Book Review: Mouseschawitz

Hands up: who thinks working for Disney is a dream job? Angela Lovell's hands are not up. For her, Disney was not a dream job but a death camp, and she wrote about it in her new book, Mouseschawitz, which takes us behind-the-screams at Disney World.

- by Bob McLain, May 18, 2011

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You know what you're in for when you buy a book called Mouseschawitz.

Unless, of course, you're too young or too history-deprived to know what that means. Try out the sub-title:

"My Summer of Concentrated Fun".

Catch the clue? Mouseschawitz is a clever twist on Auschwitz, the Nazi concentration camp, where I'm pretty sure only the Nazis had much summer fun.

Put another way, what we've got here is Disney Death Camp.

I mentioned to a few friends (well, maybe not friends friends, but the type of friends it's so easy to make by e-mail) that I'd be reviewing this new Disney book called Mouseschawitz.

Both were shocked. Not that I was reviewing a Disney book, but by the title.

Give me a break. I love the title. And, as of this minute, Mouseschawitz is ranked #8 on Amazon in the Essays category, comfortably ahead of the Combined Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson & Henry David Thoreau.

So what is it, exactly?

The author, Angela Lovell, recollects some magical moments from her brief experience as a Disney World Cast Member, and for good measure, includes the recollections of some friends who found themselves in the same predicament.

There's no chance Disney will be including these stories in their official park literature. Between the snakes, the blood-soaked guests, and an emotionally frustrated Carrot Top, there isn't much around which Disney can whip up a new jingle.

The book is a book in the sense that it has two (virtual) covers, but really it's a short collection of shorter stories and anecdotes. It took me about 30 minutes to read it.

And I enjoyed each of those 30 minutes. Angela Lovell is not just someone who slapped together a few Disney stories. She has published other (non-Disney) books, and her work has appeared in such venerable venues as High Times, Opium Magazine, and MTV. She's an award-winning playwright, director, film critic, and sex columnist, among other things, and her eponymous website is a blast to visit. She writes humor that is equal parts absurd and scathingly funny.

That's your warning.

If you buy this book expecting to read about 'park secrets' or the exact shade of purple used 40 years ago to paint one of the dolls in It's a Small World, you'll be disappointed.

(Like Angela was disappointed when a panel of Disney 'judges' told her that her nose was too sharp and her eyes too close together to be a Disney princess - but lo and behold, she later ran into a "size sixteen Snow White with an obvious floaty eye" working Fantasyland.)

I wish, if anything, Angela hadn't given me such a quickie. Once inside Mouseschawitz, perversely, I didn't want to leave, and I hope there's a sequel, maybe called Duckau.

Mouseschawitz is available only for the Kindle, and it's priced to sell at $2.99.

Later this week come on back for my chat with Angela!