Book Review: Welcome to Pawnee by Jim O’Heir

Nostalgia is big money in entertainment.

There are a few new stories on the big screen and in print. But most content these days is derived from something that came before. Spinoffs. Reruns. Revivals. Sequels. Rewatch podcasts. We’ve found endless ways to live in the past with our favorite movies, books, and television shows.

Welcome to Pawnee by Jim O’Heir lives in that world of nostalgia. Written by the actor who played background character turned side character Jerry/Garry/Larry/Barry Gurgich on the hit sit-com Parks and Recreation.

For the record, I love Parks and Rec. It’s among my favorite feel-good comedy shows of all time. My wife and I have watched and re-watched the show approximately five times. I’m not immune to the nostalgia monster either. That’s why I was willing to pick up a comp of this new book (which I was given for free in exchange for this review).

I’ve read similar recap books of shows like The Office, Seinfeld, and The Daily Show — some of the other all-time comedies that have graced the small screen in my lifetime.

Welcome to Pawnee is like those books, but different. It’s part oral history of the show, and part pseudo-memoir of Jim O’Heir, who’s enjoyed a semi-successful career in Hollywood, highlighted by the titular show. There was plenty to like in this book for raving fans of the show — who, let’s be honest, is the vast majority of people interested in this title.

There are plenty of pull quotes from well-known actors and creators, including Amy Poehler, Chris Pratt, Greg Daniels, and Mike Schur. There are insights of what went on behind the scenes and factoids about the life of the cast.

Obviously, this is all told from the perspective of O’Heir, who started on the sidelines and gradually moved towards the center spotlight as his character became more developed and deeper. Unfortunately, O’Heir’s narrative voice is too similar to his character's.

He’s kind and humble, almost to a fault. He hems and haws over details. He stresses and frets about his place in the show. He rambles on, interlacing his distant past with the show’s more recent past. Some passages are interesting and humanizing. Others feel abrupt and out of place.

It’s a little too wandering without a clear focus on the message the book is trying to share. This may work perfectly fine for fans looking to wash themselves in a warm bath of nostalgia. But it’s too thin for readers looking for a deeper assessment of what the show means.

O’Heir himself is a primary benefactor of this nostalgia obsession. Besides this book, he’s also the co-host of a Parks and Rec rewatch podcast, cleverly titled Parks and Recollection. However, he doesn’t mention this fact until over halfway through the book. That podcast title alone is worth the mention. It’s also much-needed credibility that he buries until deep into the work, and even then, just barely mentions.

There’s a mix of valuable pieces scattered throughout this book, but they fail to coalesce into anything more meaningful. It can’t quite decide if it’s the memoir of a lucky character actor or the oral history of one of our generation’s best comedies. Either of those would have been great. Mixed together, the result is too watered down.

I really wanted to like Welcome to Pawnee, and I did like parts of it. But overall, the book doesn’t add much to Parks and Rec’s legacy. Instead, it’s just another drop in the massive bucket that is the nostalgia economy.