Having been a waiter for a while, I knew that I wanted to read this one when I heard about it. The anonymous author first caught the bug of pseudo-fame with his blog of the same name. Basically, the book (and the blog, too) share the waiter's experiences of becoming a server and his history in the field over the course of 10 years. Each chapter is a short essay focusing on different aspects of the job from the unique interaction between the servers and the kitchen staff to the challenges of having a social life with the wacky schedule that is demanded of servers.

In many ways, I found myself relating to his experiences, though, he often tends to have a superiority complex about the people he works with/for and those he is serving. Don't get me wrong, there is no shortage of challenges when it comes to working for the public, but I find that sometimes some of the sass he experiences is due to the fact that he forgets that he is there to serve. The onus of responsibility falls on servers in a relationship.

I have never worked in a high-end urban eatery like The Bistro he was at for a number of years, but I have worked at a nice family restaurant and a high-end restaurant based in a rural historic farmhouse. He definitely knows his stuff and should be proud of the level of service he usually provides when his ego is not getting in the way.

The Waiter started in a less than optimal working environment, where his brother helped him get a job after being down and out on his professional luck. The manager is horrible, having employees bribe him for prime shifts, and the owner was a major ego who literally lorded it over the staff. Thankfully, the Waiter moves on to another restaurant, where he seems to find happiness and no shortage of interesting situations from people having various forms of sex to people demanding a higher level of service as someone is being worked on by EMTs, which is something I have experienced myself.

He does do a great job of revealing the dark underside of working as a server. There are things in the book that would probably horrify most restaurant visitors, but there are also no shortage of stories that will make people realize how much their server will do for them (or to them if they are rude).

While I enjoyed the book, I thought Waitress: The True Confessions of a Waitress by Debra Ginsberg was a little closer to my experiences. She has less of an ego and shares a lot more personal experiences with customers, co-workers, and owners.