What's with Baum?
Woody Allen (Rifkin’s Festival, Stardust Memories) has written and directed several films and plays over the years, but What’s with Baum? happens to be his debut novel. A comedic look at the life of a writer on the brink of a third teetering marriage, What’s with Baum? tonally fits in with Woody’s more comedic films.
Running a lean 192 pages, What’s with Baum? follows the travails of Asher Baum, a conflicted journalist turned writer whose jealousy of his stepson’s Thane’s more successful career as a novelist leads to an unexpected discovery. On top of all this, Baum has a scandal in the making coming from kissing a journalist that threatens to shutter a career that wasn’t exactly keeping up with the Joneses to begin with.
What’s with Baum? is more character-based than plot-focused. Baum isn’t a character who lacks for opinions. Whether he’s talking to his wife Connie, talking to himself, or thinking about what might happen in the future, Baum is a character chock-full of witty observations, making for a fun main character to follow around as he kvetches about nearly everything in sight.
While it can take a little bit for the story to get going (by spending so much time setting the table, Woody Allen really makes us care about the characters when said table gets flipped), the rapid climax of the book contains some surprising revelations that will make readers want to flip through the book a second time to see just how smoothly everything lines up.
As one would suspect, there are some very funny jokes in here (a bit comparing sentences to specific hors d’oeuvres is a riot). The book is also packed with enough Yiddish turns of phrase that you might have to reach for your nearest dictionary (my decades of reading MAD Magazine wasn’t enough to catch them all!).
A breezy look at a foible-filled character, What’s with Baum? is a fun read and a decent debut novel from Woody Allen. If you’re fond of his comedic work, you’ll love What’s with Baum?
What’s with Baum? will be available in hardcover, Kindle, and on Audible formats on September 23, 2025. A review copy of the book was provided by Post Hill Press for review.