The Financial Lives Of The Poets

The Financial Lives of the Poets is about the financial, emotional, and personal downturn of a Matt Prior. Matt used to work for a newspaper. He left after many years to pursue a personal endeavor to create a website mixing financial news with poetry. When that idea didn’t quite work, he went back to the paper only to be laid off a few months later.

With his house payments piling up, his kids private school tuition and his wife’s part-time non-benefit eligible position, and the job market not promising, he must find a way – any way – to get money quick.

Though the premise may sound depressing, this book is actually quite funny. I rarely laugh out loud while reading a book, but I did with this one. Often. The author, Jess Walter, gives Matt Prior a very dry sense of humor and the way his quest for money plays out presents the opportunity for many hilarious situations to ensue.

But, still, underneath all the humor, there is a very real situation happening that, I think, most people are going through or have gone through in their lives. Layoffs, upside down mortgages, financial desperation, the desire to live life the way you want to but never quite having the financial means to do so…it’s all very relatable. It may also be what makes this book so funny; you laugh because you understand and we’ve all been there and we’ve all had those thoughts.

Go read it. It’s a good book.