While Bernard-Henri L vy was working the talk-show circuit, espousing heavily-accented nuggets of pseudo-wisdom about the United States, Garrison Keillor and the Times book review were busy concocting yesterday's very, very funny spanking of his book, which has Intern Alexis waving her "Freedom Fries Forever!" flag. Meanwhile, Ariel Levy has fallen victim to the Mastercard style guide and Dwight Garner loses touch with reality. After the jump, your weekly guide to sounding literate.

American Vertigo
 By Bernard-Henri L vy
Reviewed by Garrison Keillor

Bernard-Henri L vy, you may be one hot toddy, you may rock a three-quarters of the way unbuttoned dress shirt, we may want to floss our teeth with your silvery chest hairs, we may want you to put your finger up to our mouths and say, "ne rien dire," — BUT, if we are to believe Garrison Keillor (and we believe everything GK says), you are also a twaddling fool. Garrison Keillor pulls off a really fabulous piece of reviewin' that had us yeah, don'tchyaknow-ing all along. GK starts off with a bang comparing BHL's writing style to that of a college sophomore. He then goes on to just brutally tear apart the ol' frog. Here's one of our favorite nuggets of cruel hilariousness below:

when, visiting Cooperstown ("this new Nazareth"), he finds out that Commissioner Bud Selig once laid a wreath at the tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington, where Abner Doubleday is also buried, L vy goes out of his mind. An event important only to Selig and his immediate family becomes, to L vy, an official proclamation "before the eyes of America and the world" of Abner as "the pope of the national religion . . . that day not just the town but the entire United States joined in a celebration that had the twofold merit of associating the national pastime with the traditional rural values that Fenimore Cooper's town embodies and also with the patriotic grandeur that the name Doubleday bears.

Uh, actually not. Negatory on "pope" and "national" and "entire" and "most" and "embodies" and "Doubleday."

Basically, we are not even remotely as funny as Garrison Keillor and we can't really do justice to this review. So, as those crazy tykes on "Reading Rainbow" used to say, "Don't take our word for it!" Read it yourself, you lazy pups.


Inside the List

Dwight, did you forget to take your objectivity pills? Last week he was told-you-soing all of us about James Frey and this week he lifts up his hind leg and pees on Dan Brown like a frickin fire hydrant in his Inside the List column. He writes:

"The Da Vinci Code," in its 147th week on the hardcover fiction list, claws its way back to No. 1 - the first time it has occupied that slot since last October. Isn't this book supposed to be gone by now?"

Hellllllo! It's a funny but irrelevant lil observation that leads us to wonder... Does Dwight realize that Brian Grazer is producing the movie version? Brian Grazer WILL NOT let the book slide from the public's attention. He will hold it in first place with the strength of his hair. It will not be gone by now, Dwight. Not a chance. Duh.


Money, A Memoir: Women, Emotions, and Cash
 By Liz Perle
Reviewed by Ariel Levy

The last paragraph of Ariel Levy's review of Liz Perle's money-moir is an example of when bad pop-culture metaphors happen to good writers:

"Money, a Memoir," by Liz Perle: $23. A book that really nailed the meanings and mysteries of money as it relates to gender: priceless."

Sorry to nit-pick, but the Mastercard joke has NOT BEEN FUNNY SINCE 1999!! For example:

New York Times Sunday edition: $3.50
Being retarded: Priceless.

See? Not funny.