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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN num: 9780743247177
ISBN number: 0743247175
Label: Simon & Schuster
Manufacturer: Simon & Schuster
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 336
Printing Date: September 14, 2004
Publishing house: Simon & Schuster
Sale Popularity Level: 488959
Studio: Simon & Schuster
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MEMOIR
It all began one typical day in the life of Joe Heller. He was jogging four miles at a clip these days, working on his novel God Knows, coping with the complications of an unpleasant divorce, and pigging out once or twice a week on Chinese food with cronies like Mel Brooks, Mario Puzo, and his buddy of more than twenty years, Speed Vogel. He was feeling perfectly fine that day -- but within twenty-four hours he would be in intensive care at Manhattan's Mount Sinai Hospital. He would remain hospitalized for nearly six months and leave in a wheelchair.
Joseph Heller had Guillain-Barré syndrome, a debilitating, sometimes fatal condition that can leave its victims paralyzed from head to toe. The clan gathered immediately. Speed -- sometime artist, sometime businessman, sometime herring taster, and now a coauthor -- moved into Joe's apartment as messenger, servant, and shaman. Mel Brooks, arch-hypochondriac of the Western world, knew as much about Heller's condition as the doctors. Mario Puzo, author of the preeminent gangster novel of our time, proved to be the most reluctant man ever to be dragged along on a hospital visit. These and lots of others rallied around the sickbed in a show of loyalty and friendship that not only built a wild and spirited camaraderie but helped bring Joe Heller, writer and buddy extraordinaire, through his greatest crisis.
This book is an inspiring, hilarious memoir of a calamitous illness and the rocky road to recuperation -- as only the author of Catch-22 and the friend who helped him back to health could tell it. No Laughing Matter is as wacky, terrifying, and great-hearted as any fiction Joseph Heller ever wrote.
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Rated by buyers -
This book is good it jumps around a little to much between chapters from Joseph Heller who had GBS in the early 80's and Speed Vogel his friend that really helped take care of allot of the things Joe couldn't take care of. It gives both meets perspectives. There was allot of good information obtained from the book and there was also some humour even though this is a bad situation to be in... I did benefit from reading this book. I have a friend who has GBS and I wanted to better understand how he and some others have recovered from it....
Rated by buyers 
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Heller was one of my all-time favorite writers, and his books never disappointed me. This book, written with his good friend Speed Vogel, is a description of Heller's medical ordeal.
Heller had Guillain-Barre syndrome, which is like a temporary form of polio. The muscles in his body shut down leaving him paralyzed. Eventually, the muscles started to work again, but he had to go through a long, difficult rehab process. He had to learn to do everything he had done without thinking about it before he got sick. Vogel helped him through the process and they decided to write this book to describe the whole ordeal.
The book is full of funny stories of these two men, and their other friends. It was great to see that he kept his amazing sense of humour throughout his illness. If you've enjoyed any of his other books, you should get a big kick out of this one too.
Rated by buyers -
Not exactly a laughing matter, but certainly one presented with plenty of humor. Author Joseph Heller developed a nerve disease called Guillain-Barre after years of seeming good health, and later wrote a book (coauthored by his pal Speed Vogel) chronicling his declining health and his fight back to semi-normality.
It was a day like any other, just before getting a divorce and starting a new novel (which became "God Knows"). But Joseph Heller found that his food tasted funny, his body felt abnormally heavy, and he was having problems putting on and removing clothing. He checked into a hotel, and sure enough -- he had had a problem. What's more, he had a nerve disease called Guillain-Barre, which could cause permanent paralysis.
While his mind remained sharp and unusually witty, Heller's body became paralyzed. His pals Speed Vogel, Mario Puzo (of "Godfather" fame), Dustin Hoffman and Mel Brooks all clustered around to help their friend as he began to regain control of his life.
The account is funny and kooky, full of eccentric people like Puzo and Brooks. But there are deeper undercurrents in "No Laughing Matter," in which the friends help keep Heller from sinking into a frenzy of displeasure and cabin fever. There are no gooey monologues about the power of love and friendship -- it would probably have made the authors gag, even if it didn't make the readers. But the accounts of an admittedly difficult-to-deal-with famous author being helped out, despite his eccentricity, is very touching.
There is a lot of serious content, with Heller's decline in health and the details of his time in the hospital. (Constantly lying in a hospital bed, mostly paralyzed, unable to grip a pen and with a tube in his nose) But he manages to give a funny spin to almost everything in the book, including his encounters with Valerie Humphrey, a beautiful nurse who became his second wife, and media-shy Mario Puzo telling him how lucky he was to be sick and paralyzed, since he wouldn't be require do interviews. Half the book is Speed Vogel's voice; he offers an alternate, somewhat humbler viewpoint. He also gives more entertaining anecdotes such as Mel Brooks painting his "SNORE! SNORE! SNORE!" message on the wall, or the lobster dinner, or just arguing with Joe about the thirty-person dinner.
Funnier and more heartwarming than most "disease diaries," this gives us two different viewpoints: The patient, and the loyal pal. Definitely an intriguing and interesting read.
Rated by buyers -
NO LAUGHING MATTER is a very informative and entertaining piece of writing. Co-authored by Joseph Heller and Speed Vogel (who write alternating chapters) it details the effects of the rare debilitating affliction called Guillain-Barre syndrome. This autobiographical/biographical chronicle passes along a lot of information without once falling into obscure medical dullness.
Guillain-Barre is a disease that attacks the central nervous system, rendering the victim completely paralyzed. Although what Heller contracted was a mild form of the disorder, in an extreme case mentioned a patient was only able to move their eyes. Recovery is possible from this disease; if it's caught early enough, the patient can be hooked up to a respirator if need be and then slowly rehabilitated. NO LAUGHING MATTER is two stories. The very first is that of Joseph Heller the patient who goes from being in (seemingly) perfect health to being utterly bedridden in a matter of days. The second part of the tale is told by Speed Vogel, a friend of Heller, who took care of virtually all of his financial, legal and personal obligations.
From reading some other reviews of the book, one might be under the impression that this is a light and fluffy feel-good story of friendship where one will be forced to read numerous passages on the deeper meanings of love and caring. People learning great life lessons by sacrificing much that they have purely in the name of camaraderie. Chicken soup for the soul and novocain for the brain. Fortunately, one couldn't be further from the truth. While the two authors obviously have a great fondness for each other, you won't find any obvious soliloquies on the healing power of friendship. What you will find are people who care a great deal, but aren't afraid to share a lot of good-natured abuse. While in sickness and on the road to recovery, this never feels false or sugarcoated. It's an honest account of what real friendships are made of.
Despite the title, much of the book is laugh out loud funny. Heller may have been bedridden but he didn't lose any of his trademark wit. Celebrity cameos of everyone from Dustin Hoffman to Mario Puzo to Mel Brooks help to liven up an already interesting narrative. Both authors have a warm and engaging style of writing that makes even the more incomprehensible medical jargon understandable. The jokes are great and serve also to counterpoint the feelings of desperation and of loneliness.
The book is extremely intriguing, though there are one or two sections that don't quite work. Heller was going through what appeared to be a fairly messy divorce and the legal proceedings got a little bit complicated. For a section, Heller even reproduces a few pages of the court transcripts in order to show his lawyer in the right. As justified as he may be in including these segments, they aren't nearly as interesting as the rest of the book and pale in comparison.
NO LAUGHING MATTER shows us illness from two viewpoints. From Vogel we see the outward appearance of the disease and its effect on Heller. From Heller we experience the sickness firsthand. It's a fascinating dual look at the nature of the affliction. Well worth a read.
Rated by buyers 
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NO LAUGHING MATTER has some great moments. In places Joseph Heller demonstrated his ability to be funny and touching at the same time. The book was a great inspiration to me at a time when I needed the help it gave me. As the author of SOLOMON'S PORCH, a novel about a man with CIDP, the slow version of Guillain Barre', I was fascinated with this book about Joe Heller and his caretakers. Most of the material that I have read about GBS and CIDP focuses almost exclusively on the patient, but Mr. Heller wrote every other chapter of this book and had his friend, who became one of his caretakers, write the alternate chapters. At the time I read NO LAUGHING MATTER, I was beginning to formulate SOLOMON'S PORCH in my mind. NLM gave me some good ideas about structure.
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