Rating:  -
Bought the book based on JH's very funny peformances on the Daily Show, but found it dull. The introduction and personal background lead to high expectations, which are quickly dashed in a series of tedious charts and unfunny lists. 700 hobo names? Making fun of hockey hair? Please. You may find the occasional nugget, but each is buried in layers of tedium. Pass on this one.
Rating:  -
Though a little excessive at times (700 hobo names!?), TAoME is quite funny, frequently. Based on JH's work on the John Stuart Show, I might otherwise have expected as much. The reason I was pleasantly surprised to find myself chuckling a lot as I read TAoME is because of another relatively recent read: an anthology of humor pieces of McSweeny's magazine, to which JH had been a contributor. That book was quite possibly the unfunniest anthology of humorous writings I have ever read (quite possibly the only one, too). JH's humor, per his work on the John Stuart Show, is of the dry, wry, eggheaded sort. Generally not side-splitting, but pretty routinely side-shaking. I don't suppose I'll be rushing out to pick up JH's next book, but I probably will give it a read some day. Fun stuff!
Rating:  -
This book is supremely entertaining! I first "read" it as a free audiobook download on iTunes, then quickly went out to purchase a hard copy of it. I thoroughly enjoyed the humor that was exactly to my taste. It's not for everyone, however. I strongly recommend you buy this book if you enjoy a bit of sarcasm and wit.
Rating: -
I felt a tingling sensation in my brain after reading this book...
But as the eminently wise Mr. Hodgman explains, this is a natural result of acquiring knowledge from his pamphlet tome. There are some psedu-truths that you won't find in any other book: The Hobo Wars of the 1930s, the 51st state (no, not Canada), the skinny on the Lochness Monster, among others. I just wouldn't recommend this book for those studying for the US immigration test. There may not be a single fact contained within it...but it contains a factiness far deeper than what mere facts can possibly impart. Stuff yer brain. Get this book! Let the man drop soome knowledge on y'all.
Rating: -
I just re-read this, since I a) got this for Christmas and b) got the follow-up and wanted to re-read this first just in case there were callbacks. (There are.) I remembered enjoying this; I had forgotten, though, just how gleefully silly, deranged, and bizarre Hodgman's humor often is, made all the more hilarious by his deadpan prose. (I would imagine that the audiobook version of this, with his cadence and delivery, would be genius.) I understand that Hodgman's tongue-in-cheek, dry wit isn't for everyone, but as you get into his anarchic, surreal, twisted world, the result is side-splittingly funny all the way through, from the secret history of hoboes to the hook-handed presidents and beyond. I've read this twice now, and found it hilarious both times. On to More Information Than You Require, which I couldn't be more excited for.
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