Train Preemptive Book Review: “Sarah Palin, The Book”

Picture this, if you will: I’m sitting at my desk here in China, trying to figure out what to do with myself now that “imagining a world without President Bush” isn’t a constant drain on my free time. My desk is covered in empty whiskey bottles and gives off the faint odor of margarine (long story (elections have consequences)). As I disconsolately click through random URLs I arrive at Publishing Newswire, a deeply bland site designed by someone using a cutting-edge “cheap website made in the mid-90s” aesthetic. Scrolling down I see something that instantly cuts through my bourbon-fuelled haze: “Sarah Palin Enters Book Deal.” I begin to vomit furiously, and pass out.

Waking up the next morning (or is it night? I’ve had my blinds drawn for weeks, it’s so hard to tell), I try to remember what had set off my reaction the night before. I eat some breakfast while watching “The Dark Knight” for the 23rd time, but I’m nagged by the feeling that there’s something on my laptop I should read. Hitting the button to wake it up, the screen instantly brings up my web browser and word processor. The browser has the Palin book deal story, while a new document contains just two words: “the horror.” It wasn’t a nightmare, after all: Sarah Palin has a book deal.

I spent a few minutes wondering what a book written by someone on Sarah Palin's behalf could possibly say- how many pages can you fill with “gosh-darn” and “maverick” before your publisher tears up your check and slams the door? Luckily we here at The Train of Thought have sources everywhere, and within a matter of hours I had procured a copy of Sarah Palin: The Book. First, take a look at the cover (graphic design by Sarah herself):


Great start! The next thing I noticed about the book is how thin it is- ten pages, tops. Flipping to the first page I started reading, only to feel my blood curdle. The book consists of 8 pages of bitter ranting aimed at the media, John McCain, Barack “Obomba,” and more. The last three pages are a list of McCain aids against whom she plans to get “revenge most foul.” Next to that she has hand-written “murder” and a drawn a winking face. On the last page is an apology from the publisher stating that she’s already had Todd begin shooting her old speechwriters and handlers from a helicopter, so after signing the book deal they had to make do with a stack of notes found in her desk.

Just skimming the book had given me a headache, so I settled down for a quick nap. To my bewilderment I awoke on the floor, beneath my desk! The book itself was gone, along with the standard-issue Train Shipment Box I had received it in. Wondering if the entire thing had been some horrific fantasy, I turned on my computer- only to find my picture of the front of the book, and a quick google search revealed that Publishing Newswire had indeed just run a story announcing a Palin book deal.

If it was all a dream, how did I have a picture of the cover, and how had I known about the book itself? The memory of those terror-inducing pages still chills my spine. I suspect there is only one logical conclusion: I’ve been haunted by The Ghost of Horrible Books From The Future, giving me a vision of a book that is not yet, but some day will be- a book too terrible to contemplate- Sarah Palin: The Book.

May God have mercy on us all.