Mick Foley's Christmas Chaos by Mick Foley (2000, Hardcover)

Mick Foley is a superb writer when it comes to describing his own life; however, his Christmas Chaos book is a different story. Unfortunately, it probably just isn't a book that you would want to read to your kids at Christmas time. The overall story is a fairly nice one, and the story of his inspiration and the donation of "some" of the proceeds to the Shriners are certainly praiseworthy, but its the little details that make this a book mainly for Mick Foley fans and collectors.

The Good: Illustrations (by Jerry Lawler) are quite good, and are brightly colored - certainly appealing to young and old, alike. The underlying story is decent, and the story of the little boy who inspired this book is heartwarming (but you'll have to read Mick Foley is Good to find out that story). The story will mainly appeal to those who have read Mick Foley's other books, and would make a unique gift for an adult.

The Bad: If you let your young children watch ALL the WWE's shows (including the ladies' "matches"), then ignore this section - your kids see and hear much worse than is in this book. However, I'm not going to read my child a book that features a naked elf drawn three different times - once on the front cover, and once while mooning Santa. What's more, I don't really want to explain to my child why Santa's elves are cursing (they are only shown with %$#@ symbols or "beep beep") or his reindeer are actually fighting and ganging up on another. The rhyme scheme (aabb) gets old after a while, and it often seems like Foley is scraping the bottom of the barrel for another word. Finally, most of the funny parts are inside jokes about other wrestlers, like Al Snow. If you've read Foley's other books, then you'll get all of them; if not, then you will be lost throughout the book. The kids that are going to have this book read to them won't understand most of what is going on, and so will mainly focus in on Rudolph's bloody nose and black eye and Tommy the Naked Elf.

This book just isn't appropriate for young children, in my opinion.

Although the holiday title may make you think this is a children's book - it definately is not! Nudity and sexual innuendo rum rampant through the book. With that said, it is a silly little story that adults might enjoy - but not at retail price.