By Ina Saltz Abrams Image, $19.95, 190 pages The stories behind people’s tattoos are often kept private. They make the tattoos mysterious and intriguing and can ultimately spark an amazing conversation. In Body Type 2 the stories are brought to life by those who own the tattoos. The book focuses only on typographic tattoos, or [...]
By Joe Mande Griffin, $11.99, 208 pages LATFH started as a blog and uses images of twenty-something college students to define hipsterdom. It then goes on to mock the subjects with snark that reinforces the sort of conservative values of gender roles, masculinity, and anti-intellectualism (to the extent that Joyce, Dali, and left political leaders [...]
By Sol Steinmetz Harmony, $19.99, 246 pages I am an unabashed word nerd. I thoroughly enjoy trawling through the dusty byways of the English language and unearthing not only unfamiliar words, but the surprising origins of more common words. And There’s a Word for It is a terrific resource, presenting a decade-by-decade breakdown of linguistic [...]
By Jerry Hopkins Tuttle Publishing, $14.95, 224 pages It’s often tempting, when I’m sitting in my windowless office at 3:00 PM on a Wednesday, to think seriously about packing up my entire life and moving it to another country where I can just start over. I never have, of course, but I find myself reading [...]
By John Hodgman Riverhead Trade, $14.00, 256 pages I can imagine John Hodgman sitting in a very rigid, very erect position at Starbucks, or at the well appointed study desk of his home, with an extremely serious expression, earnestly typing away with concentrated but effortless relish, on a Macbook no less (which he can well [...]
By David Valdes Greenwood Crown, $25.00, 288 Pages Being a native California resident I gained my knowledge of pageants from the usual place…TV. Silly girls who are overly made up and act like airheads. After reading The Rhinestone Sisterhood my opinion has definitely changed. The book takes you through the competitive world of festival queens [...]
By Chuy Bravo Grand Central Publishing, $13.99, 181 pages Chuy Bravo’s book of “wisdom” is a spin-off from the television show Chelsea Lately (E! network). It is a humorous look at fashion, love, music, finance, friendship, and so on, through slightly out-of-focus binoculars. The book starts with a hilarious, self-deprecating account of Chuy’s humble beginnings [...]
Edited by Shana Liebman Grand Central Publishing, $13.99, 288 pages Editor Shana Liebman explains the genesis of this collection of essays in her introduction–and it provides a fascinating glimpse into the American Jewish culture, a culture rife with humor, sarcasm, and the ability to laugh at mankind’s foibles. And these aren’t just Jewish foibles, they [...]
By Greil Marcus Harvard University Press, $24.95, 482 pages Lipstick Traces: A Secret History of the Twentieth Century, Twentieth Anniversary Edition was first published 20 years ago. The author, an excellent researcher, sheds light on world events and the makings of the revolutionary twentieth century. The author refers to The Sex Pistols, an English punk rock band, [...]
By David Wild Da Capo, $14.95, 203 pages He Is…I Say: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Neil Diamond is ultimately a loving biography of Neil Diamond written by a contributing editor at Rolling Stone and a true believer in Neil Diamond. The title is a obviously a spin-off of Neil Diamond’s “I Am…I [...]
By David Greven University of Texas Press, $55.00, 297 pages In Manhood in Hollywood from Bush to Bush David Greven explores Hollywood’s changing representation of manhood by comparing the theoretical treatments of narcissism and masochism through their representation in such films as Casualties of War, Fight Club, The Talented Mr. Ripley, and Brokeback Mountain. Through the examination of [...]
By Trey Parker, Matt Stone, Sam Stall Running Press, $16.95, 175 pages Those foul-mouthed fourth graders are back! And they are just as insulting on the page as they are on the small screen. Kyle, Cartman, Stan, and of course, Kenny, of South Park fame, are one-dimensional and bound by glue, but (don’t fret) even that can’t [...]
By Peter Grossman Grand Central Publishing, $19.99, 144 pages Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt—dubbed “Speidi” by an especially stupid sector of the media—are upfront about the fact that they’re famous for basically no reason. They started out as regulars on the MTV reality (depending on your definition of the word) series The Hills, and then they started [...]
By David Shields Knopf, $24.95, 219 pages The book is a selection of quotations and excerpts plucked from the last five centuries of thought, divided into twenty-six topics to create a comprehensive overview of realism in contemporary literature. Walter Benjamin’s The Arcades Project is similarly structured (not that I’ve read the copy I’ve owned for almost 10 years). [...]
By Robert Hofler Da Capo Press, $15.95, 320 pages Hollywood in the 1970s was an age when movie stars, supermodels, and rock ‘n’ roll musicians could begin to be seen crossing celebrity lines and attending over-the-top parties. At the center of all this was Allan Carr. Robert Hofler looks into Carr’s rise as Hollywood’s No. [...]
By Steven B. Green; Dennis LaValle Adams Media, $12.95, 208 pages There are thousands of self-help books out there, offering to help you achieve your dreams, change your life, or otherwise revamp yourself in countless ways. Only a scant few dare the reader to blaze the trail of the asshole. A**holeology is a guide through [...]
