Ian Frazier has been writing for the New Yorker since his first "Talk of the Town" piece in 1974. The 46 career-spanning selections collected in The Snakes That Ate Florida: Reporting, Essays, and Criticism, his 16th book, offer a generous sampling of his work for that magazine and others, demonstrating the encyclopedic breadth of his curiosity and the versatility of his writing.
Of the three categories identified in the book's subtitle, more than two-thirds of the pieces gathered here fall under the heading of reporting, but there is significant variety within its scope. Many of the shorter offerings exemplify Frazier's early work, touching on subjects that include a rodeo in Madison Square Garden, the pool hustler Minnesota Fats, Montana's bald eagles, and Kim Williams, a homespun philosopher from that state and an NPR favorite in the 1980s. These entries depend more for their appeal on Frazier's observational skill, keen wit, and economical prose than they do on one's interest in their occasionally dated subject matter, but are consistently pleasing nonetheless and whet the appetite for the more substantial journalism to come.
The examples of Frazier's long-form writing demonstrate considerable range. They include historical excursions to the 13th-century Mongol Empire and the Russian Revolution, alongside "Frogpocalypse Now," a sometimes tongue-in-cheek examination of the cane toad, "one of the most successful invasive species on the planet," whose members "sit and look at you as if you owe them money" as they overrun southern Florida's housing developments and shopping centers. Frazier literally waded in with both feet to report the collection's titular piece, the story of the Burmese pythons, "simply the latest in a series of environmental nightmares we've inflicted on the Everglades."
Frazier is equally adept at the personal essay, whether it's a charming description of a day he spent at a used automotive parts market in Los Angeles ("Pick Your Part") or recounting with his characteristic wry humor his involvement in a seven-car pileup on N.J.'s Garden State Parkway while driving his heavily dented 18-year-old Honda Civic ("Driving in New York"). Among the several examples of his criticism featured here, he reviews a biography of the Lakota warrior Crazy Horse and examines a book on the environmental toll of modern American agriculture in "Grim Reapers."
The seeming ease with which Frazier writes about such a variety of subjects might cause some to devalue his work, but his ability to sustain such high quality, informative, and entertaining journalism for half a century speaks eloquently to his talent. Though he's perhaps not as well known as fellow New Yorker writers Susan Orlean and Calvin Trillin, this volume confirms that Frazier is entitled to be included in their company. --Harvey Freedenberg, freelance reviewer
Shelf Talker: Longtime New Yorker contributor Ian Frazier offers an ample collection of his writing, both short and long, on an assortment of subjects over more than half a century.