Best Sports Humor
BASKETBALL (AND OTHER THINGS) presents readers with a set of pivotal and ridiculous questions from basketball history, providing arguments and answers, explained with the wit and wisdom that is unique to Shea Serrano. With incredible art from Arturo Torres, this book is a must-have for anyone who has ever stayed up late into the night debating basketball's greatest moments, what-ifs, stories, and legends, or for those who are discovering the mythology of basketball for the first time. ( Men's Journal ) “ With colorful, comic-book depictions of Spurs great Tim Duncan and other NBA stars by artist Arturo Torres, Serrano drops some serious and seriously funny knowledge on a sprawling range of hoops debates.“. ( Esquire ). “Even if you’re a basketball novice or die-hard Spurs fan like Shea, this is a perfect companion to his Rap Year Book: full of myths, what-ifs, and hyperspecific fanaticism.”.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"This is the most essential piece of media since the 1993 film Blood In Blood Out."
"They put these pajamas on him that made him look like a fox as he left the hospital and it to this day is probably the best thing I have ever seen with my own two eyes. In that moment it was this incredible combination feeling of pure joy and fear and love and anxiety and excitement and terror and everything was perfect."
"I bought this as a gift to my 14 year old son who is obsessed with basketball."
"Got this as a gift, and she was apparently immediately liked by the author after sharing her photo with it."
"Definitely contains adult language, but it adds the salt and flavor needed for a man who loves basketball."
"On the other hand, Shea is super awesome, a former middle school teacher turned twitter hero."
"All anyone can ever ask for in a sports book is to be made to laugh, made to learn and made to think - and my God Shea does that on every page."
"20 something son loves this book!"
Michael Rapaport, actor, Top 50 podcaster, award-winning film maker, and sports fanatic, is here to set the world straight on the greatest and downright worst athletes, players, teams, and jerseys—while refusing to mention statistics, analytics, or anything else that isn’t pure hustle. “We are dealing with an individual who tried to convince Willis Reed that Bill Russell was overrated. He is a sick man and I often wonder what his life could have been like had the Knicks ever been a competent organization, but he has somehow managed to write a good book.” –Bill Burr. All of it of course can be explained by his love for the Knicks, which even in good times isn't a remarkable experience. Reminds me of a sports version of Joan Rivers’s book I Hate Everyone…Starting with Me. “The book is crude and candid, unsurprisingly one-sided, surprisingly insightful, and highly opinionated with a ton of lowbrow humor.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"The Raging Bull chapter and his Top Five Athlete list is worth the price alone."
"And this book’s a good thing."
"If you like Rapaport, you'll probably like this book, but have also probably heard a lot of his views on these topics."
"It dragged slightly in some spots which is why I gave it 4 stars and not 5."
"I’m a huge NBA fan and I heard Rappaport pitching his book on Sirius’ NBA channel."
"Eh.....A lot of rants but that is what Rapaport does."
"This book is great."
At long last, answers to these questions and more can be found in one handy volume—THE SWOLY BIBLE, written by the Internet’s favorite gym expert/literary genius, Dom Mazzetti. Confidently stupid with good intentions, Dom refuses to grow up, and takes glee in his day-to-day responsibility-free existence.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Some say he is the first ever to successfully bench "all of it", others may say he is the patriarch of the church of iron, i.e. Pope trenaddict."
"If you don't buy it you are contributing to the obesity and lack of gains in America."
"the swoly bible is my one true bible."
"It's actually has the truth for beginners going to the gym plus it's funny to read, I'm impressed with the book."
"4 stars bc a lot of the content in the book is in the authors youtube channel."
"I'm 91 Pounds!!"
"Basically a collection of the first 80ish episodes of brosciencelife. I wish there was more specific excercises and things to do other than a general broscience way of doing things that we all already know. not bad to have a physical copy though."
Best Sports Essays
Bill Simmons, the wildly opinionated and thoroughly entertaining basketball addict known to millions as ESPN.com’s The Sports Guy, has written the definitive book on the past, present, and future of the NBA. Simmons summarizes the history of the league, discusses his personal fandom, includes a great “what if?” chapter (what if Michael Jordan had been drafted second by Portland instead of third by Chicago? The true NBA fan will dive into this hefty volume and won’t resurface for about a week, emerging from the man cave unshaven, smelling of beer and pizza, grinning, and armed with NBA history, insight, anecdotes, statistics, and a dozen new examples of Simmons’ Unintentional Comedy Scale.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"It's a great mix of stats and "I just feel" analysis that forms the basis of all great sport's debates."
"The focus here beyond his dad's Celtics season tickets sealing his fate as a kid fan, is on pyramid pantheon best ever debates, what ifs, secret knowledge, team comparison compendiums and various other scenario incidentals. Simmons, master of the between the lines scoop, says what's on his mind, is quick to offend and may be off the cuff with tactless fan boy antics, but he thinks like a genius GM and really should be considered as part of an NBA team brain trust someday. Via a coach sharp humanist link tying cults of personality to levels of performance, we learn that selfish players hit a ceiling and greats must share the ball to be transcendent. Twas ironically originated by an adult cinema historian who mixed pop, news and sports trivia intros with his movie reviews in an erotic film bible from the early 1980s. With so much info on elite players and teams, this needed a tongue-in-cheek chapter on footnote characters of the game like Darryl Dawkins, aka Chocolate Thunder, a rushed high school prospect who never reached his full potential but was memorable for destroying backboards on slam dunks."
"Last year I purchased Bill Simmons' The Book of Basketball for my birthday. If you aren't a fan who loves reading about the past in great detail this book may not be for you. And while it may make you wrinkle your nose at some of his thoughts he is still pretty centered and doesn't go too far left. His perspective is a great easy read and he loves having fun with his words. My brother-in-law Curtis got me into playing an NBA board game (Statis Pro Basketball) in the 70's and I was hooked. I wish there had been a little more love for my favorite Dominique Wilkins and the Atlanta Hawks but I was still very happy with his thoughts on both. To quote Paul Harvey this book gave me "the rest of the story". Nowadays every move is over analyzed instantly on TV and on the web allowing us to make a better informed analysis of what we are seeing in a game and around the league. Again it may be a bit much for the casual fan but if you think there is any possibility you might like this book I suggest you spend the $11.11 on Amazon or at some other retailer and I don't think you'll be disappointed."
"The passion yields some diversion that I think even the most NBA wonk might get a bit overwhelmed by."
Best Hunting & Fishing Humor
Lange provided what Stern had yet to find all in the same place: a wit quick enough to keep pace with his own, a pathetic self-image to dwarf his own, a personal history both heartbreaking and hilarious, and an ingrained sense of self-sabotage that continually keeps things interesting. A natural storyteller with a bottomless pit of material, Lange grew up in a close-knit, working-class Italian family in Union, New Jersey, a maniacal Yankees fan who pursued the two things his father said he was cut out for—sports and comedy. This debut memoir from the comedian best known as Howard Stern's radio show sidekick is scrappy, funny, tumultuous and profane, just like its author. Lange, a self-proclaimed fat guy with a heroin problem, is difficult to love, but easy to like, his shaggy-dog life story full of derogatory self-awareness and cheerful vulgarity (often in the form of casual profanity and sexism).
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Thanks Artie for a great book."
"Despite several stories being retold or similar to ones heard in the other bestseller, there is enough original Artie Lange storytelling here to keep true fans entertained, and should not disappoint fan's of the Stern Show either, as his years at the hit radio show are heavily discussed throughout the book, as well as Artie's earlier life."
"Artie has had a roller-coaster of a life and he pulls no punches even when telling many very embarrassing stories about himself."
"Bought the Audio CD version as I was taking long drives for work and enjoyed him reading his own story."
"I've been a long time listener of the Stern Show and I fully welcomed the replacement of Jackie."
"I loved the book."
"I'd like to thank Artie for sharing his story with me...I've been in his shoes plenty of times and I know it can be a real struggle to stay on the right path...good on ya mate!"
"I love Artie like I love my crazy uncle and he doesn't even know me."
Best Miscellaneous
The #1 New York Times –bestselling story about American Olympic triumph in Nazi Germany and now the inspiration for the PBS documentary “The Boys of ‘36” For readers of Unbroken , out of the depths of the Depression comes an irresistible story about beating the odds and finding hope in the most desperate of times—the improbable, intimate account of how nine working-class boys from the American West showed the world at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin what true grit really meant. In doing so, he offers a vivid picture of the socioeconomic landscape of 1930s America (brutal), the relentlessly demanding effort required of an Olympic-level rower, the exquisite brainpower and materials that go into making a first-rate boat, and the wiles of a coach who somehow found a way to, first, beat archrival University of California, then conquer a national field of qualifiers, and finally, defeat the best rowing teams in the world.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"But by taking every sliver of hope, and mixing in superb craftsmanship (from George Pocock), excellent coaching (Al Ulbrickson), and these nine perfectly attuned young men learning together........the result was perfection. It is nice to learn something you never knew, but is common knowledge to an entire set of other people. Concepts from Daniel Brown to consider that are mixed into the story to teach all of us: 1) One of the fundamental challenges in rowing is that when any one member of a crew goes into a slump the entire crew goes with him. The speed of a racing shell is determined primarily by two factors: the power produced by the combined strokes of the oars, and the stroke rate, the number of strokes the crew takes each minute. There are other great ideas to ponder in this epic almost 400 page, could-not-put-down story."
"held local discussions, and had an opportunity to meet the author locally.If you like learning about history through a good story, this is the book for you."
"But I had never read this book because I didn't think I would be interested in an athletic story, especially one about rowing (a sport I never follow)."
"Every college student should read this and stop complaining, this guy worked very hard to obtain his education, something that most young people take for granted these days."
"Even knowing the outcome did not diminish the excitement of the quest, and weaving the story of Hitler's rise to power during the 1936 Olympics captured the irony of his policies."
"The men in my life had been trying for years to get me to read this book."
"Boys racing boats?"
Best Basketball
Fore more than two decades, legendary trainer Tim Grover has taken the greats—Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Dwayne Wade, and dozens more—and made them greater. Direct, blunt, and brutally honest, Grover breaks down what it takes to be unstoppable: you keep going when everyone else is giving up, you thrive under pressure, you never let your emotions make you weak. This book is the blueprint for discovering what you are capable of achieving, getting results you never imagined, reaching the highest level of success--and then going even higher." "Tim Grover’s insight into leadership and excellence has taken the greats to the top, and his book will do the same for you. "In all the years that I coached, inspired and trained world class athletes there was no better resource to collaborate with than Tim Grover." No one knows more than Tim Grover about competitive intensity, killer instinct and crushing the other guy. "A must-read... Grover calls upon his decades of experience working with the world's most eliteathletes to dissect what it takes not just to succeed, but to be the absolutebest."
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Some weak scrubs who took the time out of their day to write a poor review on Amazon OR a highly successful trainer who has been the go-to guy for some of the top basketball legends who ever played?" I've always known that there are just a lot of weak people out there that can't keep up or perform at top levels. This book is for the people who can (or at least have the desire and are working on being able to) perform at top levels."
"It’s a rare treat to learn from the man who helped Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, and Dwayne Wade amongst many others achieve that next gear."
"I like Tim's direct no punches pulled philosophy and approach to improvement."
"I’m a physician who takes care of the sickest patients in ICU’s and found so many similarities to the mentality mentioned in this book and what it takes to succeed in highly competitive medical training programs."
"the best I ever read beside the bible."
"Rick Nesbitt. Author of Earthly Kings: Temporal Treasures."
"This is a really interesting book with solid advice."
"This is such a great book for anyone who is a real go-getter!!"
Best Basketball Biographies
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar explores his 50-year friendship with Coach John Wooden, one of the most enduring and meaningful relationships in sports history. He is also one of a handful of influential and respected black men in America who has a national platform as a regular contributing columnist for the Washington Post and TIME , where he shares his thoughts on some of the most socially relevant and politically controversial topics facing our nation today. Currently he serves as the chairman of his Skyhook Foundation whose mission is to "Give Kids a Shot That Can't be Blocked" by bringing educational opportunities to under-served communities through innovative outdoor environmental learning.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Hearing all the personal stories that Kareem shared with the greatest coach in sports history was such an enjoyable read."
"this is a gift for my dad."
"I love reading about Kareem and Wooden's friendship."
"Great story of a friendship over a long career."
"A touching look at the special relationship Kareem had with his "surrogate father,' John Wooden."
"I purchased this book for my husband and he is totally enjoying the read."
"Birthday gift, guaranteed 5 stars from my husband."
"Great story of Kareem's life with Coach Wooden."
Best Boston Massachusetts Travel Books
This is the true story of Stan Zuray's incredible journey; the reformation of a man's heart and mind in the forbidding darkness of Alaska's endless winter.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Nice product like advertised."
"Love this book."
"One of the better adventure books about Alaska that I have ever read."
"I enjoyed Stans story, I found it was just enough story to make the point, & give a descent amount of detail."
"Very good book and very interesting ."
"Great adventure book."
"Excellent."
Best Religious Humor
Happy 90th birthday (10/14/16), to one of the world's most beloved icons of literature, Winnie-the-Pooh! In which it is revealed that one of the world's great Taoist masters isn't Chinese--or a venerable philosopher--but is in fact none other than that effortlessly calm, still, reflective bear. As a child, he preferred to spend his time outdoors, observing animals, insects, and plants.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"It IS for adults, but I read segments to my daughter and use it to teach her Taoist principles in simpler terms."
"Benjamin Hoff really blessed humanity with a gem."
"Hoff makes a good point in joining the Taoist teachings to (Tao Master) Pooh Bear."
"Best book ever."
"Insightfully true to the original."
"Great book, simplifies philosophy in a humorous way."
"gr8 book."
"Could not get into it, gave it away."
Best Cooking Humor
Dripping Thighs, Sticky Chicken Fingers, Vanilla Chicken, Chicken with a Lardon, Bacon-Bound Wings, Spatchcock Chicken, Learning-to-Truss-You Chicken, Holy Hell Wings, Mustard-Spanked Chicken, and more, more, more! Fifty chicken recipes, each more seductive than the last, in a book that makes every dinner a turn-on. A parody in three acts—“The Novice Bird” (easy recipes for roasters), “Falling to Pieces” (parts perfect for weeknight meals), and “Advanced Techniques” (the climax of cooking)— Fifty Shades of Chicken is a cookbook of fifty irresistible, repertoire-boosting chicken dishes that will leave you hungry for more. With memorable tips and revealing photographs, Fifty Shades of Chicken will have you dominating dinner. Ingredients 1 pound boneless, skinless chicken thighs, patted dry with paper towels 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped 1 teaspoon plus pinch coarse kosher salt ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 1 sweet onion, thinly sliced 1 cup white wine 1 bay leaf 1 cinnamon stick 2 tablespoons unsalted butter 1 tablespoon honey. Directions Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F. In a large bowl, toss the chicken, garlic, 1 teaspoon salt, and pepper together. In a small saucepan, simmer together onion, wine, bay leaf, cinnamon stick, and a pinch of salt until most of the liquid has evaporated, 15 to 20 minutes. Bake until chicken is no longer pink and onions are meltingly tender and caramelized, about 25 minutes.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I bought this for a Christmas gift exchange."
"This is a great book to have out on the kitchen shelf, its also good as a gift for the fans of the original book series."
"I purchased this book for my boss at work since she is a fan of the movies and her diet only allows her to eat chicken, but anyway, I looked through it before giving it as a gift and the content is great!"
"Well written recipes, fun pictures and a great cheeky gift."
"The perfect gift for a bachelorette party!"
"I gave this as part of a bridal shower gift."
"This is a funny book with actual pictures of the chicken dishes....it is based on 50 Shades of Grey."
"I wrapped a bow around the book with a note saying to be opened by final recipient only....didnt want to reveal it's juicy contents ahead of time."
Best Political Humor
It's a book about what happens when the nation's foremost progressive satirist gets a chance to serve in the United States Senate and, defying the low expectations of the pundit class, actually turns out to be good at it. In this candid personal memoir, the honorable gentleman from Minnesota takes his army of loyal fans along with him from Saturday Night Live to the campaign trail, inside the halls of Congress, and behind the scenes of some of the most dramatic and/or hilarious moments of his new career in politics. "The best political book of 2017. "[AL FRANKEN, GIANT OF THE SENATE] may...be the funniest memoir by a sitting - standing, recumbent, squatting - U.S. senator. This is a genuinely funny book, often hilarious...the Senate, and the country, would be the poorer without him. [Franken] uses self-deprecating humor to poke fun at everyone on either side of the aisle, and he gives readers insight into the daily workings of life in the Senate.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"That seemed like it was tough on him, and this memoir makes it clear just how tough it was, not only because Franken had been professionally funny for decades, but also because Franken had always used humor to say whatever he pleased throughout his life. This book is very funny, and Franken both borrows and satirizes the tropes of the traditional political bio in telling his own strange story of his rise to office. Because Franken gives himself leave to be funny again in this book, he is also very honest about his colleagues, the state of American politics, and himself."
"Read first half before he resigned and just recently finished it."
"Funny, informative and enligthening."
"Because the book was so compelling, I had to put off reading the last few pages in order to avoid the end of the book."
"Al Franken provides valuable insight into the workings of the senate and the behavior of his collegues."
"A really funny yet really Informative book."
"Good read and interesting."
Best Theories of Humor
Praised throughout the cartoon industry by such luminaries as Art Spiegelman, Matt Groening, and Will Eisner, Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics is a seminal examination of comics art: its rich history, surprising technical components, and major cultural significance. “If you read, write, teach or draw comics; if you want to; or if you simply want to watch a master explainer at work, you must read this book.” (Neil Gaiman). “Cleverly disguised as an easy-to-read comic book, Scott McCloud’s simple-looking tome deconstructs the secret language of comics while casually revealing secrets of time, space, art and the cosmos!
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Helpful for not just understanding comics, but also the concepts of semiotics."
"Excellent book selection for learning the history of comics!"
"This book is an incredible read for anyone interested in comic books."
"I consider this book as important as Richard William's Animator's Survival Kit and The Illusion Of Life by Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnson."
"This book is very well written and the ideas are clearly explained."
"It's everything I wanted a comic about comics to be."
"For example, it isn't a history of comics or a how-to book for aspiring comics artists, but McCloud does show different ways of drawing the same thing, and points out how each different style carries a slightly different message for the reader."
"McCloud's books are amazing!"
Best Language Humor
Featuring a foreword by Frank McCourt, and interspersed with a lively history of punctuation from the invention of the question mark in the time of Charlemagne to George Orwell shunning the semicolon, Eats, Shoots & Leaves makes a powerful case for the preservation of proper punctuation. Filled with dread at the sight of ubiquitous mistakes in store signs and headlines, Truss eloquently speaks to the value of punctuation in preserving the nuances of language.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I couldn't imagine enjoying a book on punctuation; Ms Truss' "Eats, Shoots, and Leaves" weaves together the marks, their history and the rules of punctuation with examples, quotes and commentary in a bright and delightful way."
"It doesn't teach too much in the way of punctuation but does a solid job of showing where we'd be without it."
"I've always been a punctuation nut, because my mom, who taught English, made me very aware."
"Rather, she uses irony, self-deprecating humor, and other techniques to make apostrophes, commas, full stops (periods), and more interesting. In fact, she inspires: Her explanation of colons and semi-colons prompted me to play with their usage; I’ve been experimenting with them ever since. And “cutting a dash?” Well—I must stop using them as an easy way to incorporate stream-of-consciousness thinking, but I haven’t quite elevated them to an art form."
"Very funny and thought provoking little book."
"Author Lynne Truss, a self professed punctuation stickler, writes with knowledge, passion, not to mention an entertaining jazzy wit, with the result that EATS, SHOOTS AND LEAVES is great fun and not a little instructive. She does use real world examples, like the title of the Sandra Bullock-Hugh Grant movie "Two Weeks Notice," in which the possessive apostrophe eluded everyone from the screenwriter upward through the ranks of the studio brass, but she never wastes time flaying the irresponsible."
"It's a book about punctuation, yes, but it's not nearly as dull as it sounds."
"Lots of information, but not clear if you are trying to learn proper punctuation."
Best Urban Legends Humor
Omnibus edition, books 1-4 in the Skeleton Creek series in one 820 page volume.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Going into the last week of school with 6th graders knowing that grades have all been submitted and their fate has been decided is rough. First you read the book.... Ryan's journal of events that are taking place AND THEN you watch a video from Sarah online. This book was so good that soon the 6th grade class next door was wondering what we were up to and wanted in on the action. We ended up reading the first 4 books of the series in the last 4 days of the school year!!!"
"My 9 yr old son and I love these books, we read them together.The Skeleton Creek books keep him interested and he actually wants to read, which we all know what a challenge for a parent that can be."
"The story takes place in Skeleton Creek, Oregon.The main character is Ryan McCray. My favorite part of the story was when Sarah Fincher and Ryan McCray were at the dredge and they think there was a ghost on the dredge."
"The book is full of emotion and question (As it is a mystery/horror book) that pulls in the ready until the very end. It is truly an amazing experience, from the themes regarding teens' relationships with parents, to the secretively of children and their relationships, this book can teach a lot to both young children and adults alike while still bringing them entertainment."
"I read this book, along with the other ones in the series, to my 6th grade students last school year."
Best Humor Essays
Trevor was born to a white Swiss father and a black Xhosa mother at a time when such a union was punishable by five years in prison. Living proof of his parents’ indiscretion, Trevor was kept mostly indoors for the earliest years of his life, bound by the extreme and often absurd measures his mother took to hide him from a government that could, at any moment, steal him away. Finally liberated by the end of South Africa’s tyrannical white rule, Trevor and his mother set forth on a grand adventure, living openly and freely and embracing the opportunities won by a centuries-long struggle. It is also the story of that young man’s relationship with his fearless, rebellious, and fervently religious mother—his teammate, a woman determined to save her son from the cycle of poverty, violence, and abuse that would ultimately threaten her own life. Whether subsisting on caterpillars for dinner during hard times, being thrown from a moving car during an attempted kidnapping, or just trying to survive the life-and-death pitfalls of dating in high school, Trevor illuminates his curious world with an incisive wit and unflinching honesty. His stories weave together to form a moving and searingly funny portrait of a boy making his way through a damaged world in a dangerous time, armed only with a keen sense of humor and a mother’s unconventional, unconditional love. Born a Crime is not just an unnerving account of growing up in South Africa under apartheid, but a love letter to the author’s remarkable mother.” —Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times. “[An] unforgettable memoir.” — Parade “What makes Born a Crime such a soul-nourishing pleasure, even with all its darker edges and perilous turns, is reading Noah recount in brisk, warmly conversational prose how he learned to negotiate his way through the bullying and ostracism. In the end, Born a Crime is not just an unnerving account of growing up in South Africa under apartheid, but a love letter to the author’s remarkable mother.” —Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times. “You’d be hard-pressed to find a comic’s origin story better than the one Trevor Noah serves up in Born a Crime . [He] developed his aptitude for witty truth telling [and]…every hardscrabble memory of helping his mother scrape together money for food, gas, school fees, and rent, or barely surviving the temper of his stepfather, Abel, reveals the anxious wellsprings of the comedian’s ambition and success. If there is harvest in spite of blight, the saying goes, one does not credit the blight-but Noah does manage to wring brilliant comedy from it.” — O: The Oprah. Magazine “What makes Born a Crime such a soul-nourishing pleasure, even with all its darker edges and perilous turns, is reading Noah recount in brisk, warmly conversational prose how he learned to negotiate his way through the bullying and ostracism. “This isn't your average comic-writes-a-memoir: It’s a unique look at a man who is a product of his culture—and a nuanced look at a part of the world whose people have known dark times easily pushed aside.” —Refinery29. told through stories and vignettes that are sharply observed, deftly conveyed and consistently candid. Growing organically from them is an affecting investigation of identity, ethnicity, language, masculinity, nationality and, most of all, humanity—all issues that the election of Donald Trump in the United States shows are foremost in minds and hearts everywhere. What the reader gleans are the insights that made Noah the thoughtful, observant, empathic man who wrote Born a Crime . Here is a level-headed man, forged by remarkable and shocking life incidents, who is quietly determined and who knows where home and the heart lie. “A gifted storyteller, able to deftly lace his poignant tales with amusing irony.” — Entertainment Weekly. Among the many virtues of Born a Crime is a frank and telling portrait of life in South Africa during the 1980s and ’90s. Born a Crime offers Americans a second introduction to Trevor Noah, and he makes a real impression.” — Newsday. “An affecting memoir, Born a Crime [is] a love letter to his mother.” — The. Washington Post. Noah is quick with a disarming joke, and he skillfully integrates the parallel narratives via interstitial asides between chapters. Perhaps the most harrowing tales are those of his abusive stepfather, which form the book’s final act (and which Noah cleverly foreshadows throughout earlier chapters), but equally prominent are the laugh-out-loud yarns about going to the prom, and the differences between ‘White Church’ and ‘Black Church.’” — Publishers Weekly (starred review). Incisive, funny, and vivid, these true tales are anchored to his portrait of his courageous, rebellious, and religious mother who defied racially restrictive laws to secure an education and a career for herself—and to have a child with a white Swiss/German even though sex between whites and blacks was illegal. and his candid and compassionate essays deepen our perception of the complexities of race, gender, and class.” — Booklist (starred review).
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Trevor Noah is a superb storyteller, and this memoir is his eloquent and touching account of growing up as the mixed race child of a single mother, living in poverty in deeply racist and sexist South Africa. Reminiscent of The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls, it is a superbly written story of a perceptive and resilient child thriving in very difficult circumstances, and it beautifully captures these circumstances seen through the eyes of a child."
"I have to love a guy who finds comedy in tragedy and who gleefully spins yarns about experiences that would keep most of us in therapy for a lifetime. The heroine of the book is Noah's mother, a feisty lady with a solid rock faith, a gal who snubs her nose at things that don't make sense. He learned to navigate Apartheid society's complex system that divided people in to three groups: black, white, and colored. Noah was 'colored' with a 'black' Xhosa African mother and a 'white' Swiss father, his very existence implicating his parent's crime. He spoke multiple languages, Xhosa and Zulu and Afrikaans, and English, could fit into most groups, but felt affiliated to black culture."
"As a long time viewer of the Daily Show, I started watching as Trevor took over from Jon Stewart and while I've always thought he does a good job, I had no idea the depth of character and experiences that were below the surface of those cute dimples! He is a wonderful story teller, finding the right balance between relaying his experiences, weaving in the social atmosphere around it and doing it in such a way that even as an American reader, I was able to visualize the communities he was describing in rich detail."
"The Trevor tome is written without anger at the system but the love and devotion of his mother."
"What this book does do is describe life growing up during Apartheid in ways that probably most readers are not familiar with."
Best Rural Life Humor
Author Barbara Kingsolver and her family abandoned the industrial-food pipeline to live a rural life—vowing that, for one year, they’d only buy food raised in their own neighborhood, grow it themselves, or learn to live without it. The book's bulk, written and read by Kingsolver in a lightly twangy voice filled with wonder and enthusiasm, proceeds through the seasons via delightful stories about the history of their farmhouse, the exhausting bounty of the zucchini harvest, turkey chicks hatching and so on.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"This was a wonderful book that will change the way you look at food, how it is grown, processed, transported and satisfies our nutritional and emotional needs."
"All I can say is excellent, excellent, excellent!"
"Good info infused throughout story but at times a little too technical."
"WOW, so much to think about!"
"I have not finished the book, it is a year in the life of a family who moves from Arizona to the East, and it contains several stories where I thought Aye, why do they do this..."
"Positives = Organic, Pesticide Free, Grown in Backyard. - The idea of trying to eating locally and doing so much of it yourself is impressive, no questions asked. - Kingsolver's writing made me want to read her works of fiction- there's a fluidity of language and an ability to describe that I definitely can appreciate. - I learned a lot about growing your own food, eating locally and the politics behind agriculture. Negatives = Hamburgers from McDonalds, GMOs, and Twinkies. - I try so hard to eat my fruits and veggies, but after reading this I felt a little discouraged."
"I loved having chapters written by different family members."
"She along with support from a few family members and the farm manager have set up four tunnels over the last three years, sells at five of the local markets and to local eateries. SO....reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle gave me additional insight in ways I could offer support to her and the farm."
Best Science & Scientists Humor
From the creator of the wildly popular webcomic xkcd, hilarious and informative answers to important questions you probably never thought to ask. In pursuit of answers, Munroe runs computer simulations, pores over stacks of declassified military research memos, solves differential equations, and consults with nuclear reactor operators. Fortunately, such people can turn to Randall Munroe, the author of the XKCD comic strip loved by fans of internet culture. For Munroe, who writes with a clarity and wit honed over eight years of writing captions for his webcomic, the fact that a question might be impossible to solve is no deterrent to pursuing it.” —Wall Street Journal Speakeasy blog. while dealing with relationships and the meaning of a computer-centric life, xkcd has become required reading for techies across the world….The Internet has also created a bond between Mr. Munroe and his readers that is exceptional. "With his steady regimen of math jokes, physics jokes, and antisocial optimism, xkcd creator Randall Munroe, a former NASA roboticist, scores traffic numbers in NBC.com or Oprah.com territory. [A]t its best [xkcd] isn’t a strip comic so much as an idea factory and a shared experience."
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I love the blog and was really looking forward to this book, but buying the kindle edition was a mistake."
"This is a great way to enjoy older questions and answers over again, updated, and to share them with new people, and the new questions and answers - never featured on the website - are delightful; I won't spoil it for you, but my favorite has to be the answer to "If a bullet with the density of a neutron star were fired from a handgun (ignoring the how) at the Earth's surface, would the Earth be destroyed?" If you have even a passing interest in science and ever enjoy daydreaming about the fantastic or the ridiculous, this book is for you. Gift season is coming up; thanks to this book my Christmas shopping will be a great deal easier."
"Randall Munroe hits that oddball humor sweet spot with zany questions and actual, scientific--and most importantly, interesting--answers."
"Randall Munroe's XKCD is a cornerstone of the World-Wide Web, and he brings the same intelligence and overabundance of careful research here to absolutely hilarious (and often randomly awesome or terrible) questions."
"Best bathroom book ever... and I mean that in the very best possible way you can imagine."
"All wrapped up in a well made book sufficient for display."
"Whether it's taking a dip in a nuclear reactor cooling pool, or halting the earth's spin just to see what would happen, Monroe accepts the intellectual challenge and delivers with gusto."
"They're hyperlinked, and you can use the links on the footnote to jump back But the page bounds move slightly every time, and notes near the top activate the Kindle options rather than the footnote."
Best Parenting & Families Humor
" Go the F*** to Sleep challenges stereotypes, opens up prototypes, and acknowledges that shared sense of failure that comes to all parents who weary of ever getting their darling(s) to sleep and briefly resuming the illusion of a life of their own." Seriously, Just Go to Sleep, a children's book inspired by Go the F*** to Sleep and appropriate for kids of all ages, is also available, as well as Seriously, You Have to Eat for finicky ones everywhere! Adam Mansbach's novels include The End of the Jews, winner of the California Book Award, and the best-selling Angry Black White Boy, a San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of 2005.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I was shocked to find that some reviewers, apparently completely forgot to read the title of the book before purchasing. For those parents who do have a sense of humor and who may not find profanity particularly offensive and who live in the real world. It's real, overworked, frustrated beyond belief, about to loose your mind at 3am, inner parent monologue. Samuel L. Jackson should narrate a book for every single stage of life, from being born to the grave. This book is one that will be shared from one exhausted, fed up, delusional, red eyed, sleep deprived parent to another."
"One for his first child and one for his second child."
"I do not recommend this for the uptight, no sense of humor kind of person or for the children unless you change it out for 'heck'....maybe."
"When the source of sleep deprivation is a small child, it is mind numbing relentless torture."
"The helpless feeling of not being able to get your little one to sleep is captured perfectly in this hilarious adults bedtime story!"
"I purchased this book as a 21st birthday gift for my best friend."
"A great shower or first baby gift for those parents with a sense of humor."
"If you have a child that fights sleep, this book may be for you."
Best Doctors & Medicine Humor
By turns heartbreaking, hilarious, and utterly human, The House of God is a mesmerizing and provocative novel about Roy Basch and five of his fellow interns at the most renowned teaching hospital in the country. “A wildly funny, sad, laugh-out-loud, frightening, outrageous, thought-provoking, moving book…a story of modern medicine rarely, if ever, told.”— The Houston Chronicle.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Absolutely a requirement for anyone in the medical field -- especially newcomers, interns, new nurses, patients who need to know how the hospital experience will work (or not work) &c. Hilarious-because-its-true details of the writer's intern year in a major Boston teaching hospital."
"This book is the "Catch 22" for medicine."
"Samuel Shem has created pages and pages of realistic medical training, I would be interested in reading a critique of the. Fat Man."
"I read that book a lot during my internship and residency. The only comparison to this experience was "The Hospital", script by Paddy Cheyefskie (I forgot how to spell his last name)."
"Though this was a requirement as part of a small learning group at my medical school, I couldn't be happier to have pulled and rushed through this book."
"I had a similar experience in my medical training, I felt that matters to him personally and I am myself moving to psychiatry."
"I remember reading this book back in he 80's when I first got out of nursing school."
"Nice to hear how his intern year went back in the day, unfortunately that doesn't make me like the him in the book any more."
Best Lawyers & Criminals Humor
Despite the fact that Australia harbors more things that can kill you in extremely nasty ways than anywhere else, including sharks, crocodiles, snakes, even riptides and deserts, Bill Bryson adores the place, and he takes his readers on a rollicking ride far beyond that beaten tourist path.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I'm a sexagenarian who, on a recent vacation, happened to walk out and back on the first three miles or so of the southern terminus of the Appalachian Trail (Springer Mtn, GA) and, in a fit of exhilaration, decided then and there that I would, by golly, hike the AT before I died. As I was joyfully entertained by his incisive sense of humor, I was simultaneously and seriously learning history, biology, geology (and several other -ologies) as well as being discomfitted by Bryson's documentation of our culture's dismissive practices regarding ecology."
"Read one and except for a few events, you've pretty much read them all and almost any extended backpacking trip involves the same rigors, risks, weather and that mixture of misery and exhilaration."
"Bill's storytelling captured me immediately...I was taking every step he took, I enjoyed every vista he looked out on, I was eavesdropping on his conversations with his fellow hikers and feeling the spectrum of emotions held for his friend and hiking companion."
"An adventure that walks you experientially and historically through the nation's longest series of trails from Georgia to Maine while feeling every fear from blisters, hunger, thirst, wildlife, climate changes, man's limitations and nature's nuances, all the while trekking with a forty pound pack on your back, and any one of these could do you in, well it's a wonder why the wild is so compelling."
"After reading Bryson's African Diary, I had to continue on with this offering on the Australian state of affairs."
"With the film in theaters, I decided to pick it up and give it a go. I loved this book, and place it among Jon Krakauer's "Into the Wild," Cheryl Strayed's "Wild," and Elizabeth Gilbert's "The Last American Man" in terms of well-written essays that explore our yearning to return to a simpler, untethered way of life."
"Unfortunately some of his stories about what happened to people along the trail, made me not that interested in walking any trail."
"I think Bill Bryson is an incredibly good writer whose humor extends to poking as much fun at himself as he does at others."
Best Computers & Internet Humor
The liberal media machine did everything they could to keep this book out of your hands. ''Fat people will hate this book.''.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"As an information professional I have always been very interested in intellectual freedom issues and am a card carrying member of the Freedom to Read Foundation so as soon as my industry colleagues began to tell me how dangerous Dangerous would be, I knew I had to read it as soon as possible. I emailed my old Intellectual Freedom & Censorship professor from grad school about the cancellation and her response was that Milo already had a platform so it's not the same type of insidious censorship. It is important to be mindful that censorship can come from both the political right and the political left. It seemed a bit ironic to me that all these alleged advocates of free speech were refusing to get a book called Dangerous because it would be too dangerous for people to read. Milo was more invigorating to read than Trump, probably because he is by trade a professional word slinging journalist. I'm not saying I agree with literally all the things Milo Yiannopoulos says or stands for but that doesn't matter. Dangerous is a decent book and censorship is dangerous."
"I pre-ordered the book out of curiosity, there was so much controversy when Simon and Schuster cancelled the book deal."
"As a gay man who has seen not just the gay rights movement but the entire progressive movement hijacked by Marxist regressives, Milo is and has always been a breath of fresh air. Milo comes back from a takedown that would have left most people in hiding."
"You don't have to like who he is, you might not like the way he looks or speaks or expresses his thoughts, but what he stands for is EVERYTHING that we are slowly losing as the media outlets take control of manipulating everything we see and hear."
"It is extraordinarily funny, and gets the modern conservative viewpoint across in a way that stereotypical stuffy conservatives can only imagine. While I have tried my best to encourage free-thinking in her impressionable young mind, the mindset in her public school has her believing all sorts of PC based nonsense. I asked for specific examples, but they have thus far been unable or unwilling to give examples."
"Milo is absolutely correct in the following excerpt from "Dangerous". "In short, I’m the Left’s worst nightmare: a living, breathing refutation of identity politics, and proof that free speech and the truth wrapped in a good joke will always be more persuasive and more powerful than identity politics.""
Best Satire
Trevor was born to a white Swiss father and a black Xhosa mother at a time when such a union was punishable by five years in prison. Living proof of his parents’ indiscretion, Trevor was kept mostly indoors for the earliest years of his life, bound by the extreme and often absurd measures his mother took to hide him from a government that could, at any moment, steal him away. Finally liberated by the end of South Africa’s tyrannical white rule, Trevor and his mother set forth on a grand adventure, living openly and freely and embracing the opportunities won by a centuries-long struggle. It is also the story of that young man’s relationship with his fearless, rebellious, and fervently religious mother—his teammate, a woman determined to save her son from the cycle of poverty, violence, and abuse that would ultimately threaten her own life. Whether subsisting on caterpillars for dinner during hard times, being thrown from a moving car during an attempted kidnapping, or just trying to survive the life-and-death pitfalls of dating in high school, Trevor illuminates his curious world with an incisive wit and unflinching honesty. His stories weave together to form a moving and searingly funny portrait of a boy making his way through a damaged world in a dangerous time, armed only with a keen sense of humor and a mother’s unconventional, unconditional love. Born a Crime is not just an unnerving account of growing up in South Africa under apartheid, but a love letter to the author’s remarkable mother.” —Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times. “[An] unforgettable memoir.” — Parade “What makes Born a Crime such a soul-nourishing pleasure, even with all its darker edges and perilous turns, is reading Noah recount in brisk, warmly conversational prose how he learned to negotiate his way through the bullying and ostracism. In the end, Born a Crime is not just an unnerving account of growing up in South Africa under apartheid, but a love letter to the author’s remarkable mother.” —Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times. “You’d be hard-pressed to find a comic’s origin story better than the one Trevor Noah serves up in Born a Crime . [He] developed his aptitude for witty truth telling [and]…every hardscrabble memory of helping his mother scrape together money for food, gas, school fees, and rent, or barely surviving the temper of his stepfather, Abel, reveals the anxious wellsprings of the comedian’s ambition and success. If there is harvest in spite of blight, the saying goes, one does not credit the blight-but Noah does manage to wring brilliant comedy from it.” — O: The Oprah. Magazine “What makes Born a Crime such a soul-nourishing pleasure, even with all its darker edges and perilous turns, is reading Noah recount in brisk, warmly conversational prose how he learned to negotiate his way through the bullying and ostracism. “This isn't your average comic-writes-a-memoir: It’s a unique look at a man who is a product of his culture—and a nuanced look at a part of the world whose people have known dark times easily pushed aside.” —Refinery29. told through stories and vignettes that are sharply observed, deftly conveyed and consistently candid. Growing organically from them is an affecting investigation of identity, ethnicity, language, masculinity, nationality and, most of all, humanity—all issues that the election of Donald Trump in the United States shows are foremost in minds and hearts everywhere. What the reader gleans are the insights that made Noah the thoughtful, observant, empathic man who wrote Born a Crime . Here is a level-headed man, forged by remarkable and shocking life incidents, who is quietly determined and who knows where home and the heart lie. “A gifted storyteller, able to deftly lace his poignant tales with amusing irony.” — Entertainment Weekly. Among the many virtues of Born a Crime is a frank and telling portrait of life in South Africa during the 1980s and ’90s. Born a Crime offers Americans a second introduction to Trevor Noah, and he makes a real impression.” — Newsday. “An affecting memoir, Born a Crime [is] a love letter to his mother.” — The. Washington Post. Noah is quick with a disarming joke, and he skillfully integrates the parallel narratives via interstitial asides between chapters. Perhaps the most harrowing tales are those of his abusive stepfather, which form the book’s final act (and which Noah cleverly foreshadows throughout earlier chapters), but equally prominent are the laugh-out-loud yarns about going to the prom, and the differences between ‘White Church’ and ‘Black Church.’” — Publishers Weekly (starred review). Incisive, funny, and vivid, these true tales are anchored to his portrait of his courageous, rebellious, and religious mother who defied racially restrictive laws to secure an education and a career for herself—and to have a child with a white Swiss/German even though sex between whites and blacks was illegal. and his candid and compassionate essays deepen our perception of the complexities of race, gender, and class.” — Booklist (starred review).
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Trevor Noah is a superb storyteller, and this memoir is his eloquent and touching account of growing up as the mixed race child of a single mother, living in poverty in deeply racist and sexist South Africa. Reminiscent of The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls, it is a superbly written story of a perceptive and resilient child thriving in very difficult circumstances, and it beautifully captures these circumstances seen through the eyes of a child."
"I have to love a guy who finds comedy in tragedy and who gleefully spins yarns about experiences that would keep most of us in therapy for a lifetime. The heroine of the book is Noah's mother, a feisty lady with a solid rock faith, a gal who snubs her nose at things that don't make sense. He learned to navigate Apartheid society's complex system that divided people in to three groups: black, white, and colored. Noah was 'colored' with a 'black' Xhosa African mother and a 'white' Swiss father, his very existence implicating his parent's crime. He spoke multiple languages, Xhosa and Zulu and Afrikaans, and English, could fit into most groups, but felt affiliated to black culture."
"As a long time viewer of the Daily Show, I started watching as Trevor took over from Jon Stewart and while I've always thought he does a good job, I had no idea the depth of character and experiences that were below the surface of those cute dimples! He is a wonderful story teller, finding the right balance between relaying his experiences, weaving in the social atmosphere around it and doing it in such a way that even as an American reader, I was able to visualize the communities he was describing in rich detail."
"The Trevor tome is written without anger at the system but the love and devotion of his mother."
"What this book does do is describe life growing up during Apartheid in ways that probably most readers are not familiar with."
Best Limericks & Humorous Verse
" Go the F*** to Sleep challenges stereotypes, opens up prototypes, and acknowledges that shared sense of failure that comes to all parents who weary of ever getting their darling(s) to sleep and briefly resuming the illusion of a life of their own." Seriously, Just Go to Sleep, a children's book inspired by Go the F*** to Sleep and appropriate for kids of all ages, is also available, as well as Seriously, You Have to Eat for finicky ones everywhere! Adam Mansbach's novels include The End of the Jews, winner of the California Book Award, and the best-selling Angry Black White Boy, a San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of 2005.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I was shocked to find that some reviewers, apparently completely forgot to read the title of the book before purchasing. For those parents who do have a sense of humor and who may not find profanity particularly offensive and who live in the real world. It's real, overworked, frustrated beyond belief, about to loose your mind at 3am, inner parent monologue. Samuel L. Jackson should narrate a book for every single stage of life, from being born to the grave. This book is one that will be shared from one exhausted, fed up, delusional, red eyed, sleep deprived parent to another."
"I purchased this book as a 21st birthday gift for my best friend."
"If you have a child that fights sleep, this book may be for you."
"Then they said their baby wouldn't need it - that they knew how to make babies sleep really well."
"Nor should you purchase this book if you do not have a sense of humor."
"I gave this book to my best friend who is due any day now and she could not stop laughing."
"If you have had children, you have said and or thought what is written in this book."
"It is cleverly written in a tone that only the most desperately tired mom or dad could understand."
Best Cat, Dog & Animal Humor
Cat lovers will laugh out loud at the quirkiness of their feline friends with these insightful and curious poems from the singular minds of housecats. In four cat-egories - family, work, play, and existence - Francesco Marciuliano (writer of the comic strip "Sally Forth") has given voice to cats' 'every desire, their every conflict, their every epiphany.'. From expressing their love for dead mice to pulling over Christmas trees, cats reveal their genius and neuroses". Shelf Awareness. "With poems like 'Who Is That On Your Lap,' 'Nudge' and 'Kneel Before Me,' this quirky book will surely induce laughter and whimsical from all who decide to delve into its poetry."
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"The book is a small hard-cover that fits on a table without taking up a lot of space. Cat portraits showing our furry brethren in cute and/or compromising poses illustrate the pages."
"Just received "I Could Pee on This: And Other Poems by Cats" today and have already finished it, wiping the tears of laughter as I went along."
"This is a cute book, and enjoyable."
"The author Francesco Marciuliano clearly understands cats, and his poems seemed to come directly from cats."
"The recipient also found it to be funny and very apt in it's descriptions of our interactions with felines."
"I recommend this adorable book to cat lovers."
"I love kittens and cats and always have wondered what's going on in their minds."
"I understand that the cute kitten pictures add to the funniness of the book, the material can still be reformatted to work on all platforms."
Best Self-Help & Psychology Humor
When Randy Pausch, a computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon, was asked to give such a lecture, he didn't have to imagine it as his last, since he had recently been diagnosed with terminal cancer. In this book, Randy Pausch has combined the humor, inspiration and intelligence that made his lecture such a phenomenon and given it an indelible form. And while they speak, audiences can't help but mull the same question: What wisdom would we impart to the world if we knew it was our last chance? When Randy Pausch, a computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon, was asked to give such a lecture, he didn't have to imagine it as his last, since he had recently been diagnosed with terminal cancer. It was about the importance of overcoming obstacles, of enabling the dreams of others, of seizing every moment (because "time is all you have...and you may find one day that you have less than you think"). In this book, Randy Pausch has combined the humor, inspiration and intelligence that made his lecture such a phenomenon and given it an indelible form. We were shy about barging in on Randy Pausch's valuable time to ask him a few questions about his expansion of his famous Last Lecture into the book by the same name, but he was gracious enough to take a moment to answer. As anyone who has watched the lecture or read the book will understand, the really crucial question is the last one, and we weren't surprised to learn that the "secret" to winning giant stuffed animals on the midway, like most anything else, is sheer persistence. I have neuropathy (numbness in fingers and toes), and varying degrees of GI discomfort, mild nausea, and fatigue. Occasionally I have an unusually bad reaction to a chemo infusion (last week, I spiked a 103 fever), but all of this is a small price to pay for walkin' around. Amazon.com: Your lecture at Carnegie Mellon has reached millions of people, but even with the short time you apparently have, you wanted to write a book. Also, much of my lecture at Carnegie Mellon focused on the professional side of my life--my students, colleagues and career.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Bought this to re-read it."
"Great and inspiring book!"
"This books is an awesome read."
"Excellent read."
"Interesting story, sad to know he passed away."
"great book--very sad but very inspiring."
"This is an excellent inspirational book, it is a refreshing look at what matters."
"It is an easy read, but makes you dig deep within yourself & think about how you choose to see your life and are you spending your time the way you should."
Best Love, Sex & Marriage Humor
" Go the F*** to Sleep challenges stereotypes, opens up prototypes, and acknowledges that shared sense of failure that comes to all parents who weary of ever getting their darling(s) to sleep and briefly resuming the illusion of a life of their own." Seriously, Just Go to Sleep, a children's book inspired by Go the F*** to Sleep and appropriate for kids of all ages, is also available, as well as Seriously, You Have to Eat for finicky ones everywhere! Adam Mansbach's novels include The End of the Jews, winner of the California Book Award, and the best-selling Angry Black White Boy, a San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of 2005.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I was shocked to find that some reviewers, apparently completely forgot to read the title of the book before purchasing. For those parents who do have a sense of humor and who may not find profanity particularly offensive and who live in the real world. It's real, overworked, frustrated beyond belief, about to loose your mind at 3am, inner parent monologue. Samuel L. Jackson should narrate a book for every single stage of life, from being born to the grave. This book is one that will be shared from one exhausted, fed up, delusional, red eyed, sleep deprived parent to another."
"I purchased this book as a 21st birthday gift for my best friend."
"If you have a child that fights sleep, this book may be for you."
"Then they said their baby wouldn't need it - that they knew how to make babies sleep really well."
"Nor should you purchase this book if you do not have a sense of humor."
"I gave this book to my best friend who is due any day now and she could not stop laughing."
"If you have had children, you have said and or thought what is written in this book."
"It is cleverly written in a tone that only the most desperately tired mom or dad could understand."
Best Business & Professional Humor
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From the creator of Dilbert , an unflinching look at the strategies Donald Trump used to persuade voters to elect the most unconventional candidate in the history of the presidency, and how anyone can learn his methods for succeeding against long odds. Scott Adams—a trained hypnotist and a lifelong student of persuasion—was one of the earliest public figures to predict Trump’s win, doing so a week after Nate Silver put Trump’s odds at 2 percent in his FiveThirtyEight.com blog. But Adams recognized in Trump a level of persuasion you only see once in a generation. “Win Bigly taught me how to persuade my boss to treat me with slightly less contempt.”. —Dilbert. “If I’m being honest, Win Bigly is better than all other books and at least one play.”. —Abe Lincoln.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"It has me questioning everything I feel like I have a solid rational opinion on and is helping me understand why it is that people who I think are reasonable in other instances can believe in things that I think are so obviously wrong. It goes without saying that very few people will agree with everything in this book, but the author is interesting, thoughtful, and he presents techniques that are simple enough you can test out in real life to see if they are effective or not."
"He gives current, real world examples taken from the Trump and Clinton campaign to illustrate how our brains respond to different forms of persuasion and how we can adopt them ourselves to affect change, and hopefully change for the good. If you're familiar with his work, this is a good refresher to help you improve your master persuasion, and if you're not, this will give you some insight on both interesting elements of the 2016 election, and how you can apply the techniques, and avoid the pitfalls, of what helped and hindered both campaign teams."
"One of the best features of the book is that Adams gives you little marketing lessons in side notes that apply to the chapter they are in. Whatever you think of Donald Trump, this is a convincing (and entertaining) book about the marketing principles and strategies Trump used to gather a growing loyal base, and eliminate the competition. Trump may not know much about politics, but he sure knew a lot about marketing. This book outlines how Donald Trump did it, what marketing principles and strategies were used, and the results. Adams makes it clear that just because he may admire the marketing savvy of Donald Trump, he isn't a huge supporter. Adams also spends some time explaining why Trump's techniques worked on the public, and why we are susceptible to such manipulation in marketing and advertising.. This is the only book I've seen that covers the marketing methods used to win a political election. Adams gives Trump himself credit for the marketing techniques used in the campaign."
"He very calmly and objectively shares his observations on Trump, without calling him Hitler or God's gift to the country."
"This is a great introduction to persuasion and how it affected the U.S. presidential election."
"The authors is ridiculous about the claims that only he saw the president win the election when no one else did."
Best Comedy
Trevor was born to a white Swiss father and a black Xhosa mother at a time when such a union was punishable by five years in prison. Living proof of his parents’ indiscretion, Trevor was kept mostly indoors for the earliest years of his life, bound by the extreme and often absurd measures his mother took to hide him from a government that could, at any moment, steal him away. Finally liberated by the end of South Africa’s tyrannical white rule, Trevor and his mother set forth on a grand adventure, living openly and freely and embracing the opportunities won by a centuries-long struggle. It is also the story of that young man’s relationship with his fearless, rebellious, and fervently religious mother—his teammate, a woman determined to save her son from the cycle of poverty, violence, and abuse that would ultimately threaten her own life. Whether subsisting on caterpillars for dinner during hard times, being thrown from a moving car during an attempted kidnapping, or just trying to survive the life-and-death pitfalls of dating in high school, Trevor illuminates his curious world with an incisive wit and unflinching honesty. His stories weave together to form a moving and searingly funny portrait of a boy making his way through a damaged world in a dangerous time, armed only with a keen sense of humor and a mother’s unconventional, unconditional love. Born a Crime is not just an unnerving account of growing up in South Africa under apartheid, but a love letter to the author’s remarkable mother.” —Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times. “[An] unforgettable memoir.” — Parade “What makes Born a Crime such a soul-nourishing pleasure, even with all its darker edges and perilous turns, is reading Noah recount in brisk, warmly conversational prose how he learned to negotiate his way through the bullying and ostracism. In the end, Born a Crime is not just an unnerving account of growing up in South Africa under apartheid, but a love letter to the author’s remarkable mother.” —Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times. “You’d be hard-pressed to find a comic’s origin story better than the one Trevor Noah serves up in Born a Crime . [He] developed his aptitude for witty truth telling [and]…every hardscrabble memory of helping his mother scrape together money for food, gas, school fees, and rent, or barely surviving the temper of his stepfather, Abel, reveals the anxious wellsprings of the comedian’s ambition and success. If there is harvest in spite of blight, the saying goes, one does not credit the blight-but Noah does manage to wring brilliant comedy from it.” — O: The Oprah. Magazine “What makes Born a Crime such a soul-nourishing pleasure, even with all its darker edges and perilous turns, is reading Noah recount in brisk, warmly conversational prose how he learned to negotiate his way through the bullying and ostracism. “This isn't your average comic-writes-a-memoir: It’s a unique look at a man who is a product of his culture—and a nuanced look at a part of the world whose people have known dark times easily pushed aside.” —Refinery29. told through stories and vignettes that are sharply observed, deftly conveyed and consistently candid. Growing organically from them is an affecting investigation of identity, ethnicity, language, masculinity, nationality and, most of all, humanity—all issues that the election of Donald Trump in the United States shows are foremost in minds and hearts everywhere. What the reader gleans are the insights that made Noah the thoughtful, observant, empathic man who wrote Born a Crime . Here is a level-headed man, forged by remarkable and shocking life incidents, who is quietly determined and who knows where home and the heart lie. “A gifted storyteller, able to deftly lace his poignant tales with amusing irony.” — Entertainment Weekly. Among the many virtues of Born a Crime is a frank and telling portrait of life in South Africa during the 1980s and ’90s. Born a Crime offers Americans a second introduction to Trevor Noah, and he makes a real impression.” — Newsday. “An affecting memoir, Born a Crime [is] a love letter to his mother.” — The. Washington Post. Noah is quick with a disarming joke, and he skillfully integrates the parallel narratives via interstitial asides between chapters. Perhaps the most harrowing tales are those of his abusive stepfather, which form the book’s final act (and which Noah cleverly foreshadows throughout earlier chapters), but equally prominent are the laugh-out-loud yarns about going to the prom, and the differences between ‘White Church’ and ‘Black Church.’” — Publishers Weekly (starred review). Incisive, funny, and vivid, these true tales are anchored to his portrait of his courageous, rebellious, and religious mother who defied racially restrictive laws to secure an education and a career for herself—and to have a child with a white Swiss/German even though sex between whites and blacks was illegal. and his candid and compassionate essays deepen our perception of the complexities of race, gender, and class.” — Booklist (starred review).
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Trevor Noah is a superb storyteller, and this memoir is his eloquent and touching account of growing up as the mixed race child of a single mother, living in poverty in deeply racist and sexist South Africa. Reminiscent of The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls, it is a superbly written story of a perceptive and resilient child thriving in very difficult circumstances, and it beautifully captures these circumstances seen through the eyes of a child."
"I have to love a guy who finds comedy in tragedy and who gleefully spins yarns about experiences that would keep most of us in therapy for a lifetime. The heroine of the book is Noah's mother, a feisty lady with a solid rock faith, a gal who snubs her nose at things that don't make sense. He learned to navigate Apartheid society's complex system that divided people in to three groups: black, white, and colored. Noah was 'colored' with a 'black' Xhosa African mother and a 'white' Swiss father, his very existence implicating his parent's crime. He spoke multiple languages, Xhosa and Zulu and Afrikaans, and English, could fit into most groups, but felt affiliated to black culture."
"As a long time viewer of the Daily Show, I started watching as Trevor took over from Jon Stewart and while I've always thought he does a good job, I had no idea the depth of character and experiences that were below the surface of those cute dimples! He is a wonderful story teller, finding the right balance between relaying his experiences, weaving in the social atmosphere around it and doing it in such a way that even as an American reader, I was able to visualize the communities he was describing in rich detail."
Best Parody
" Go the F*** to Sleep challenges stereotypes, opens up prototypes, and acknowledges that shared sense of failure that comes to all parents who weary of ever getting their darling(s) to sleep and briefly resuming the illusion of a life of their own." Seriously, Just Go to Sleep, a children's book inspired by Go the F*** to Sleep and appropriate for kids of all ages, is also available, as well as Seriously, You Have to Eat for finicky ones everywhere! Adam Mansbach's novels include The End of the Jews, winner of the California Book Award, and the best-selling Angry Black White Boy, a San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of 2005.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I was shocked to find that some reviewers, apparently completely forgot to read the title of the book before purchasing. For those parents who do have a sense of humor and who may not find profanity particularly offensive and who live in the real world. It's real, overworked, frustrated beyond belief, about to loose your mind at 3am, inner parent monologue. Samuel L. Jackson should narrate a book for every single stage of life, from being born to the grave. This book is one that will be shared from one exhausted, fed up, delusional, red eyed, sleep deprived parent to another."
"I purchased this book as a 21st birthday gift for my best friend."
"If you have a child that fights sleep, this book may be for you."
"Then they said their baby wouldn't need it - that they knew how to make babies sleep really well."
"Nor should you purchase this book if you do not have a sense of humor."
"I gave this book to my best friend who is due any day now and she could not stop laughing."
"If you have had children, you have said and or thought what is written in this book."
"It is cleverly written in a tone that only the most desperately tired mom or dad could understand."
Best Puns & Wordplay
Featuring 65 delicious drink recipes paired with wry commentary on history's most beloved novels, Tequila Mockingbird also includes bar bites, drinking games, and whimsical illustrations throughout.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Bought as a holiday gift for a book-lover."
"I do actually use this for mixed drink ideas, but more often it is used as a topic for discussion at parties when people see it sitting on my home bar!"
"Nice gift."
"It was a great success!"
"Gave this book to my daughter and husband along with the Historically Modern Design tequila glasses."
"was a Christmas gift, the person loved it."
"Only complaint, no martini recipes!"
"Purchased Christmas gift for my sister and she loved it!"