Book Review: Satan Takes Over

I reviewed another Jass Richards book, Turblojetslams. It was a hilarious take on modern cottage life. We cottaged from 1960 until 2010. Things were so different in the 60's. Not for the better. 

This book takes modern times, with renters who fire off fireworks every night for two weeks, jetskis doing figure 8's, bonfires day and night, and manages to solve the problem. It is a hilarious take, based in reality. You know Jass has lived this life. It is way too familiar. 

I love the creativity with which she writes. I just laugh at her take on modern cottage life, as much as I cry over the inhumanity towards one another. The noise that blocks out the sounds of the critters, what with technology and lake toys. The sights and smell of smoke wafting across the lake, bonfires on hot summer days. The notion that landowners are kings of their own castles drove us away from lakeside life.

It was a timely read for us, as we work on preventing a gun range nearby. Jass is a kindred spirit, a clever writer, and a person with a seriously wonderful sense of humour. Some days you just have to laugh. If you need a laugh, you can find her publications here, I've downloaded several on my iBook. It makes for great reading. You'll shake your head as you recognize characters, as much as you want to whack them upside the head! 

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Cottage life used to be simpler. We hand pumped water up from the lake. There was a two-seater outhouse. Eventually, we got in Hydro, and were connected to Bala's town water and the sewer system.

We were given an old wooden boat by friends who built seafleas. I loved that old boat. I'd crank up the 60 HP outboard, and toodle up the lake to visit my friend. Wooden, and a heavy boat, it eventually rotted. Here is my dad being given the boat by Bob Scythes.

My uncle had a sailboat, and dad bought it from Uncle Fred when he upgraded to a bigger, better boat. Dad would roar up and down the lake.

Mom and dad bought me a used canoe from a kids' camp. I loved that canoe!

Bonfires abound:

 

Renters partying, yelling and screaming on the lake at 2 a.m.. Setting off fireworks in the dark. I called the OPP. They were quiet, then ramped it all up, again.

Then there were the people ice fishing. They built a fire on the ice. In the meanwhile, the truck roared up and down the lake. You could both hear and feel the waves under the ice sloshing back and forth towards our shore.

Citiots peeing in the lake. This makes me laugh as much as it creeps me out. We were sitting here, quietly watching the wildlife, on our lakeside bench, just like our kids. I had my smaller zoom lens on. 

Book Review: TurboJetslams

TurboJetslams 

I loved this book, as much as I hated it. It you have cottagey friends, or people who liked the 'good old days' of spending quiet days by the lake, or those who like canoe camping, be sure and take it as a guest gift. The cover sort of turned me off, until I began reading. Then, I recognized all of the neighbours, renters, and new cottage owners I'd met in Muskoka! The ones who brought city ways to rural Muskoka.

Now, I just wrote a poem about lake life:
Lake Etiquette - a dream or nightmare, but Richards wrote a sarcastic novel. It might have made me feel better, too!

TurboJetslam is Richards' name for jetskis, or Personal Water Craft. Water Craft *is* too benign a term for them, as they do figure 8's in front of your dock. They let the 8-year-old drive the jetslam. Or the dudes who like to fish just off your dock, where you swim, and leave their lures behind. Or running over the loons. Shooting, target practice, or hunting season.

There, in the book, were the same neighbours we met, who bought a cottage with another family. Trailers of jetskis for the weekend. Renters who didn't believe you had to get up in the morning for work.  Bonfires and leaf burning. Fireworks every night for two weeks. (We called the cops. We should have called them again. They were worse after our fine OPP had left. In a drunken, loud party animal state they launched canoes at 2:00 a.m.)

Yes, the one who peed off his boat, while his buddies fished, and we were having a coffee by the lake. The fireworks at 2:00 a.m., the ATVs on the road at 4:00 a.m., the 6' bonfires in the middle of the day, the blaring music on the boats across the calm lake. Richards calls them idiots, but we call them citiots. Even worse, waterskiing at dusk, sans lights, screaming in the sunset.

What Richards has done is brilliant. At first, I began getting irritated as I read about a familiar character, or a familiar scenario from our time living on the lake. Then, as the main character amps up her game, I see the thrill in the planning and the retribution she undertakes for pay back.

From the publisher

You ever have a neighbour whose behaviour is so mind-bogglingly inconsiderate and so suicide-inducingly annoying that you just want to ask him, in a polite Canadian way, to please stop? TurboJetslams isn’t like that. Jass Richards’ new novel, TurboJetslams: Proof #29 of the Non-Existence of God, tells the tale of one person’s pathetic and hilarious attempts to single-handedly stop the destruction of a little piece of beautiful Canadian wilderness by the increasing numbers of idiots who couldn’t care less. A perfect cottage-warming gift. Boomer lit. Sure to resonate with paddlers everywhere.