Some comedians are naturally funny writers. Jon Stewart's Naked Pictures of Famous People is funny, and Woody Allen's first three books are classics. If I had to make a bet, I would bank on Michael Ian Black, of comedy groups Stella and The State, as one of those gifted writers; his sense of humor tends to be slightly subtler than his peers, which often translates more effectively into print.

Sadly, I would have lost that bet. Black is, at best, a mediocre comic author. The 50 essays in My Custom Van hinge on one joke apiece: One essay is titled "A Series of Letters to a Squirrel," and it offers no surprises at all. Other one-note essays involve handlebar mustaches, perms, and jug bands—and then they drag along for pages, not investigating the concept any further, before they dutifully end. One essay riffs on the idea of finding a DJ name, and all the choices (DJ Sandra Bullock Fan, DJ Animal Lover, and DJ LOL) are exactly the same kind of dopey-white-guy funny.

Black is funnier on the internet. He's been featured on the McSweeney's website, and his own blog (www.michaelianblack.typepad.com) is frequently hilarious. His long-running, one-sided jealous feud with David Sedaris, culminating in a reader contest to Photoshop Sedaris into a comic-book-style villain, shows the sort of inventive leeway that a book doesn't seem to provide him. His posts about scabies are also funnier than just about everything in My Custom Van. The interactivity of the internet seems to stimulate him, but Black's straight-faced surrealism, a kind of cross between Bob Newhart and Steven Wright, dances for a moment and then drops dead on the page.

Michael Ian Black reads Tues July 22, Third Place Books, 6 pm, free.