The Underminer: Or, the Best Friend Who Casually Destroys Your Life

by Mike Albo and Virginia Heffernan

Book Overview

You can't escape him. He swerves in and out of your life as if effortlessly walking through a crowded restaurant. He's a passive-aggressive master. He's as undetectable as a whisper and as effective... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1582344841
• ISBN13: 9781582344843
• Release Date: February 2005
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
• Length: 164 Pages
• Weight: 0.65 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.4" x 8.1"

Customer Reviews

Inspired!

I never heard of Mike Albo before this book, and wow! He is a real talent. I was frequently overcome with laughter as I read. What is truly inspired is the way Albo nails the trends of the past 15 years. The yoga theme is a hoot, with its Hinduisms spouted by the pretentious narrator. Another blast is the conceit of Disorder, for which the cure-all is Askalar. The tones of know-it-all worldliness with which these ideas and cures are touted add to the fun. Each chapter ends with a drawing succinctly encapsulating the preceding episode, and each is a fabulous, witty entry. I don't have words to describe the fun of this book. But are people really so begrudging of others' success? Mike Albo's social circle must be green with envy at his triumph.

Hilarious, razor-sharp social satire

After reading an excerpt in The New Yorker, I couldn't wait to get this book. It's spot-on satire--deceptively breezy (so difficult to pull off, but Albo does it perfectly), filled with passages you'll love to read out loud to your partner, but able to make you squirm as it begins to dawn that you're no slouch in the undermining category yourself. How funny is it? I laughed out loud over and over--while in a "patient's family waiting room" waiting for a loved one to come out of surgery (he's fine). Now that's funny. I immediately went out and got Hornito; can't wait to dive in.

Comic Genius, Pure and Seething

By turns haunting and hilarious, The Underminer is a 164-page bitchfest as you've never experienced. Or maybe you have. . . . Every few pages, I was stifling SHRIEKS of recognition. Truly. It was if authors Albo and Heffernan had snuck a peak at my personal life, uncovering all the demons in disguise, and one in particular. . . . My absolute favorite lines: "I mean maybe you're not feeling upset because your body is in a kind of indecision about how to handle grief" and "It's just so great how yoga has spread its influence across the four corners of America. Old people are doing it, fat people are doing it, retarded people are doing it. . . ." This is the perfect book for everyone who's ever felt as if his/her so-called friends were lording their success/money/fame/real estate coups/babies over them. Buy one for yourself, and another for your nemesis. . . .

UNDERMINER is hilarious, pointed satire

We all know at least one of them: acquaintances who seem perfectly pleasant on the outside but offhandedly make you feel awful every time you encounter them. Who ARE these people, and CAN THEY BE STOPPED?? Albo and Heffernan's hilarious book finally calls this nasty social menace by his (or her!) true name: THE UNDERMINER. This book may inspire legions to finally call such "friends" on their passive-aggressions, but THE UNDERMINER is no self-help treatus: it's a hilariouly pointed piece of social satire. I can't count the number of times I had to STOP READING THIS book because I was laughing so hard. Down with Underminers and up with THE UNDERMINER!