Cool, Calm & Contentious

By Merrill Markoe
Villard, $24.00, 270 pages

Cool, Calm, & Contentious is a collection of essays by Emmy award winning comedy writer, Merrill Markoe, sharing personal moments, which include not only comedy and laughter, but also heartbreak and pain. The essay subjects are randomly diverse. She is painfully honest and nails certain stereotypes with zinging clarity, yet the book is slow moving and boring at times.

The beauty of an essay collection is skipping to the next story. Each reader may find different essays more or less engaging. One essay written by the dog, so to speak, just didn’t keep me reading. And yes, I am a dog lover. The essays exploring narcissism are painfully accurate for anyone familiar with these traits. I think fans of Merrill Markoe will find the book enjoyable as she shares deeply personal experiences that shaped who she is today. This is not however a comedic collection of essays, but a collection of eccentric musings that are at times laugh out loud funny although sometimes miss the mark.

Reviewed by Julie Finley

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Would It Kill You to Stop Doing That?: A Modern Guide to Manners

By Henry Alford
Twelve, $24.99, 242 pages

Henry Alford calls himself an investigative humorist and it’s easy to see why in his latest book Would it Kill You to Stop Doing That?: A Modern Guide to Manners . The subject is good manners and Alford covers it with a sly wit that finds humor in even the most difficult circumstances. He takes his research seriously, going so far as to travel to Japan- the bastion of etiquette (sneezing in public is frowned upon). Back in America he picked the brains of Judith Martin (Miss Manners) and Tim Gunn (Gunn’s Golden Rules) and offered online etiquette advice service to friends, all before considering himself ready to write this book.

Would it Kill You is not only interesting but outright funny. By the book’s end you want to meet the author and it comes as no surprise that he volunteers as a NYC ‘greeter’ for foreign visitors; he’s that charming and engaging. However, while it covers, in broad strokes, some of the etiquette issues we now face (Blackberry abuse, uncontrolled toddlers in public places) this is not a comprehensive reference guide to etiquette nor is it supposed to be. Rather it’s is a warm, funny book that looks at the foibles of one man in his journey to help the rest of mankind be more polite.

Reviewed by Catherine Gilmore,

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How’s That Underling Thing Working Out for You?

By Scott Adams
Andrews McMeel Publishing, $12.99, 128 pages

Scott Adams has been hilarious for so long making fun of big business it is a wonder he can keep the jokes coming. His daily column in the newspaper continues to be poignant in whatever business cycle we’re in. In the early 90’s this reviewer went back to school to earn a Master’s degree in business and even then Adams was making fun of the very stuff we were studying. Catch phrases like paradigm shift, cross discipline management, bench mark tests, empowerment and strategic planning regularly showed up in his work. In this book he takes on the latest social media phase poking fun at social engineering, FaceBook, Twitter and the Integration Layer. Although this book is very entertaining it is hard even for someone like Scott Adams to keep hitting home runs with every publication. As businesses continue to change to meet the future challenges, Adams can look forward to a steady source of material in the years to come. For those that would like to see what the latest doings are in the world of Dilbert and his fellow characters, I heartily suggest you read this book.

Reviewed by Brian Taylor

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Ghoul: A Dark and Humorous Look at Collection Agencies

By Bob Gage
Pikeminnow Publishing, 11.95, 96 pages

As an industry veteran, Bob Gage’s self-aware and often times entertaining look at the ugly underbelly of collection agencies introduces us to the faceless ghoul: that washed-up, angry guy who calls your home at least once a day, every day, to hound you for money. The ghoul in Gage’s view isn’t your ordinary bill collector—he (or she) is a highly predictable, highly volatile machine—programmed to do one thing, and one thing only: threaten/harass/scare you into handing over cash. Gage provides insight into ways to “beat” the ghoul, including explanations of rules and laws around what a bill collector can and can’t legally get away with doing or saying.

Ghoul—bill collector run akom; syn. the bill collector, the essence of collections, where souls are lost.

While Ghoul is revealing in some ways, it lacks substance as a true non-fiction book: this is not a collection agency tell-all. Rather, Gage pokes fun at the industry, and uses inline commentary to make the book a quick, light-hearted read, with a few great nuggets of important information scattered throughout. Gage doesn’t take his chosen profession too seriously, and the reader shouldn’t take the title of the book too seriously, either.

Reviewed by Alexandra Walford

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You Don’t Know Sh*t

By Doug Mayer, Val Stori, Tod Van Jahnes
St. Martin’s Press, $12.99, 214 pages

Everybody poops- we all know this. We have pooped as long as there has been a person around to do it. We poop at home, we poop in public. We poop on travel, in the ocean and even in space. But there is so much that we don’t know about it because it has become unspeakable and taboo to talk about. You Don’t Know Sh*t is a humorous look at the natural body process of pooping. The book was quite enjoyable as it moves along at a fast pace. The book is extremely informative and injected with humor throughout, which keeps you entertained through the more awkward aspects of pooping. You may wind up knowing more about poo than you ever thought possible; however, the information is interesting. While the book is a bit graphic about a few of the dirtier sides of poop, there is typically sufficient warning of descriptive facts to come. So if you’re curious about poop, and frankly, who isn’t, then this is the book for you.

Reviewed by Rachel J. Richards

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Let’s Pretend this Never Happened

By Jenny Lawson
Putnam, $25.95, 224 pages

Jenny Lawson writes the enormously popular blog “The Bloggess”. She’s now taken the life experiences that have made her blog entertaining and turned them into a memoir that is both frighteningly bizarre and uproariously funny – not two traits you expect to find in the same book. The subtitle for Let’s Pretend This Never Happened is “A Mostly True Memoir” and this reviewer clung to that fact as certain episodes are so fantastical they can only be the work of an imaginative (and slightly deranged) mind. Phenomena like a dead squirrel used as a hand puppet, chupacabra, a killer pug, the zombie apocalypse and agoraphobia are all parts of Lawson’s life she’s happy to relate for your entertainment. And you will be entertained.

While this memoir is utterly unique in its style it can also get exhausting to read. Lawson’s mind appears to work at warp speed and is often fueled by extreme anxiety and OCD. It is her self-deprecating humor that keeps the reader engaged. That, and the fact that you can’t believe all of this could have happened to one person. The law of averages makes it highly unlikely but this reviewer is not going to call her on it. One, because it made for good reading and two, I’m a little afraid of her. Disclaimer: Lawson loves the ‘f’ word. That and frequent use of explicit anatomical language. If either of those are a problem you should avoid this book like a tetanus shot. If not, read and prepare to laugh out loud in public places even if you’re alone.

Reviewed by Catherine Gilmore,

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The Playbook: Suit Up, Score Chicks, Be Awesome

By Barney Stinson with Matt Kuhn
Touchstone, $13.00, 142 pages

Ever wondered just how How I Met Your Mother’s Barney Stinson gets all of his women? Ever seen Barney use a play and ask yourself “How can I do that?” Your answer is here, dear reader, in The Playbook.

Barney Stinson, with the help of author Matt Kuhn, puts every play you would ever need directly in your hands. With plays for everyone, from beginners to the advanced, and even a play for women (“Requirements: Two X Chromosomes.”), The Playbook can increase your ability to pick up a woman from the first play on. Stinson and Kuhn have partnered together to boost the self-esteem of men everywhere and give women a reason to stay in at night. So if you’re looking for a few tips, or a good laugh, check out The Playbook. Every fan of How I Met Your Mother will enjoy reading Stinson and Kuhn’s book immensely.

Melissa Boles

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More Badder Grammar!

by Sharon Eliza Nichols

St. Martin’s Press, $9.99, 118 pages

The problem with looking for bad grammar is that you will find it far too easily. Sharon Nichols found 150 misuses of grammar and compiled them into this collection. Divided into ten sections, More Badder Grammar! lays out the errors for your entertainment and edification, all in the hopes that you will learn from other people’s mistakes and not repeat what you see here.

This book would have been far more entertaining if the grammar mistakes were bigger and more varied. Rather than finding mistakes in major magazines or television programs, it focused on small businesses and other locations that you would be unlikely to encounter, even if you lived in areas where the mistakes showed up. Worse, it seems to concentrate on misplaced apostrophes; it would have been better to have seen a wider variety of typographical errors than just a few variations on a quickly exhausted theme, especially given how relatively few samples were shown. This book could have been a lot better.

Jamais Jochim

The Second Book of General Ignorance: Everything You Think You Know Is (Still) Wrong

by John Lloyd & John Mitchinson

Crown, $19.95, 352 pages

Why does anyone bother going to school when some of what they learn is wrong anyway? With the worldwide success of the original Book of General Ignorance, authors John Lloyd and John Mitchinson are back again with The Second Book of General Ignorance. This sequel contains 187 simple, perfectly obvious questions you’ll be certain you already know the answers to. Fill up your brain with facts, trivia, and fascinating information that is perfect to impress people with at dinner parties or to use to win a game of Jeopardy.

How many arms does an octopus have? Eight, right? Actually, only two. Marine biologists have discovered that the animals use only two back tentacles to propel themselves through the water, leaving the remaining six for feeding. Did you know sharks don’t actually need to smell blood to know you are there? They have the ability to register faint electrical fields generated by all living bodies. Within each entry are even more questions and answers.

Lloyd and Mitchinson write with wit and humor. Pick your favorite subject: history, geography, medicine, common wisdom, science, literature, sports, languages, or the classics – facts about all are included, and you’ll be shocked to realize how much you don’t know.

Kathryn Franklin

The Family Fang: A Novel

by Kevin Wilson

ECCO, $23.99, 310 pages

Buster and Annie Fang, as children, were half of a family of performance artists who create chaos and mayhem for the experience it provides. Their parents, Caleb and Camille, would take them to random places and set up a scenario to enact rage or shock or horror from passersby. As adults, Buster and Annie find themselves unable to function in life and both end up back at home and living with their parents.

If you are looking for a funny, insightful, and bittersweet book, look no further than The Family Fang. The story of the Fangs is intriguing from the first word and becomes more interesting as the story progresses. The characters are delightfully written and complex. This is particularly true of Annie and Buster, who are the primary focus of the novel. The author nicely shows their struggle to break free from their family patterns but their difficulty and reluctance to actually be truly free. This is a truly wonderful book to read.

Barbara Cothern