story? Honestly I had never read one before, but I have seen most of the movies that were mentioned in the book. Most people have seen the classic ones from the eighties staring the likes of Kirk Cameron, Fred Savage, and George Burns among others. But I have never seen a movie where someone changed bodies with a sheep, so I ordered Muscle Memory from Amazon. Then I waited, and waited for a long while. I suppose this book was on back order, I don’t know, but when it finally came I read it instantly. It’s a quick read, my only complaint would be that’s it’s so short. But that’s not so bad, Steve Lowe wrote a sequel that’s just as good that you can download for free if you go to his website. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes funny well written stories. Hopefully we’ll be seeing some more Bizarro books from Steve Lowe in the near future.
Short, funny, even though its a little sad that poor Billy had to literally walk inescapably in Tina's shoes to understand what his wife was going through.
Waking up to find that he's inside his wife's body has to be one of the most insane things that could have happened to Billy. It should have been a bad dream but it wasn't and he isn't going to wake up from it anytime soon. Instead he'll find that almost everyone else in town has changed bodies with their loved ones too and no one knows just what's happened.
This was a fun read, pretty surreal and written with an honest blue collar guy in mind. Add the great humor into it and its well worth the time and pretty quick too at 57 pages.
This was a fun read, pretty surreal and written with an honest blue collar guy in mind. Add the great humor into it and its well worth the time and pretty quick too at 57 pages.
"I SHOULDA KNOWN something was up when the dog meowed at me."
Best opening line ever!
I've played out the body-swapping scenario in my head so many times, it became an obsession at one point. What if I swapped bodies with Mark Zuckerberg (please) ? Kat Dennings's BF (please, please, please) ? A diabetic tortoise ? A Latvian nun ? The list goes on... So yes, I think it's a fantastic and intriguing story device.
Steve Lowe brilliantly explores the physical and psychological impacts of body-swapping (or 'the Old Switcheroo') in Muscle Memory. He offers us a very simple, funny and compelling story with very lovable and realistic characters, and a superb ending. I simply could not put my kindle down.
Best opening line ever!
I've played out the body-swapping scenario in my head so many times, it became an obsession at one point. What if I swapped bodies with Mark Zuckerberg (please) ? Kat Dennings's BF (please, please, please) ? A diabetic tortoise ? A Latvian nun ? The list goes on... So yes, I think it's a fantastic and intriguing story device.
Steve Lowe brilliantly explores the physical and psychological impacts of body-swapping (or 'the Old Switcheroo') in Muscle Memory. He offers us a very simple, funny and compelling story with very lovable and realistic characters, and a superb ending. I simply could not put my kindle down.
What would you do if you woke up in your wife's body and saw your own body dead and poisoned on the bed? That's the problem facing Billy Gillespie one morning. Can Billy figure out what the hell happened and get back into his own body?
In this entry in the New Bizarro Author Series, Steve Lowe crafts a tale that asks the question "What Would Kirk Cameron Do?" When (most of) an entire town gets the old switcheroo pulled on it, chaos ensues and Steve Lowe is the one directing the chaos. Guys, imagine waking up and having to breast feed. That pretty much sums up the bulk of the book; coping with an unfamiliar body. Beyond that, you've got a cat in a dog's body, a man in a sheep's body, and government agents named Agent Tim and Agent Joey. Funny stuff.
I love that Steve Lowe worked in references to the body swapping comedies of the 80's. It was a really nice touch. The humor was better than I was hoping for. It was a little short but thems the breaks with the NBS.
With Muscle Memory, Steve Lowe enters the hallowed club of Goodreads Authors Who Aren't Assholes. Not only is he a funny guy in the Get the New Bizarro Authors a Book Deal Group, he's also pretty generous. How many authors do you know that would offer you a free copy of an earlier book when purchasing one of theirs? Being a whore for free books, I jumped at the chance and wasn't disappointed.
If 18 Again is a 1 and Like Father, Like Son is a 10, this book is a solid 8, right up there with Bodyswap, the episode of Red Dwarf where Lister and Rimmer switch bodies. Go out and buy it today. Steve would do it for you if your book was part of the New Bizarro Author Series.
Here's the interview I did with Steve Lowe.
In this entry in the New Bizarro Author Series, Steve Lowe crafts a tale that asks the question "What Would Kirk Cameron Do?" When (most of) an entire town gets the old switcheroo pulled on it, chaos ensues and Steve Lowe is the one directing the chaos. Guys, imagine waking up and having to breast feed. That pretty much sums up the bulk of the book; coping with an unfamiliar body. Beyond that, you've got a cat in a dog's body, a man in a sheep's body, and government agents named Agent Tim and Agent Joey. Funny stuff.
I love that Steve Lowe worked in references to the body swapping comedies of the 80's. It was a really nice touch. The humor was better than I was hoping for. It was a little short but thems the breaks with the NBS.
With Muscle Memory, Steve Lowe enters the hallowed club of Goodreads Authors Who Aren't Assholes. Not only is he a funny guy in the Get the New Bizarro Authors a Book Deal Group, he's also pretty generous. How many authors do you know that would offer you a free copy of an earlier book when purchasing one of theirs? Being a whore for free books, I jumped at the chance and wasn't disappointed.
If 18 Again is a 1 and Like Father, Like Son is a 10, this book is a solid 8, right up there with Bodyswap, the episode of Red Dwarf where Lister and Rimmer switch bodies. Go out and buy it today. Steve would do it for you if your book was part of the New Bizarro Author Series.
Here's the interview I did with Steve Lowe.
“I shoulda known something was up when the dog meowed at me.”
And thus begins Steve Lowe's Muscle Memory, a short but hilarious take on the oft copied but rarely improved upon body-switching sub-sub-genre. And Steve pulls no punches, going after several aspects of body-switching that aren't dealt with in “nicer” material.
Given how short the book is, it's difficult to write a lot about it without giving too much away. So to sum up, Billy wakes up in the body of his wife with his own body dead, finds that most of the town has switched bodies with their “significant others” (placed in quotes for...well, you'll find out), receives a visit from investigating Agents Tim and Joey, who only give their first names because of the new policy trying to make them appear warm and friendly, and finally has his life explained by the great sage Terry Bradshaw. If this hasn't made you want to read Muscle Memory yet, then nothing will aside from a body-swap of your own. Then you can use Muscle Memory as a how-to manual for your new life.
Steve has a great sense of humor and fun. You'll find yourself chuckling frequently, and whats more impressive is the way Steve will make you chuckle at some pretty average, everyday stuff. A short but fun read and a great little unexpected journey that comes highly recommended.
4 out of 5 stars.
And thus begins Steve Lowe's Muscle Memory, a short but hilarious take on the oft copied but rarely improved upon body-switching sub-sub-genre. And Steve pulls no punches, going after several aspects of body-switching that aren't dealt with in “nicer” material.
Given how short the book is, it's difficult to write a lot about it without giving too much away. So to sum up, Billy wakes up in the body of his wife with his own body dead, finds that most of the town has switched bodies with their “significant others” (placed in quotes for...well, you'll find out), receives a visit from investigating Agents Tim and Joey, who only give their first names because of the new policy trying to make them appear warm and friendly, and finally has his life explained by the great sage Terry Bradshaw. If this hasn't made you want to read Muscle Memory yet, then nothing will aside from a body-swap of your own. Then you can use Muscle Memory as a how-to manual for your new life.
Steve has a great sense of humor and fun. You'll find yourself chuckling frequently, and whats more impressive is the way Steve will make you chuckle at some pretty average, everyday stuff. A short but fun read and a great little unexpected journey that comes highly recommended.
4 out of 5 stars.
What would I do if I woke up with breasts and a vagina? This is the ethical question Steve Lowe wrestles with in his opus, Muscle Memory.
Actually, that's not the only issue he wrestles with here. This is a book about guilt: the guilt of having neglected a person who loves you and not having the chance to take it back. It's about coming to terms with loss, and accepting loss, and accepting your own failures. These issues are just as important as ones having to do with waking up genderly resituated.
This book laughs with you, and tells you funny jokes, and very clearly came here to party. Then, it stabs you in the fucking head and you die before your death even registers. That's what this novella does. Which is a combination I LOVE: comedy by itself feels like angel food cake, but when you mix some real emotional resonance in with humor, you end up with the recipe for my favorite kind of book. This combination is often pulled off by Vonnegut and sometimes by John Irving, but I can't think of many other authors who I've felt truly made it work.
A lot of the humor comes from the fact that this book is a hilarious modern update of the "who's on first" joke, only in technicolor and with dick jokes. Main character wakes up in his wife's body. His own body, laying next to him, is stone dead. He quickly discovers that almost everyone is in someone else's bodies, most of the time spouses trading skins. Almost all the characters are in bodies that aren't really theirs, and they're trying to keep track of who is who, and figure out whether they should refer to the name of the BODY or the name of the person INSIDE the body, and figure out whether a man in a woman's body should be referred to as a he or a she...is all bizarro about gender identity? Anyway, this dynamic adds a lot of hilarity. So do bestiality humor, hiding-the-body humor, and a bunjillion other genres of humor.
I can tell that I should've started reading bizarro much sooner, because I've loved all of it I've read yet. Before trying it out, I was expecting something much closer to splatterpunk, but clearly that's not what bizarro is about. Lowe's main character is in an unbelievably strange world, yet the story really revolves around his attempt to come to terms with his wife's death and how he treated her before she died. The peripheral characters are also struggling with relationships in various ways, some of which are very funny. But, these characters are mainly foils to the main character's maturation.
I usually don't like short stories, and this almost qualifies as one. But, Steve packs a lot into sixty pages, keeping the story moving, showing us his character's internal struggles, and finally reaching a climax that I will say nothing about, because the last two pages are haunting and perfect. If you're lucky enough to find a copy of this, I would definitely recommend it. And if you can't find a copy, I still have Caris's signed copy at my apartment, and I'm sure he wouldn't mind if I gave it away.
Actually, that's not the only issue he wrestles with here. This is a book about guilt: the guilt of having neglected a person who loves you and not having the chance to take it back. It's about coming to terms with loss, and accepting loss, and accepting your own failures. These issues are just as important as ones having to do with waking up genderly resituated.
This book laughs with you, and tells you funny jokes, and very clearly came here to party. Then, it stabs you in the fucking head and you die before your death even registers. That's what this novella does. Which is a combination I LOVE: comedy by itself feels like angel food cake, but when you mix some real emotional resonance in with humor, you end up with the recipe for my favorite kind of book. This combination is often pulled off by Vonnegut and sometimes by John Irving, but I can't think of many other authors who I've felt truly made it work.
A lot of the humor comes from the fact that this book is a hilarious modern update of the "who's on first" joke, only in technicolor and with dick jokes. Main character wakes up in his wife's body. His own body, laying next to him, is stone dead. He quickly discovers that almost everyone is in someone else's bodies, most of the time spouses trading skins. Almost all the characters are in bodies that aren't really theirs, and they're trying to keep track of who is who, and figure out whether they should refer to the name of the BODY or the name of the person INSIDE the body, and figure out whether a man in a woman's body should be referred to as a he or a she...is all bizarro about gender identity? Anyway, this dynamic adds a lot of hilarity. So do bestiality humor, hiding-the-body humor, and a bunjillion other genres of humor.
I can tell that I should've started reading bizarro much sooner, because I've loved all of it I've read yet. Before trying it out, I was expecting something much closer to splatterpunk, but clearly that's not what bizarro is about. Lowe's main character is in an unbelievably strange world, yet the story really revolves around his attempt to come to terms with his wife's death and how he treated her before she died. The peripheral characters are also struggling with relationships in various ways, some of which are very funny. But, these characters are mainly foils to the main character's maturation.
I usually don't like short stories, and this almost qualifies as one. But, Steve packs a lot into sixty pages, keeping the story moving, showing us his character's internal struggles, and finally reaching a climax that I will say nothing about, because the last two pages are haunting and perfect. If you're lucky enough to find a copy of this, I would definitely recommend it. And if you can't find a copy, I still have Caris's signed copy at my apartment, and I'm sure he wouldn't mind if I gave it away.
Too short! The guys cracked me up, but man nothing tops Edgar