WOBEGON BOY

Monologuist, author and radio personality Garrison Keillor has grown a bit smug, sentimental and shopworn over the years. Although those qualities are apparent in this tape, it's nonetheless a funny, touching, shyly romantic and mildly autobiographical novel. And Keillor, who has been honing his Lake Wobegon tales for a decade or two on public radio's "Prairie Home Companion," has his delivery, as well as his prose, down cold. After hearing him reading his own opus, one wonders how the bare words on the printed page could possibly possess anywhere near as much lyricism and nuance. Indeed, his oral skills almost completely mask his literary flaws. Squeeze-box musical bridges add to the charm. The engineering by his longtime associate Tom Mudge is pristine. It's just a shame that his prickly jibes at the public radio world, which are merely incidental to the story, will be fully comprehended and appreciated by only a few. Y.R. Winner of AUDIOFILE Earphones Award ©AudioFile, Portland, Maine [Published: MAR/APR 98]