Moore's books are a light, quick, fun read. Lamb in particular, the Christmas book, and Fluke are hilarious. They're not meant to be taken seriously and they're not highbrow, but that's half the fun.

And color me weird, but I really enjoyed the first two vampire books, since they were so absurdly dopey and charming.

I am apparently not enough of a Moore fan to have known about the reading ahead of time. But having stumbled upon it by chance about fifteen minutes before it started, it was really a pleasant way to spend part of my evening! The vampire books may not be his best work, but they're certainly a great distraction from the rest of the sparkley vampire nonsense going on in the literary world. (My favorite is Coyote Blue.)

@ 1 & 2: I totally agree with both of you. I enjoyed the last vampire books, but could hardly get through this one. Lamb is my favorite to date, but also the first of his I ever read.

Wait, wait..."Abbey Normal"? Please tell me he credited Young Frankenstein at some point...endnotes, maybe?

No @5, I don't believe he ever does. It was honestly pretty distracting to me.

I didn't realize there was a third book that came out, although I am rereading Lamb for probably the sixth time. That book has the annoying habit of not being returned to me when I lend it out, so I'm on my third copy at this point too.

I LOVE Christopher Moore's novels, they are witty, intelligent and very highly amusing.

While Moore's enjoyable for the first 5/6th of all his books (I love most of the Pine Cove novels right up until just before the sort of "man, I'm sick of writing a book" climax). I assume his readings are much like his books: great right up until just before where the climax should be at which point they sort of drift of into a ("deus ex machina" is far too generous) "let's just finish this" sort of end. Is this wrong?

I can imagine he's a great conversationalist who just drifts off mid-sentence and disappears at the end of the night.

Moore's fun. It is unfair to him not to say that. He definitely has witty moments and I have laughed out loud, or at least chuckled, during every book of his that I have read. The vampire novels are... not my favorite. I don't see any reason to read this newest one.

Nobody else ever seems to mention really liking Fool, but I'm kind of a Shakespeare junkie and I thought it was great. I mean, he's no Stoppard, but there was something terrifically amusing about rewriting Lear for the groundlings.

@9

"Conversationalist" isn't what you meant, is it?

Lamb is epic, but I have to say my favorite of all his books so far is A Dirty Job. It seems the least cartoonish, the least buffoonish, of them, a little heavier on the detail I guess. Fluke, the Pine Cove books, and Island of the Sequined Love Nun were cute and funny, but had way less character development. If someone wants to get into Moore, I recommend A Dirty Job, then Lamb, then Fool. But that's just me.

My co-worker lent me the audio book of A Dirty Job for my daily commute.

Not only are Moore's jokes lame, they are unremitting. You will not get a single sentence of relief from the puns, pseudo-snappy dialogue and the cliched quirks of the characters.

This isn't to say you shouldn't read or listen to his works. I found the road rage that a Dirty Job induced strangely therapeutic.