“We are professionals. Though not specifically professionals in the field of ‘psychology’ or ‘psychiatry,’ we are both highly paid actors and comedians, and as such know more about neuroses than you could possibly imagine. . . .”

If you’re tired of following the rules, dating people from Mars and Venus, gorging on chicken soup for your soul, or getting lost on a road less traveled, then it’s time you listened to Ben Stiller and Janeane Garofalo, two people who actually sweat the small stuff . . . because, let’s face it, if your body doesn’t sweat, it dies–much like Ben and Janeane’s train wreck of a relationship many years ago. From that experience came wisdom and self-reproachment. Now, in Feel This Book, they tackle the tough questions:

– Is love necessary?
– How can I make money off my spouse?
– Compassion–is it overrated?
– Why can’t I sleep around and still love you?
– How many times have you told your significant other that you would pick up something for dinner on your way home from the office, and next thing you knew you’re at an all-night eatery with some hermaphrodite you found on the strip, having eggs and bacon at three in the morning?

Through helpful tips, completely fabricated case studies, the six laws of spiritual success, the fourteen by-laws of spiritual awakening, and the twenty-three addendums and sub-laws regarding anything spiritual and successful, Stiller and Garofalo teach such valuable lessons as:

– When it comes to family, grasp onto the blame and don’t let go
– Make the connection . . . between Deepak and Tupac
– Your mother lied; looks are everything, and the sooner you submit and stop denying the inevitable, the happier you will be
– And much more!

Feel This Book. Let it be your path, your compass, your sensible shoes, your Frappuccino®. It’s what self-help was meant to be.A warning to readers: though Ben Stiller (Flirting with Disaster) and Janeane Garofalo (The Truth About Cats and Dogs) used to be a couple, do not confuse their advice book with Chicken Soup for the Couple’s Soul. This is more of a cross between James Thurber and E.B. White’s satirical Is Sex Necessary? and MTV’s Beavis and Butt-Head: Chicken Soup for the Butt.

The ex-couple give us alternating chapters of remarkably rambling, extravagantly ironic, showbiz-insider’s philosophical musings, but they do discuss their actual relationship, just to let you know where they stand–right on your funny bone, exerting maximum pressure until you beg for mercy. After their breakup, writes Garofalo, “We agreed that in the future we would only meet for professional purposes, or if we were drunk and felt like having emotionally destructive sex.”

This faux tome (also read by the authors on audiocassette) is a meeting of the minds for professional purposes. But again, don’t be fooled by what these wily authors say! The intriguing chapters referred to in the opening pages–“Why Can’t I Sleep Around and Still Love You?”; “How to Fake an Orgasm to Show Your Love, or The Art of the Squeal”; “Negotiating with God for What You Want–and Getting It!”; “Pros and (Very Few) Cons of a Third Party in the Bedroom”–these chapters do not in fact exist! What does exist is a dog’s breakfast of jokes from a pair of clowns. Read it and weep, but heed it at your peril. –Tim Appelo