Cabin Pressure: One Man's Desperate Attempt to Recapture His Youth as a Camp Counselor

This is in many respects one of those universal stories that plays effectively on shared memories. It may have taken place in Maine, but the images that ran through my mind as I read it were of a Boy Scout camp in East Texas. Wish we could have ended each camp session in the Eastwind tradition, but it was not to be. Regardless, I'm in debt to Mr. Wolk for letting me return for one more season.

I take that title from a Frank Black song, which I think is a pretty accurate way of describing the nervous step you take into full-fledged adulthood. "Cabin Pressure" details Josh Wolk's step. I first took notice of Wolk through his terrific writing at "Entertainment Weekly." He wrote day-after commentary on the "Real World" that was so gut-bustingly hilarious my friends and I used to E-mail the highlights to each other. After a while, the writing was so good and the show so bad, we stopped watching the show and just read the wrap-ups. Wolk's best skill as a writer is his gift of observation. Give him any scenario and he can instantly break it down, expose each player's motivation, and end it all with a hilarious analogy. He brings that keen observation to "Cabin Pressure," his tale of heading back to camp as a counselor on the brink of his wedding day. Having remembered camp as a kind of innocent oasis, Josh wants to reexperience it one more time before he becomes, gulp, a husband and a father. Wolk fills us in on summer-camp life -- what he remembered from his day, what has changed, and what hasn't. The best part of the book is Wolk's interaction with the kids in his cabin. He does an amazing job of letting you know each one, whether they are charming, maddening, or depressingly and prematurely stressed-out and miserable. I don't necessarily think I bought into Josh's overall theme here -- this whole nostalgic innocence trip -- but it doesn't matter because "Cabin Pressure" is often hilarious and reading this book is like a well-spoken, really funny friend telling you his best summer-camp stories. The tone can shift from body-odor humor to some strong emotional connections with the boys, and all the while Wolk's razor-sharp observation and pitch-perfect punchlines remain. After reading Wolk in "Entertainment Weekly" all those years, and laughing my butt off, this book lives up to all of my expectations. Funny and insightful, "Cabin Pressure" is a wonderful debut book.

Even though it's been 35 years since the first time I was a counselor, every year around Fathers Day I have the urge to grab my sleeping bag and head up to camp for staff orientation. This book reminded me of why that urge is still so strong - why I spent six summers of my life as summer camp staff, working 14 hours a day most days and making less than I could have working a virtually anywhere else. In the summer before he married and entered a new phase of life, the author chose to relive part of his childhood by becoming a camp counselor at the same camp he'd attended as an adolescent. Although older than the typical counselor and with a fiance waiting at home for him to finish his adventure, the authors experiences of feeling like he didn't quite fit in with the staff, his struggles with trying to stay upbeat after weeks of little sleep and hard physicial work and the silliness he shared with his campers mirror the experience of every counselor, whatever age. His story rang so true - although I worked at two coed YMCA camps rather than an all boys camp, the songs, jokes, activities and adolescent angst are universal. For those who were campers, it's a window into the mysterious life that counselors led. For those of us who staffed camps, it's a sometimes funny, sometimes touching reminder of why we chose spend our summers without creature comforts of home, making little money while living with other people's children.

My mom bought me this book a week before i left for my own summer camp and after i read the first page i found it impossible to stop. The word nostalgic is a perfect adj. to define this book. As i flipped through the pages I got more and more excited about my upcoming camp experience and started to remember all the old times i had at my camp. I recommend this book to any one because anyone can read it and enjoy it. I found myself laughing and cracking a smile numerous times during my reading and I know other readers will too.

I bought this book for my Dad for Father's Day and when it arrived just wanted to read the first page or so...and couldn't stop. It is really well written and although it's a cliche I really did laugh out loud while reading it. The perfect gift for any guy...which is why I am buying my Dad a new copy.