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[[Category:New Reviews|Trivia]]==Trivia==__NOTOC__{{newreview|author=Mikael Krogerus and Roman Tschappeler|title=The Question Book|rating=4.5|genre=Lifestyle|summary=Most of us have probably made at least one of those end<!--ofRemove -the-year lists of the best books, albums and parties we have been to in the previous twelve months. But can you, with some effort, locate the one you made in 1987? Have you ever constructed a graph of your ups and downs in a given period, and then decided to expand it by separating emotional, intellectual, sexual and financial aspects and colour coding them? Have you made a list of all your lovers, bosses or friends and then rated them from 1 to 10 on several dimensions each? Do you have one of the books that list ''100 things to do before you die'' or ''500 books to read in your life'' (and ticked off the ones you have done)? Did you ever spend a whole evening and half of a night filling in dubious 'personality' questionnaires on the Internet? Have you ever doodled something, decided that it beautifully expresses the deepest essence of your personality and then proceeded to draw such icons for all your friends? >|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846685389</amazonuk!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->}} {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Francesca Simon1780724047|title=Horrid Henry's A - Z Dictionary of Everything HorridInteresting and Important Dogs|author=Peter J Conradi
|rating=4
|genre=Confident ReadersPets|summary=Francesca SimonI struggle to resist a book about dogs, but I did wonder why this one was so ''thin'': given that I's Horrid Henry is ve never encountered a very popular little boydog who wasn't interesting or important - and probably both, although you might have I was expecting a different opinion if you actually had to put up with his antics yourselfmassive tome. But ''A slightly modernised embodiment Dictionary of 'slugs Interesting and snails and puppy dogsImportant Dogs' tails' concept of boyhood, Henry is naughtiness personified, combining irreverence for authority with actually ''a huge dose rich compendium of gross-out crude humour that really appeals to the target readership of early primary school childrenworld's most significant and beloved dogs'' and it's certainly a rich treasure trove. Add a somewhat nostalgicWe begin with Peter J Conradi's four collies: Cloudy, timeless feel, trademark alliterations, subtle (Sky. Bradley and not so subtle) digs at family dynamicsMax. They're consecutive rather than simultaneous dogs, sibling rivalry but what comes over is Conradi's love for each and particularly at modern middle-class manners and sensibilities and you have a winning character and a base for a very successful edutainment franchiseevery one of them. I knew that I was in safe hands.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444002260</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mark ForsythDon Behrend|title=The Etymologicon|rating=5|genre=Trivia|summary=I like wordsCopernicus! What Have You Done?: . Words are awesome. End of. But I also like trivia. I like knowing things that perhaps other people don’t, and helpfully passing on this knowledge to them. So a book about word-related trivia is just a win-win, and this one is so good I think we’ll have to call it a win-win-win.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848313071</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Philip Ardagh|title=Philip Ardagh's Book of Kings, Queens, Emperors and Rotten Wart-Nosed CommonersOther Interesting Questions|rating=34.5|genre=Children's Non-Fiction|summary=If you deem a good children's historical trivia book to be one that tells you, the adult, something they didn't know about historical trivia, then this is a good example. I didn't know George V broke his pelvis when his horse fell on him, startled by some post-WWI huzzahs. I didn't know Charles VI of France nearly got torched in some drunken bacchanal. The length of time Charlemagne sat on a throne (over 400 whole years (even if he wasn't wholly whole all that time)) was news to me, as was the raffle that was held (more or less) for being the unknown soldier. Therefore this is a good book for children and the adults willing to instill some historical trivia into them.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330471732</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jolyon Fenwick and Marcus Husselby|title=It Could Have Been Yours: The enlightened person's guide to the year's most desirable things|rating=4
|genre=Trivia
|summary=In a world of diamond-encrusted skulls, gold-leafed iPhones and luxury yachts ten a penny, of blingy shit (or should that Hello! Would this review be shitty bling?) itokay if I simply said 's a relief to know people are still spending money on unique one-offs that are more worthwhile. The records for costliest photo, artwork, musical instrument and manuscript have all been broken in the twenty four months leading up to this book's releaseI LOVED THIS GLORIOUS LITTLE BOOK AND SO WILL YOU. Our collators have scoured the press for those and other, similarly noteworthy auctions, and found what other people paid for what you didnFIN't know you would have wanted given the money.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846684900</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Stephanie Pain|title=Farmer Buckley's Exploding Trousers|rating=4?! Because I did.5|genre=Popular Science|summary=The history of science is filled with many miraculous discoveries. ...It's also filled with exploding trousers, self-experimentation, a coachman's leg that becomes a museum piece and gas-powered radios. ''Farmer Buckley's Exploding Trousers'' regales us with fifty odd events on the way to scientific discovery. Part popular science book, part trivia, each article is a treat to read, either as a fun-sized nugget, or when reading from cover to coverAnd you will.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846685087</amazonuk>1789016770
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Peter GillLloyd_1423|title=42 - Douglas Adams' Amazingly Accurate Answer 1,423 QI Facts to LifeBowl You Over|author=John Lloyd, the Universe James Harkin and EverythingAnne Miller
|rating=5
|genre=Trivia
|summary=A common question about Douglas Adams’ famous Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy You may think me lazy, but there is just why Adams chose the number 42 an inherent satisfaction for book reviewers in hitting upon a book such as the answer to lifethis – you know you will have very little bearing on its sales, the universe and everything. In what's more you hardly even need describe it – just dip in here and there for a charming trivia bookfew quotes, author Peter Gill takes 50 pages or so to look into and sit back and relax knowing your job is done. ''Only 1% of people who buy marmalade are under the story age of 28. Treadmills were once the book and harshest form of punishment after the author and another 250 to find occurrences of 42 in death penalty. Naked mole-rats can survive for 18 minutes without oxygen by turning themselves into plants.'' And the worlds whole of sportpage 52. There, crime, science job done – and a wide range the creators of other fieldsthis book certainly have done their job to perfection.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907616128</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Christopher WinnBrightside_101|title=I Never Knew That About the River Thames|rating=4.5|genre=Trivia|summary=Here are the remains of the building that could be said 101 Things to have sired two important British royal dynasties. Here is Take the place Stress Out of ill-repute, where 'Rule Britannia' was premiered, and which also bizarrely saw a death by cricket ball that inspired the most famous gardens in the world. Here too is the largest lion in the world. To where am I referring? Well the answer is either the Thames valley, or this very book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091933579</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewChristmas|author=Mick O'Hare|title=Why Can't Elephants Jump?Robin Snow|rating=4.5|genre=Popular Science|summary=Well? Why can't elephants jump? And while you're pondering that, think about why James Bond wanted his martini shaken, not stirred. Why is frozen milk yellow? Does eating bogeys do you any harm? What's the hole for in a ballpoint pen? How long a line could you draw with a single pencil? For answers to all these questions, and so many more, then do yourself a favour and pick up the latest collection from the New Scientist's [http://www.last-word.com/ Last Word column]. Mick O'Hare was also kind enough to be [[The Interview: Bookbag Talks To Mick O'Hare|interviewed by Bookbag]].|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184668398X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Phil Cousineau|title=Wordcatcher: An Odyssey into the World of Weird and Wonderful Words|rating=3.5
|genre=Trivia
|summary=I formed a new, close friendship recently, and For many years one of my guiding principles has been that the first things I subtly dropped into things was C word should not be mentioned until the fact that I might use a different dictionary beginning of December but, unfortunately, C seems to other people. Probably be coming earlier each year and there was a subconscious thought forming that are even shops where it would never ceases to be better to make it knownimminent, in case I trod on any toeswhich ramps up the stress levels considerably. So, said anything that didn't go down quite as well as I had planned. But that's nothing compared a book which promises 101 things to what Phil Cousineau has done here, for he has written his own dictionary, and got it published in take the stress out of C seemed like a very nice, glossy, browsable formgood idea. Alright, What’s it's nothing about? Tips like putting the sprouts on to boil in November or joining a complete dictionaryreligion which avoids the celebration altogether? Well, but everything is here in his own personal style - 250 main words, definitions, derivations and examples of use. Oh, and some modern-ish artworks as wellnot quite.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1573444006</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John AndrewsBrightside_Worry|title=The Economist Book 101 Things to do instead of Ismsworrying about the world|author=Felicity Brightside
|rating=4
|genre=Trivia
|summary=Idon'm assuming all readers t think that I've ever been quite so worried about the state of this book, and this review, will know the meanings world as I have been of late - and I speak as someone who lived through the words racism, atheism Cuban Missile Crisis and Communismvarious other apocalyptic moments. But how about Orphism? Nestorianism? Vorticism? Or the exact difference between egoism, egotism, and egocentrism? I'll confess It almost certainly comes down to ignorance on all a lack of that second trio of words before reading this book, but was fascinated to find out what they were. (Orphism is a religion originating confidence in 6th or 7th century BC Greece based on the poems of Orpheuspeople who are supposedly in charge, who returned whether it be from Hades. I'll leave you to find out the definitions a political point of the other two yourself!) Similarly, I was aware view or of all three our stewardship of that final trilogy, but am not sure I even knew there ''this planet we call home. But what can be done about it? We'was''' a differenceve tried voting, let alone that Iarguing and demonstrating. Now we'd have come close re down to being able pulling up the drawbridge and doing our best to actually define them all as this volume doesthink about something else.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846682983</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Susie DentLloyd 1342|title=How to Talk Like a Local: From Cockney to Geordie1,342 QI Facts To Leave You Flabbergasted|author=John Lloyd, John Mitchinson, a National CompanionJames Harkin and Anne Miller|rating=4.5
|genre=Trivia
|summary=Meeting I love the way the QI elves play games with us with [[:Category:John Lloyd, John Mitchinson and James Harkin|these books]]. That's not to say it's a grammersow game of pulling the wool over our eyes, for every entrant in a netty this series has had the equivalent online version for the sources, so every page is more common than replicated with the due links you might think - Ineed to search for proof of their statements. No, the game is Six Degrees of Separation. And they'd put my revits on re so good at it, they can do most things in three. Having a neb around these pages I So in just three standalone, but thematically linked, phrases, you can find many different ways get from how to make the sound of an Orc army for ''Lord of saying the above, as well Rings'' films to record- or should that be boco waysbreaking nipple hair. But before this review comes out as complete cag-magFrom illicit wartime barbers in Italy to American founding father bedroom arrangements, I'd better say this book is just as you'd expect only three steps – and the path carries on to reach that erstwhile novice stand- an amenableup, Ronald Reagan, approachable but intelligent look at regional idiom in two more. It's only two jumps between Donald Trump and slangCharles Darwin, in A-Z dictionary formdisconcertingly.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905211791</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Derrick NiedermanLloyd_1411|title=Number Freak: A Mathematical Compendium from 1 to 200,411 QI Facts To Knock You Sideways|author=John Lloyd, John Mitchinson and James Harkin
|rating=4.5
|genre=Trivia
|summary=Signs are everywhereHandsome is as handsome does. I wasnAnd you know what else benefits from being curt and succinct, alongside old housewives't really saws like that one of those who ? Trivia. I always thought our roads were littered with too many traffic signs until the day I was driven past a pair of speed regulation signs, positioned at the exit end of a QI books such as this one-way street but facing the illegal way up it. Not all signs, of course, are quite as unnecessaryto be handsome things – perfectly presenting trivia, or indeed as blatantly visiblefour (on rare occasion, which is where this pictorial guide three) statements to countless coded messagesthe page, signifiers and other similar factoids comes ina very nice little cubical hardback. Now they're being represented in paperback, but you know what? They're still handsome things.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340994487</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Matt Allen Lloyd_1339|title=Where Are They Now? - Rediscovering Over 100 Football Stars of the 70s 1,339 QI Facts To Make Your Jaw Drop|author=John Lloyd, John Mitchinson and 80s James Harkin
|rating=4.5
|genre=Trivia
|summary=Once youA spermologer ''ve done all the hard work (written a book, found a publisher, decided on is a design for the cover and all those things), one collector of the remaining difficulties must be deciding who you should dedicate the tome to. Assuming ittrivia's no Oscar speech, and you can't thank the world and his dog, you have to narrow it down somewhat and select . Just that special person whose name wins pride of place on the first page. Do sentence tells you then go with something cryptic and intriguing, or apparently banal and blatantly obvious? I'm sure most readers dona lot – we't even look at the dedications re once more in most books, but if you did, would you understand the significance realm of them? Would something saying ''To my wife'' make you look twicethe curt, or would that seem like a reasonably common way succinct approach to dedicate a book? In the world''Once Agains information and oddities. It says more, To Zelda'' you can discover however – beyond the stories you don't know behind weirdness of the stories you may well, as word is the author delves into the detail behind ''Fifty Great Dedications''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330511351</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Mick O'Hare|title=How To Make A Tornado|rating=4|genre=Popular Science|summary=Another year, another must-read book from obvious necessity for the New Scientist. We've been here before with [[Do Polar Bears Get Lonely? by Mick O'Hare|polar bears]], [[Why Don't Penguins' Feet Freeze? by Mick O'Hare|penguins]] and [[How To Fossilise Your Hamster by Mick O'Hare|hamsters]]. Now it's time to turn our attention to how word to make a tornado, and all the other crazy experiments exist – without people that scientists have done over could be called collectors of trivia you would not need the yearsterm.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846682878</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=David O'DohertyAnd rest assured, Claudia O'Doherty and Mike Ahern|title=100 Facts About Pandas|rating=3.5|genre=Humour|summary=Sometimes the title says it all - this is a book with 100 facts about pandas. Sometimes you need to note there are currently few people that stand as better spermologers than the author too - David O'Doherty won an Edinburgh Comedy Award, so this is a book of a 100 silly and untrue facts about pandaschief QI elves.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224086324</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Vivian Cook Metcalf_Skedaddle|title=It's All in a WordFrom Skedaddle to Selfie: Words of the Generation|author=Allan Metcalf
|rating=3.5
|genre=Trivia
|summary=AhI have to go a roundabout way to introduce this book, the English languageso bear with me. That sine qua non, It stems partly from dictionaries and the prima facie lingua franca etymology of the world. Prima inter pares when it comes to taking influence and words language we use, but more so if anything from other tonguesa different couple of books, and responding in kind, to the chagrin their ideas of the Frenchgenerations. We The authors of those posited the idea that all use itthose archetypical generations – the Baby Boomers, the Millennials, and those before, in this day between and age we can update an internet dictionary overnight to absorb all the neologismssince – have their own cyclical pattern, like "iPhone"; we can put and the entire output history of an author into a computer humanity has been and it will count every word use up so we can find a fingerprint be formed by the interplay of a writer's stylejust four different kinds, running (with only one exception) in regular order. ItI don's a never-endingt really hold much store by that, fluid, changing entityand I certainly didn't know we'd started one since the Millennials – who the heck decides such things, for better or worse.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846680069</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Tadg Farrington|title=The Average Life of the Average Person|rating=5|genre=Popular Science|summary=Back in school, we would often bemoan the idea of one? 'average', saying that like being Somebody must have put out an order'normal', if there were such a thing, who would even want to be it? There could be nothing worse, we thought, than being averageas someone here says of something else. Except...there is But in the same way as generations get defined by definition collective persons unknown, so do words – and those words are certainly a whole lot worse than 'average' – the exact same amount that is better than averageclue to what was important, predominant and of course spoken in fact. And that was the problemeach decade.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224086235</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Robin LauranceHalliday_Cathedrals|title=Just What I Always Wanted: Unwrapping the World's Most Curious Birthday PresentsCathedrals and Abbeys (Amazing and Extraordinary Facts)|author=Stephen Halliday
|rating=4.5
|genre=Trivia
|summary=Is there anything more suited to What makes a trivia book, yet so much thought overcathedral? It's not automatically the principal church of anywhere that is made a city – St Davids is a village of 2, 000 people and serious, than the birthday present? It might be something completely throw-awaywasn't always a city, but mean always had a lot to the receivercathedral, as did Chelmsford. It might have cost 's not the giver an awful amount seat of moneya bishop – Glasgow has the building but not the person, and be disregarded by the person expected to accept ithasn't had a bishop since 1690. And It's not a minster – that's something completely different, and if you think can understand the sign in the delightful Beverley Minster describing the difference, that I saw only the givings other month, you're a better man I, Gunga Din. Luckily this book doesn't touch on minsters much, and takings we can understand abbeys, so it's only the vast majority of this book that is saddled with the rich definition problem. It's clearly not a real problem, and famous those it does have are sheer triviaby-passable, just think about the number for this successfully defines a cathedral as somewhere of sociologists major importance, fine trivia and historians who would jump at the chance to explore, say, Hitler's given giftsgreatly worthy of our attention. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847246168</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=AQA 63336Bramley_Shakespeare|title=Brilliant AnswersThe Shakespeare Trail|author=Zoe Bramley
|rating=4
|genre=Trivia
|summary=Do you need an answer to a question? Have you got your mobile handy? Right – text that question to 63336It has been 400 years since William Shakespeare, the Home of Any Question Answeredman heralded as the greatest writer in the English language, and for £1 youEngland'll have the answer within minutess national poet, died. It might seem like magic but it's actually the result of Shakespeare has made a lot of people being profound mark on hand to research your problem our culture and give you heritage, yet many aspects of his life remain in the solutionshadows, and many places throughout England have forgotten their association with him. Over Here, Zoe Bramley takes the years 1.7 million people have asked over fifteen million questions and as reader on a special treat at the end journey through hundreds of each year AQA lets us have places associated with Shakespeare – many whose connections will come as a look at some surprise to most. Filled with intriguing tidbits of information about Shakespeare, Elizabethan England, and the most interesting questions and answers places that they've seen in the course of the yearshe talks about, this is no mere travel guide.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846682169</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Tracey TurnerHalliday_London|title=The Book of Big ExcusesLondon (Amazing and Extraordinary Facts)|author=Stephen Halliday|rating=34.5
|genre=Trivia
|summary=AhWhat makes a city? Is it the materials, we've all made excuses at one time or another. We've all done things we shouldn't have donesuch as the very London Stone itself, of mythological repute, that has moved around several times, then when caught out given and now forms part of a reason for it. Perhaps weWH Smith've even given excuses as stylish as Zambian tennis player Lighton Ndefwayls branch? (This has nothing, who said of his opponentcourse, on Temple Bar, which has also been known to walk.) Is it the people – the butchers [[Jack the Ripper: CSI: "[HeWhitechapel by John Bennett and Paul Begg|(Jack the Ripper)]] is , the bakers (or whoever set fire to the entire city from Pudding Lane) and the candlestick makers? Is it the infrastructure, from the Underground, whose one-time boss got a stupid man and medal from Stalin for his success, to the London Bridge itself, that in its own wanderlust means it's highly unlikely the Thames will freeze again? However you define a hopeless player. He city, London certainly has a huge nose lot going for it as regards weird and is cross-eyed. Girls hate him. He beat me because my jockstrap was too tight and because when he serves he fartswonderful, and that made me lose my concentrationthe trivial yet fascinating. And, luckily for which I am famous throughout Zambia." Tracey Tuner us, so has collated some of the best excuses ever given into a handy collectionthis book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340970553</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Matthew ColeHolland_Railways|title=Will Work for Nuts|rating=3.5|genre=Pets|summary=The intrepid adventurer faces a most daunting challenge. Girding his loins in anticipation of achieving his goal, he leaps into action, hell-bent only on success, never fearing the inherent danger. With death-defying stunts and leaps aplenty, he needs to use any vehicles he finds in his path, untold balancing skills, nerve-racking whippy plastic stick things, and an awful lot more. Finally his lithe, muscular frame lands near his target, and he sits back Railways (Amazing and eats his nuts.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007279574</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewExtraordinary Facts)|author= Niall Edworthy and Petra Cramsie|title=The Optimist's/pessimist's HandbookJulian Holland|rating=43
|genre=Trivia
|summary=With a publication date in early NovemberHow and when did Laurel and Hardy replace the Duke of York (George VI)? They reopened the Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch Railway when peacetime resumed, at whose launch the passing Christmas shopper is clearly latter had officiated before the target for this bookWar. ''The OptimistWhat's/ Pessimist's Handbook'' isn't the worst that can happen when you travel internationally and arrive on a self-help bookLondon goods train with no further destination documents? Well, but a compendium of enlightening snippetsif you're an unidentifiable Peruvian mummy you can get buried as an unknown corpse before the invoice turns up to prove you were wanted in Belgium. Off the shelfAfter so many miles and so much drama, I think youit's no surprise odd facts and fun trivia derive from our country'd know immediately which relative or friend might enjoy receiving its trains. So I suggest eschewing Amazon in favour of a real-life bookshop, not least because there will This book is designed to be a shelf full an ideal source of similar books for a surreptitious quick articles and delightful halffun mini-hour's browse before choosingessays for use in the smallest room.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>038561411X</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Danny DanzigerDonald_Words|title=The ThingummyWords of a Feather|author=Graeme Donald
|rating=4
|genre=Trivia
|summary=Oh lookWords of a Feather. The title alone suggests an engaging read about language, a trivia and the bookcertainly delivers. I don't think even I realised quite how many were published in the run It pairs seemingly unrelated words, digs up to every Christmastheir etymological roots and reveals their common ancestry. The English language, of course, but there are provides rich pickings indeed for a lot. There book of this type and it is probably a name for fascinating to see the phenomenonhidden meaning behind common and not-so-common words. Some connections are fairly obvious once you read them. There is a name for that bit For example, the link between your nose ''grotto'' and your lips – below your nasal septum comes ''grotesque'' is easy to grasp: the philtrumword ''grotesque'' derives from unpleasant figures depicted in murals in Ancient Roman ''grottoes''. ThereOther connections are just extraordinary, like the so-crazy-you-couldn's a correct scientific name for the tummyt-grumbling noises we make -it-up link between ''furnace'' and ''fornicate''. These two words date back to Ancient Rome when things leave our stomach for lower downprostitutes took over the city's abandoned baking domes. HeckAnd some connections are more than a little tenuous, seemingly just a collection of words banded together, thereas is the case with the ''insult'' and 's even 'salmon'' pairing. One of my personal favourites: the Italian word ''schiavo'' for ''slave'' was used to summon or dismiss a slave; this word became corrupted to ''ciao'', a scientific name for those circular grooves on top word the more well-heeled among us use instead of a Frisbee''goodbye''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>038561456X</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Justin ScroggieBinney_English|title=Tic-tac Teddy Bears The English Countryside (Amazing and Teardrop TattoosExtraordinary Facts)|author=Ruth Binney
|rating=4
|genre=Trivia
|summary=Signs are everywhereI live in the countryside and spend as much time as the weather will allow exploring it, so the chance to read Ruth Binney's ''The English Countryside'' was too good to be missed. I wasnWe't really ve met Ruth [[The Allotment Experience by Ruth Binney|before]] at Bookbag and we know that she writes well and interestingly, but just one of those who thought our roads were littered with too many traffic signs until the day I thing was driven past worrying me about this book. It's a pair of speed regulation signs, positioned at hardback and beautifully presented but its the exit end size of book that you slip into a one-way street but facing the illegal way up itpocket or handbag. Not all signs, of course, are quite as unnecessary, or indeed as blatantly visible, which is where this pictorial guide to countless coded messages, signifiers and other similar factoids comes in.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340976489</amazonuk>Would it be rather superficial?
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Angus Cargill (Editor)Lloyd_1234|title=Hang the DJ: An Alternative Book of Music Lists |rating=4|genre=Trivia|summary=Ah1, the music list... balm 234 QI Facts to pop obsessives (see Nick Hornby's ''High Fidelity''), makeweight of copy-starved magazine editors, and staple of self-indulgent writers (see ''31 Songs'', also by Nick Hornby). The contributors to this volume fall mainly into the latter category. No fewer than thirty five of them supply their musical top tens, ranging from the fanatical to the frivolous, via the frankly frightening.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571241727</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewLeave You Speechless|author=Sam Jordison|title=Sod That!: 103 Things Not To Do Before You Die|rating=4|genre=Trivia|summary=Without sounding like a braggart, I have done some pleasant things in life. I've caught the first bus up to Machu PicchuJohn Lloyd, John Mitchinson and shared the sunrise with only the llamas. I've eaten strange things while on a full fortnight tour of Iceland. But closer to home, were I to have a list, there would be many things left on it – I've been nowhere near Bath, or York; I've never seen the film ET, which for a man of my age is something of a claim to fame.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1409100553</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Ian Crofton|title=History Without the Boring BitsJames Harkin
|rating=5
|genre=Trivia
|summary=Now, I'm 'No US President has ever died in May.'' ''There are fewer women on corporate boards in America than there are men named John.'' ''Dogs investigate bad smells with their right nostril and good smells with their left.'' ''Apollo 11's fuel consumption was seven inches to the gallon.'' ''The first person to admit I am not a wine buffoccupational disease ever recorded in medical literature was 'chimney sweep's scrotum'. '' I know a lot more now than I did before my current relationship''The song 'Yes, but she is right to say I have a very masculine (ie dead weak) sense of smellWe Have No Bananas' was written by Leon Trotsky's nephew. '' Added ''In the 18th Century, King George I declared all pigeon droppings to that a blunt sense be the property of taste and Ithe Crown''m left saying . I know what hardly think I like when I drink it, and that's itneed to say any more. Review over.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571241743</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stevyn ColganBerenson_How|title=Joined-up Thinking: How to Connect Everything to Everything ElseSpeak Emoji|author=Fred Benenson
|rating=4
|genre=Trivia
|summary=I am in this book. And so therefore Emojis are you. So why donfun, and there't I like it quite as s so much as I should? To be more honest, neither to them than the smileys of us are in this book, although we could well days gone by ;) They can be. It is a trivia collection based on attesting the feeling language unto themselves, though, and I've found that everything is linked to everything and everyone else, if only you know how. Thus some members of the chapters introduce us to item A, which is linked to item Bahem, which relates to Colder generation can find themselves a little troubled by them. This book, whose story is incomplete without Dthen, and so on and lo and behold, before you know it yousounds perfect for anyone who needs a little help with this 'language're back at A, having had no idea where we were going.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230712207</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Dr Robert VanderplankLloyd_3rd|title=Uglier Than A Monkey's ArmpitQI: The Third Book of General Ignorance|rating=3.5|genreauthor=Trivia|summary=Now I've always been one for delivering a nice meaty insult. And if you think otherwise then you're just a #####ing ******** of a !!!!!!!!!!, with a &%&%&% for a $$$$$$. But I've been brought up with the usual British malaise when it comes to learning foreign languagesJohn Lloyd, and so beyond knowing that ''Leche!'' is a bit meaty in SpanishJohn Mitchinson, I could not help to cuss James Harkin and swear like whatever other languages might have for trooper.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330464485</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Tom Hodgkinson |title=The Book of Idle PleasuresAndrew Hunter Murray
|rating=4.5
|genre=Trivia
|summary=We've all heard the clichés about modern lifeWell done, Hartlepool. You know – technology was meant to free us from drudgery. Instead wedidn've become its slaves t put on trial and work longer hours kill a shipwrecked monkey thinking it a Napoleonic spy – any more than the several other places thusly accused everdid. We're overloaded with means of communication but few of us know our neighboursWell done, Italy, etcfor making the ciabatta such a global phenomenon it seems like a traditional foodstuff, etceven if it was invented in 1982. On hearing theseAnd well done to that famous ice hockey player, most of us shrug and carry on with our busyCharles Darwin – who was probably playing it, seeing as it was a British invention, busy liveslong before the Canadians ever realised they might be good at it. But now and thenYes, something reminds us for a book that spends a lot of who its time saying 'this didn’t happen,' 'hoojamaflip didn't do this,' and what we are. This delightful'that was never thus', unassuming book is it's one of those thingsthat's incredibly easy to be most positive about.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091923328</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Georgina PhillipsTaggart_New|title=Ouch! Extreme Feats of Human EnduranceNew Words for Old: Recycling Our Language for the Modern World|author=Caroline Taggart|rating=43.5
|genre=Trivia
|summary=Everything from Shackleton I never declare myself off to Ellen MacArthurhave a 'kip', by way as I recall reading that it originally meant the same amount of the Japanese sleeping – and activity – as happens in a whorehouse. The word for fried rice-field grasshopper'cleave' can mean either to split apart or to connect together, and 32 hour long after dinner speechesI'm sure there's another word that has completely changed its meaning from one end of things to another although I can't remember which. Certainly, ''Ouch!literally'' contains fascinating trivia on every page that children will love has tried its best to repeat back to you at lengthmake a full switch through rampant misuse.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330454056</amazonuk>}} {{newreview |title=Any Question Answered|author=AQA 63336|genre=Trivia|rating=3|summary=Did you know that if you have a question Such is the nature of our language – fluid both in spelling until moderately recently, any question, you can text AQA on 63336 and their team definitely in meaning. This attempt at capturing a corner of dedicated researchers will find the answer trivia/words/novelty market is interested in such tales from the etymological world – the way we have adapted old words for our own, modern and text perhaps very different usages. Certainly, having browsed it back to you? It will cost you just £1 and AQA have now answered over nine million questions. That's a lot of questions and the answers didn't just disappear into the ether. AQA have them all stored awayweek, I can declare it a pretty strong attempt. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846680824</amazonuk>
}}
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