Tucker Max is not your typical internet celebrity. Where most online personalities gain recognition for political views or celebrity gossip, Max, armed only with stories of the wanton drunken head trip that is his life, built an online shrine to himself which receives around 11 million hits a year. He has self-published two books, starred in an MTV “Sex 2K” special and will release I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell, a hilarious short story collection of debauchery, deviance and delinquency this December.
This wild whirlwind of hedonism opens with “The Famous Sushi Pants Story,” a time-stamped chronology of a night out drinking with a portable breathalyzer. He challenges a stranger to a BAC contest (which he loses, despite blowing a .22) and wakes up the next morning without his pants, cell phone or wallet, still blowing a BAC of .09. This drunken outrageousness continues in “Tucker goes to hockey game, causes trouble” where Max ends up tackling a hockey team’s mascot and is escorted out of the arena. There are assorted sexual vignettes, such as “The Blowjob Follies,” a literary blooper reel of blowjobs gone wrong. Among the more memorable stories in the collection, though, are Max’s road trips. “The Austin Road Trip” details his journey with three friends to Babydolls, one famously depraved strip club in Texas.
Max’s writing style is nothing to revere, but it is clear, intelligent and easy to follow. His blunt, crude tone isn’t for everybody, and his sexual exploits make most pornos seem tame. His womanizing won’t appeal to many females. In one story he hooks up with a fat girl eager to meet his roommates, throws her clothes out of his first story window, forces her to rush out for them nude and locks the door after her.
The ladies do get a bit of consolation in “This’ll Just Hurt a Little,” in which one of the many women he’s burned gets revenge in a manner that will make most male readers queasy.
Max’s stories are packed with laughs, but the real magic of I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell is Max’s honest introspectiveness. He’s arrogant, rude and insensitive to the needs of others, but is completely forthcoming with it. The stories narrate not only the events but also his mentality, both during the event and upon later reflection. He takes full responsibility for the things he’s done, even showing regret at times, and proves that he’s learned from his mistakes???though he never apologizes for them. On the base level, his stories offer little more than superficial entertainment, but they leave the reader with an in-depth look into Tucker’s psyche and emotional growth. In particular, “Tucker Has a Moment of Reflection; Ends Poorly” goes beyond drunken madness and deals with a philosophical crisis as Tucker copes with the realization that among all the girls he’s slept with, at least a few have done the same to him. By cope, of course, he means get piss drunk and wake up in a park with vomit encrusted on his face.
In the end Tucker feels lucky to be able to share the surreal comedic events in his life with the world, but he remains well aware of the end result of all his alcohol-laced wickedness. “Forget an upper management role in hell,” he writes. “I have the CEO position in my sights.”
