The Bureaucrat of Bedtime

C. R. Yeager's second canter through the minefield of suburban family life mixes hilarity and heart with considerable flair. Whether lamenting the loss of cuteness in adolescents ("My idea of a tweeny still conjures someone in a frilly smock on a swing reading Charlotte's Web, not little Ms. Bowflex"), deconstructing lawn jockeys ("blind spots in our racial awareness"), or assessing his family's penchant for traveling with half the house ("My wife's notion of roughing it is reading the L. L. Bean catalog in front of a gas fire"), The Bureaucrat Of Bedtime abounds with clueless candor and universal appeal. A skewed love letter to the process of being a paterfamilias in the new millennium, featuring thirteen cartoons by award-winning illustrator Thomas Zahler.