Nilesh Jasani's Reviews > Thank You for Smoking

Christopher Buckley's 1994 satire is clever and biting while taking aim at the spin doctors and corporate apologists of the tobacco industry. However, the book's central premise - the behind-the-scenes story of a charismatic lobbyist selling a deadly product - ends up feeling a bit too familiar three decades later.

The writing is sharp and the novel is brimming with quotable zingers skewering the mercenary mentality of Big Tobacco's PR machine. Yet for all its wry wit and trenchant social commentary, the book treads very well-worn ground in its depiction of soulless corporate hucksters.