This book was a wonder to read. It's a picaresque fairy tale, as the hero goes on his quest and has many adventures. it's also a celebration for the power of storytelling and the written word, where some of the most beautiful language is reserved for describing the joy of reading.
the novel concerns a young librarian named Pico in a city by the sea. In this city, there are people with wings, and people without, and the two never mix. So when Pico, who has no wings, falls in love with a winged woman named Sisi, he is forbidden from pursuing his love. He therefore decides to set out for a legendary town called Paunpuam, where there is a book called the "The Book of Flying" that grants people wings if they read it.
All of the following chapters details Pico's adventures as he encounters many strange characters, learns their stories, writes poetry, and learns many things about life. Much of the book is taken up with the people Pico meets telling their stories, and many of them are just as fascinating as Pico's tale. It was something like getting many stories for the price of one.
Pico himself is a good character. He's likable for his unflappability and for his determination. I really wanted for him to suceed.
Aside from one part of the story where Pico encounters a cannibal, which was somewhat gut-turning, it was all a wondrous experience. Now what I want from the author, Keith Miller, is to write another book saying what happened to some of the characters Pico meets in his travels. We are told near the end that some of them have gone on to their own adventures, but they aren't detailed. I wanted more stories told in this same fairy-tale-like style.
All in all, a great book.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Sunday, August 23, 2009
The Essential Bordertown
"The Essential Bordertown" is the fourth in a series of anthologies all set in the same shared world, where elves and the Realm from which they come becomes acessible to humanity. All of the stories take place in the city of Bordertown, in between the World and the Realm. Here technology works half of the time and magic the other half of the time and the city is populated by both elves and humans, who are mostly exiles, runaways, outcasts, halfbreeds, and others who don't fit in.
"The Essential Bordertown" takes the form of a guidebook for new arrivals with advice on how to live in the Soho district of Bordertown, a poor neighborhood full of the young and the energetic, the waifs and strays who make Bordertown what it is. It alternates between essays on a variety of subjects (cooking, jobs, nightlife, etiquette) and stories that complement them. The guidebook sections, written by the editor, Terri Windling, are easily the best part--funny, snarky, informative, and it cnjures up a whole world of fascinating places and people. It's a brilliant example of of worldbuilding.
The stories written to take place in the world created by the guidebook sections, however, are a very mixed bag. Some, like "Dragon Child," "Socks," and "Changeling," are very good, well-written, and live up to the potential of the setting, while others, like "Oak Hill," "When the Bow Breaks," and "Arcadia" are just confusing and don't quite work. "Hot Water" has an interesting concept (an epidemic of talking teapots) but it seems half-baked. "May This Be Your Last Sorrow" is a sad little well-written vignette, but it's also very short. "Argentine" and "Cover Up My Tracks With Rain" are both good, and I want to see more of the characters in them. "How Shannaro Tolkinson Lost and Found His Heart" had a few nice moments, but other parts didn't work, and some things (such as the two elvin families involved being named after fantasy authors) just seemed cheesy.
All in all, there were some good stories, some not-so-good, and quite a few in between. I'm glad I read it, and I might even read some more Bordertown books, but the stories were greatly outshone by the background materials. I want to explore Bordertosn some more, but this book doesn't wuite live up to its potential.
"The Essential Bordertown" takes the form of a guidebook for new arrivals with advice on how to live in the Soho district of Bordertown, a poor neighborhood full of the young and the energetic, the waifs and strays who make Bordertown what it is. It alternates between essays on a variety of subjects (cooking, jobs, nightlife, etiquette) and stories that complement them. The guidebook sections, written by the editor, Terri Windling, are easily the best part--funny, snarky, informative, and it cnjures up a whole world of fascinating places and people. It's a brilliant example of of worldbuilding.
The stories written to take place in the world created by the guidebook sections, however, are a very mixed bag. Some, like "Dragon Child," "Socks," and "Changeling," are very good, well-written, and live up to the potential of the setting, while others, like "Oak Hill," "When the Bow Breaks," and "Arcadia" are just confusing and don't quite work. "Hot Water" has an interesting concept (an epidemic of talking teapots) but it seems half-baked. "May This Be Your Last Sorrow" is a sad little well-written vignette, but it's also very short. "Argentine" and "Cover Up My Tracks With Rain" are both good, and I want to see more of the characters in them. "How Shannaro Tolkinson Lost and Found His Heart" had a few nice moments, but other parts didn't work, and some things (such as the two elvin families involved being named after fantasy authors) just seemed cheesy.
All in all, there were some good stories, some not-so-good, and quite a few in between. I'm glad I read it, and I might even read some more Bordertown books, but the stories were greatly outshone by the background materials. I want to explore Bordertosn some more, but this book doesn't wuite live up to its potential.
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
The True Meaning of Smekday
"The True Meaning of Smekday" by Adam Rex is an interesting and inventive book. It' a fun read, and I finished it in about a day. It has a very quirky sense of humor, but also manages to be dark and sometimes even scary.
The book takes the form of a series of essays that the main character, a young girl with the improbable name of Gratuity Tucchi, writes about the title subject, the meaning of the day when Earth was invaded by an alien race called the Boov, who renamed the planet Smekland and sent all the humans in America to Florida. Gratuity, along with her cat, Pig, encounters a rogue Boov mechanic on the run named J. Lo who fixes her car so it can fly. The rest of the book is the trio's many wild and crazy adventures. The plot is very unpredictable, as where the Americans must go changes just as Gratuity reaches Florida, and the invasion by the Boov is overshadowed by a subsequent invasion by a different and much more intimidating alien species. While few plot points seem contrived, the story manages to go in directions one wouldn't necessarily expect.
And it's also a very funny book. Gratuity is a very witty narrator, and is quite snarky and impatient with the BS that's thrown her way. J. Lo is a bit of a Cloudcouckoolander, and his difficulty at grasping Earthling culture is another source of comedy, but Rex doesn't use it to make J. Lo a butt of jokes, but to emphasize the alienness of his character. rex also illustrates the book, both with Gratuity's photographs of everything, which manage to both look realistic and like caricatures, and J. Lo's explanatory comics, which are easily the funniest parts of the book. Other characters, like Gratuity's not-very-smart mom, the Chief (an old Navajo man with a very fake UFO in his junkyard), and the crazy UFOlogists the main characters encounter when they pass through Roswell, add just something more that makes this such a fun book.
All in all, I really quite liked this book. It's funny, clever, and unpredictable. Read it for a good time.
The book takes the form of a series of essays that the main character, a young girl with the improbable name of Gratuity Tucchi, writes about the title subject, the meaning of the day when Earth was invaded by an alien race called the Boov, who renamed the planet Smekland and sent all the humans in America to Florida. Gratuity, along with her cat, Pig, encounters a rogue Boov mechanic on the run named J. Lo who fixes her car so it can fly. The rest of the book is the trio's many wild and crazy adventures. The plot is very unpredictable, as where the Americans must go changes just as Gratuity reaches Florida, and the invasion by the Boov is overshadowed by a subsequent invasion by a different and much more intimidating alien species. While few plot points seem contrived, the story manages to go in directions one wouldn't necessarily expect.
And it's also a very funny book. Gratuity is a very witty narrator, and is quite snarky and impatient with the BS that's thrown her way. J. Lo is a bit of a Cloudcouckoolander, and his difficulty at grasping Earthling culture is another source of comedy, but Rex doesn't use it to make J. Lo a butt of jokes, but to emphasize the alienness of his character. rex also illustrates the book, both with Gratuity's photographs of everything, which manage to both look realistic and like caricatures, and J. Lo's explanatory comics, which are easily the funniest parts of the book. Other characters, like Gratuity's not-very-smart mom, the Chief (an old Navajo man with a very fake UFO in his junkyard), and the crazy UFOlogists the main characters encounter when they pass through Roswell, add just something more that makes this such a fun book.
All in all, I really quite liked this book. It's funny, clever, and unpredictable. Read it for a good time.
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Wide Awake
This was a fantastic book. It has wonderfully complex characters, an intriguing story, and a uplifting--dare I say inspirational--tone. It's a very short book, and a very fast read, as you find yourself constantly being pulled forward to find out what happens next.
Taking place several decades in the future, the US has just elected its first gay and Jewish president, a man named Abe Stein. America, having suffered through an economic collapse known as the Greater Depression and a disastrous series of wars, is seeming to be pulling out thanks to a progressive movement that has swept Stein into office. But Stein also won by a very slim margin: only a few thousand votes in Kansas finally tipped the scale in his favor.
The main character, Duncan, a high school student who like Stein is gay and Jewish, is elated that the candidate he supported has won. But things take a darker turn when the governor of Kansas declares a recount because he doesn't believe Stein won his state. Since the governor of Kansas is a dutiful member of the party that lost the presidential election, this is viewed as a political stunt by pretty much every character in the book. The uncertainty over the election is mirrored in problems in Duncan's own relationship with his boyfriend, Jimmy, and the revelation that one of his friends has been cheating on her girlfriend. When Stein calls on his supporters to come to Kansas to stop the governor from throwing the election, everything comes to a head.
As I said before, this is a fantastic book. Duncan, Jimmy, and all of their friends are all very interesting characters, and they are definitely complex ones: for instance, Duncan is a true believer in Stein but is also somewhat timid when it comes to confrontation, which causes problems with his relationship with the more confrontational Jimmy. Stein's speeches, which litter the book, are all inspirational, so much so that I kinda wish I could vote for him as president. I also liked the background details that David Levithan, the author, includes in his story, like how the progressive movement that has elected Stein was greatly supported by a progressive evangelical Christian movement known as the Jesus revolution based around Jesus's actions as a man.
However, there are a few problems with it. After a while, the dramas of Duncan and his friends are kind of pushed aside for the greater drama concerning Stein and Kansas. This kind of makes sense in context (they're all so swept up in their protest against Kansas throwing the election that they forget their petty dramas), but some of the smaller dramas, like Duncan feeling insecure about his relationship with Jimmy, feel unfinished. I also wished that there were more and less extreme characters representing the other side: those who did not support Stein seem to be made up entirely of the kind of people who think Barack Obama was born in Kenya and who think that healthcare reform will result in "death panels." Duncan mentions talking to more moderate opponents of Stein when he was canvassing, but they never actually appear in the story itself. This makes the whole political divide in the story seem a bit more than a bit one-sided.
Speaking of Obama, this book also feels a little dated now that a black semi-progressive Democrat has been elected president. Levithan was clearly expecting the US to go further into the toilet after Bush's term, and Obama's pointing us in a different direction doesn't seem now like it would lead to the future depicted in this book. A small quibble, but one I bring up nonetheless.
However, all in all I really liked this book and I found it a fantastic read, one I can truly call inspirational. I hope that one day our world can be like the one envisioned by the characters in the book, as a Great Community brought together in tolerance and equality.
Taking place several decades in the future, the US has just elected its first gay and Jewish president, a man named Abe Stein. America, having suffered through an economic collapse known as the Greater Depression and a disastrous series of wars, is seeming to be pulling out thanks to a progressive movement that has swept Stein into office. But Stein also won by a very slim margin: only a few thousand votes in Kansas finally tipped the scale in his favor.
The main character, Duncan, a high school student who like Stein is gay and Jewish, is elated that the candidate he supported has won. But things take a darker turn when the governor of Kansas declares a recount because he doesn't believe Stein won his state. Since the governor of Kansas is a dutiful member of the party that lost the presidential election, this is viewed as a political stunt by pretty much every character in the book. The uncertainty over the election is mirrored in problems in Duncan's own relationship with his boyfriend, Jimmy, and the revelation that one of his friends has been cheating on her girlfriend. When Stein calls on his supporters to come to Kansas to stop the governor from throwing the election, everything comes to a head.
As I said before, this is a fantastic book. Duncan, Jimmy, and all of their friends are all very interesting characters, and they are definitely complex ones: for instance, Duncan is a true believer in Stein but is also somewhat timid when it comes to confrontation, which causes problems with his relationship with the more confrontational Jimmy. Stein's speeches, which litter the book, are all inspirational, so much so that I kinda wish I could vote for him as president. I also liked the background details that David Levithan, the author, includes in his story, like how the progressive movement that has elected Stein was greatly supported by a progressive evangelical Christian movement known as the Jesus revolution based around Jesus's actions as a man.
However, there are a few problems with it. After a while, the dramas of Duncan and his friends are kind of pushed aside for the greater drama concerning Stein and Kansas. This kind of makes sense in context (they're all so swept up in their protest against Kansas throwing the election that they forget their petty dramas), but some of the smaller dramas, like Duncan feeling insecure about his relationship with Jimmy, feel unfinished. I also wished that there were more and less extreme characters representing the other side: those who did not support Stein seem to be made up entirely of the kind of people who think Barack Obama was born in Kenya and who think that healthcare reform will result in "death panels." Duncan mentions talking to more moderate opponents of Stein when he was canvassing, but they never actually appear in the story itself. This makes the whole political divide in the story seem a bit more than a bit one-sided.
Speaking of Obama, this book also feels a little dated now that a black semi-progressive Democrat has been elected president. Levithan was clearly expecting the US to go further into the toilet after Bush's term, and Obama's pointing us in a different direction doesn't seem now like it would lead to the future depicted in this book. A small quibble, but one I bring up nonetheless.
However, all in all I really liked this book and I found it a fantastic read, one I can truly call inspirational. I hope that one day our world can be like the one envisioned by the characters in the book, as a Great Community brought together in tolerance and equality.
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
The Brief History of the Dead
Like my last review, "The Brief History of the Dead" has a split narrative, with it alternating between two separate stories. However, in my opinion Kevin Brockmeier, the author of "The Brief History of the Dead," does it better than Cory Doctorow did in "Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town." For one thing, in this book the two narratives are split into alternating chapters, whereas in Doctorow's story they alternated pretty much whenever Doctorow wanted them too, which led to some confusion and the feeling that Doctorow wasn't weighing his stories equally. "The Brief History of the Dead," on the other hand, feels equally balanced between its two stories.
The first of the two stories involves the City, where people go when they die. It's a city composed of everything people need where people live basically the way they did when they die. However, people don't stay in the City forever: only as long as there is someone alive to remember them. And lately huge groups of people have been vanishing to what comes after the city, as new arrivals report a worldwide pandemic of a virus that kills within 24 hours, nicknamed "The Blinks."
The other story concerns Laura Byrd, a wildlife specialist working for Coca-Cola in the Antartic, and quite possibly the last person alive in the world, as she struggles to survive and find shelter and a functioning radio to contact the outside world--assuming there's an outside world to contact. Her story compliments the stories of those still left in the City, as it both gives clues as to how she knows them and helps to show the state the living world is in, where the threat of terrorism is omnipresent and Coca-Cola owns one third of Antartica.
I really liked the chapters set in the City. Th first, which deals with the City as a whole, goes from person to person, giving a very powerful image of the City as a whole. It works very well as an introduction to the rest of the book, which makes sense, as it was originally a seperate short story. All of the other chapters in the City focus on one particular character, showing how they see the City and the situation that they're in with only one person still alive in the world. The City itself seems so interesting and unique that I found myself constantly interested in learning more about it.
I was less impressed with the Laura Byrd chapters. They were well-written, and Laura is an interesting character, but she's really the only character we see in them, aside from flashbacks. Really, they're a survival story, which, although it's a good survival story, is just not quite as interesting as exploring the City was. However, it is more a case of the City chapters being so good as opposed to the Laura chapters being bad.
I would have liked perhaps one more chapter each of the City and Laura chapters (or at least one more City chapter), as they both have somewhat ambiguous endings, but their endings do work as is. It's really more a function of me being so fascinated with some of the mysteries of the City that I wanted to learn more and more.
All in all, this was a wondrous and wonderful book that's thoughtful, exciting, and very well written. Everyone should read this book if they can.
The first of the two stories involves the City, where people go when they die. It's a city composed of everything people need where people live basically the way they did when they die. However, people don't stay in the City forever: only as long as there is someone alive to remember them. And lately huge groups of people have been vanishing to what comes after the city, as new arrivals report a worldwide pandemic of a virus that kills within 24 hours, nicknamed "The Blinks."
The other story concerns Laura Byrd, a wildlife specialist working for Coca-Cola in the Antartic, and quite possibly the last person alive in the world, as she struggles to survive and find shelter and a functioning radio to contact the outside world--assuming there's an outside world to contact. Her story compliments the stories of those still left in the City, as it both gives clues as to how she knows them and helps to show the state the living world is in, where the threat of terrorism is omnipresent and Coca-Cola owns one third of Antartica.
I really liked the chapters set in the City. Th first, which deals with the City as a whole, goes from person to person, giving a very powerful image of the City as a whole. It works very well as an introduction to the rest of the book, which makes sense, as it was originally a seperate short story. All of the other chapters in the City focus on one particular character, showing how they see the City and the situation that they're in with only one person still alive in the world. The City itself seems so interesting and unique that I found myself constantly interested in learning more about it.
I was less impressed with the Laura Byrd chapters. They were well-written, and Laura is an interesting character, but she's really the only character we see in them, aside from flashbacks. Really, they're a survival story, which, although it's a good survival story, is just not quite as interesting as exploring the City was. However, it is more a case of the City chapters being so good as opposed to the Laura chapters being bad.
I would have liked perhaps one more chapter each of the City and Laura chapters (or at least one more City chapter), as they both have somewhat ambiguous endings, but their endings do work as is. It's really more a function of me being so fascinated with some of the mysteries of the City that I wanted to learn more and more.
All in all, this was a wondrous and wonderful book that's thoughtful, exciting, and very well written. Everyone should read this book if they can.
Sunday, August 9, 2009
Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town
I purchased this book 2 years ago because the blurb on the back was so weird. IT described the main character as having a father who's a mountain and a mother who's a washing machine. I was so intrigued that I bought it, and after reading it, it lives up to the promise of its blurb.
The main character,most commonly known as Alan, does indeed have a mountain in northern Canada for a father and a washing machine for a mother. He also has an equally odd assortment of brothers: a fortuneteller, an island, a dead man, and a set of three nesting dolls. However, Alan left when he was 18 and went south to Toronto. As the book opens, he's about 40 and has run a series of businesses that people remember fondly. At the start of the novel he's bought a house and plans to settle down to write a story. However, complications arise, as they always do.
There are essentially two stories interwoven in "Someone Comes to Town." The first deals with Alan's younger brother Davey, who Alan and his other brothers murdered in revenge for a terrible crime Davey committed. However, Davey didn't stay dead, and he's come back to get his vengeance on his brothers, most especially Alan. Alan also has to deal with the strangeness of himself, and try to discover just what is he. The discovery that his next door neighbor Mimi, a twentysomething young woman, has wings sheds some clues.
The other story thread, which Doctorow seems much more interested in, deals with a partnership between Alan and a thirty-year-old punk named Kurt to set up a free wireless network all across Toronto. They do this by building access points out of junked computer parts scavenged by street kids, which they then distribute to businesses to put on their roofs. Although the conflict between Alan and Davey is interesting, and exactly what Alan and his kin are is a fascinating mystery, Doctorow makes Alan and Kurt's quest to set up their wireless network the more exciting part of the book, and therefore the stuff about Davey and Alan's past seems like a distraction.
This is the one main flaw of the book: we are given Alan's unique and interesting background and the story of his early life, but not a lot was done with it. I frankly wanted to see more weird people who are not quite human, but aside from Mimi all we have are Alan and members of his family. I was OK with what they are being ambiguous and something of an unsolved mystery, I just wanted more to be done with it.
However, everything else was well done. Doctorow conjures up a very unique fantasy tale with Alan's background, and I loved reading it. Although I'm not a techie and a lot of the details went over my head, I loved the wireless story. Doctorow even acknowledges that it's all rather technical, as several times characters remark that they don't fully understand the plan. But the passion of the story demonstrates that this is something that Doctorow really cares about. I wasn't expecting to get excited about a story about creating a wireless network, but oh boy was that what happened.
The book is extremely well-written. The characters leap off the page and all of them seem fully formed and complicated, even Davey, who's basically pure evil. The plot is fast paced and I found myself zooming along quite easily. Doctorow also manages to pull off something quite tricky: Alan and each of his brothers, because of their odd upbringing, do not have a single name, but are instead known by a flurry of names all starting with the same letter. Alan, for example, is also referred to as Albert, Ari, Abraham, and the like. It could have been confuising but it ends up being pretty cool.
Aside from a lack of development of some of the weirder parts of the story and an attempt at a twist ending that suffers from being delivered too close to the end, "Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town" is a really cool book, and I'd recommend it to anyone looking for something unique
The main character,most commonly known as Alan, does indeed have a mountain in northern Canada for a father and a washing machine for a mother. He also has an equally odd assortment of brothers: a fortuneteller, an island, a dead man, and a set of three nesting dolls. However, Alan left when he was 18 and went south to Toronto. As the book opens, he's about 40 and has run a series of businesses that people remember fondly. At the start of the novel he's bought a house and plans to settle down to write a story. However, complications arise, as they always do.
There are essentially two stories interwoven in "Someone Comes to Town." The first deals with Alan's younger brother Davey, who Alan and his other brothers murdered in revenge for a terrible crime Davey committed. However, Davey didn't stay dead, and he's come back to get his vengeance on his brothers, most especially Alan. Alan also has to deal with the strangeness of himself, and try to discover just what is he. The discovery that his next door neighbor Mimi, a twentysomething young woman, has wings sheds some clues.
The other story thread, which Doctorow seems much more interested in, deals with a partnership between Alan and a thirty-year-old punk named Kurt to set up a free wireless network all across Toronto. They do this by building access points out of junked computer parts scavenged by street kids, which they then distribute to businesses to put on their roofs. Although the conflict between Alan and Davey is interesting, and exactly what Alan and his kin are is a fascinating mystery, Doctorow makes Alan and Kurt's quest to set up their wireless network the more exciting part of the book, and therefore the stuff about Davey and Alan's past seems like a distraction.
This is the one main flaw of the book: we are given Alan's unique and interesting background and the story of his early life, but not a lot was done with it. I frankly wanted to see more weird people who are not quite human, but aside from Mimi all we have are Alan and members of his family. I was OK with what they are being ambiguous and something of an unsolved mystery, I just wanted more to be done with it.
However, everything else was well done. Doctorow conjures up a very unique fantasy tale with Alan's background, and I loved reading it. Although I'm not a techie and a lot of the details went over my head, I loved the wireless story. Doctorow even acknowledges that it's all rather technical, as several times characters remark that they don't fully understand the plan. But the passion of the story demonstrates that this is something that Doctorow really cares about. I wasn't expecting to get excited about a story about creating a wireless network, but oh boy was that what happened.
The book is extremely well-written. The characters leap off the page and all of them seem fully formed and complicated, even Davey, who's basically pure evil. The plot is fast paced and I found myself zooming along quite easily. Doctorow also manages to pull off something quite tricky: Alan and each of his brothers, because of their odd upbringing, do not have a single name, but are instead known by a flurry of names all starting with the same letter. Alan, for example, is also referred to as Albert, Ari, Abraham, and the like. It could have been confuising but it ends up being pretty cool.
Aside from a lack of development of some of the weirder parts of the story and an attempt at a twist ending that suffers from being delivered too close to the end, "Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town" is a really cool book, and I'd recommend it to anyone looking for something unique
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
More Information than You Require
"More Information Than You Require" by John Hodgman is Hodgman's continuation of his previous book, "The Areas of My Expertise." Like "Areas", "More" is a book of fake trivia, with Hosdman covering in this book the lives of the presidents, the societies of the mole men, and a weird weather war between Richmond, VA and Milwaukee, WI, amongst a variety of other subjects. To emphasize that "More" is a continuation rather than a mere sequel, the book's page numbers start where the previous book's end, and there are many footnotes back to the previous book.
In addition to its regular collection of fake facts on how to divine the future from a pig's spleen and Teddy Roosevelt's many superhuman acts, each page is also assigned a day of the year, starting with October 21st (when the book is officially published), and we are given a fake factoid for something that supposedly happened that day.
A lot of people that I talked to while I was reading this couldn't get over the whole "fake" part of the fake trivia book. They seemed to think it was weird and a little pointless to read. I whole-heartedly disagree with that: not only are many of the things Hodgman writes funny, but he manages to create an alternate US, one slightly more fascinating than our own, where presidents secretly have hooks for hands, the Declaration of Independance was inspired by mole men, and that a secret lab at Yakle has been secretly performing horrific experiments on cats for decades. And not only that, oftentimes Hodgman will show his nerd cred with a throwaway reference to the Lord of the Rings trilogy, "No Exit", or the Harry Potter books.
All in all, I liked it. However, oftentimes chapters dragged on a bit, and sometimes individual essays did too. I liked the content of the list of 700 molemen, but after bout 200 I was a bit tuckered out. I also disliked the constant footnoting to other pages, including ones of "Areas." I would have preferred Hodgman had merely summarised useful inforamation from his previous book again. But these are all fiarly minor complaints.
Even though it's an odd book and not for everyone, "More Information Than You Require" is a fun and funny book. I enjoyed it a lot and I look forward to Hidgman''s next and final book in "The Areas of my Expertise." I recommend it to you if you consider yourself a nerd or are a fan of extremely surreal and dry humor.
In addition to its regular collection of fake facts on how to divine the future from a pig's spleen and Teddy Roosevelt's many superhuman acts, each page is also assigned a day of the year, starting with October 21st (when the book is officially published), and we are given a fake factoid for something that supposedly happened that day.
A lot of people that I talked to while I was reading this couldn't get over the whole "fake" part of the fake trivia book. They seemed to think it was weird and a little pointless to read. I whole-heartedly disagree with that: not only are many of the things Hodgman writes funny, but he manages to create an alternate US, one slightly more fascinating than our own, where presidents secretly have hooks for hands, the Declaration of Independance was inspired by mole men, and that a secret lab at Yakle has been secretly performing horrific experiments on cats for decades. And not only that, oftentimes Hodgman will show his nerd cred with a throwaway reference to the Lord of the Rings trilogy, "No Exit", or the Harry Potter books.
All in all, I liked it. However, oftentimes chapters dragged on a bit, and sometimes individual essays did too. I liked the content of the list of 700 molemen, but after bout 200 I was a bit tuckered out. I also disliked the constant footnoting to other pages, including ones of "Areas." I would have preferred Hodgman had merely summarised useful inforamation from his previous book again. But these are all fiarly minor complaints.
Even though it's an odd book and not for everyone, "More Information Than You Require" is a fun and funny book. I enjoyed it a lot and I look forward to Hidgman''s next and final book in "The Areas of my Expertise." I recommend it to you if you consider yourself a nerd or are a fan of extremely surreal and dry humor.
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