Title: The Trouble with Brunch: Work, Class and the Pursuit of Leisure
Author: Shawn Micallef
Publisher: Coach House Books
Joshua Definition of Brunch: Waking up at 8 in the morning, before the morning crowd shows up, to get to a cheap dim sum place on the edge of Toronto to get stuffed with dumplings, fried squid, and sticky rice.
Shawn Micallef definition of Brunch: Waiting in line to get scowled at the staff as they serve overpriced leftovers of greasy eggs, an overabundance of bacon, and Kale (not sure what that is, but it sounds pretentious) washed down with mimosa for three to four hours before being vomited out on the street in early afternoon, too drunk to do anything for the rest of the day but sleep it off.
This book has received much media attention often focusing on the almost graphic criticism of the meal.
However it isn’t about making fun of of one of the most reviled meals of the 21st century and it’s customers who work in converted lofts and choose to see auteur plays in converted churches than the newest blockbuster at Cineplex.
Rather it’s about those people “the new creative class” the ones who can be found working in converted lofts or at their local coffee shop, and how they fit into society. The Brunch is just a humours skin to cover the more essayic (yes I’ve invented a new word) focus of how this Creative class perceives itself and their role in the gentrification of the downtown of cities.
It’s one of those white people poking fun at themselves books (see Stuff White People Like as the funniest example), Shawn Micallef being a white-male, from small-town Windsor, getting by as a writer while living in downtown Toronto. aka the kind of guy who gets invited a lot to the brunches he criticizes.
If you aren’t the kind of person to normally buy books from coach house books, see an art gallery opening as legitimate a way to spend a evening as a minor league hockey game then this book might start boring after the almost pornographic description of brunches in the first couple of chapters (those are fun to read).
However it’s still a mostly easy read and those who dream of lofts and trying out brunch, this is a read for you.
By Joshua, North York Writer
