inPrint: the Pleasure of My Company by Steve Martin (2003) 4/5

The Pleasure of My Company is the second novel from writer, actor, and comedian Steve Martin, one of my favourite entertainers of all time. At 176 pages, this wonderfully written book is an easy read and thoroughly enjoyable. Martin is a talented writer on all counts: his style is unique without being difficult, he can be very funny without being comic, but above all, he is enormously perceptive and intelligent, creating characters who, while being strange and unusual, are entirely believable. Indeed, I think it is this insight that made his original comedy and subsequent writing so enjoyable.

The Pleasure of My Company is centred around the almost cripplingly obsessive-compulsive, though very intelligent, Daniel Pecan Cambridge. The story takes you on a firsthand journey through this highly unique individual's mind and life - following him as he copes with everything from ensuring that the lightbulbs in his Santa Monica apartment always total 1125 watts, to his difficulties in interacting with the outside world (e.g. having to avoid curbs resulting in him only being able to cross streets where two driveways are directly opposite one another), to the development of a touching relationship with his young therapist, Clarissa, and her son. One of the central events driving the story is Daniel's participation in the Most Average American essay contest, where he ends up competing against himself, having entered the contest twice (once using a pseudonym). However, the story is really about getting the reader inside Daniel's head, which Martin accomplishes with grace and depth. Steve Martin's novels (unlike his 1998 book, Pure Drivel) aren't meant to be specifically comical - they're funny because life is funny - but they certainly demonstrate the great intelligence that is behind one of America's greatest entertainers.