Hey everyone. This is a very special episode for me. Not only is it the book that made me laugh and cry the most this year, but the author, one of the greatest working comedians today and someone I have looked up to for his entire career, he will also be joining us. Today's book is Misfit, Growing Up Awkward in the 80s by Gary Goldman.

And this is The Book Pile.

A comedy podcast about the best of books and the worst of books.

If this is your first time on the podcast, welcome and maybe suggest checking out our

back catalog of over 160 other books. Some of those have got to interest

you, but we try and make every single episode funny regardless of the book. I'm Kellanerskin.

I'm a comic, a father, and something I learned about Gary Goldman's father from his book is that

Gary was taught that learning to fight

was a very important life skill, and at the same time, he wasn't allowed to ever say the words

idiot or fart. And that would be such a dilemma for me, because those are the only words I yell when I'm beating someone up.

And I'm David Vance.

Kellan, I don't know if you notice that this is kind of the anti-80s book despite

happening in the 80s because it's the only 80s story where a guy beats up his bully and

gets on the football team and he's miserable.

Every 80s movie makes it seem like punching your bully is the most pleasurable thing you can do in the world.

So Dave and I are going to share our thoughts on this book.

Following that will be our interview with a great Gary Goldman.

And just a quick parenthetical statement from me to our loyal listeners and subscribers.

Thank you so much for your patience these last few weeks with late episodes, including this one.

Starting next week, we'll be back on track with episodes every Monday and bonus episodes posted to the Patreon every Thursday or Friday.

Again, so sorry for the delay on this one, but we wanted to start 2024 off with a bang with a celebrity comedian guest author.

And this one took some work to put together.

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