Lynne Truss is fabulous. This book, however, is not.

 

Basically, it lacks direction. A collection of essays on the six things society has embraced which will make you want to remain at home with the door barred, it takes its brief a little too intelligently, including quotes from anthropoligical texts such as Kate Fox's Watching the English: The Hidden Rules of English Behaviour alongside Truss's trademark middle-aged cat-lady rants. Coupled with the rather slight chapter headings it makes for an odd mix which doesn't quite work - sure, I get annoyed by stuff too, but there is a point where I stop analysing why it happens, usually because I need to cook the dinner.

 

Truss is a smart writer and she does hew some interesting aspects from a saturated (even for the original publication date) subject, but I don't see the point of this one. It's not really a funny book (although parts are amusing) and it's not really an educational book (although I learned something) and if it had been longer and I hadn't been taking a bath I would likely have quit.

 

Two stars, just for making me go and look up some of the texts she's mentioned

Talk to the Hand: The Utter Bloody Rudeness of the World Today, or Six Good Reasons to Stay Home and Bolt the Door by Lynne Truss

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


From the author of Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to PunctuationThis was her follow up. It was okay but there really wasn't enough material for a whole book. Should've just been a clever(if occasionally whiny) article. So rather than a review, I'm just going to share my own thoughts on rudeness, society, and other things.

In my neighborhood, there is a small business whose name is based on that lovely saying, "Talk to the hand." Think a bakery called 'Talk to the Flan' or a deli 'Talk to the Ham' Why? Why would a business owner want to give the impression that she was rude and didn't care about her customers? We'll see how long she lasts, it's been at least two years now.

In my mother's high school yearbook, there was a section under each grad's picture where they got to list their pet peeves. I'm hoping there was more than that but I don't remember anything else. My sibs and I loved reading the ridiculous things that bothered these old fogies. We wee probably 8-9-10ish at the time. Now I'm embarrassed to admit, I often start conversations with, "Know what my pet peeve is?" It's probably a pet peeve of my friends that I do this.

I was at the grocery store and the ringer upper and the bagger were having a conversation as if I weren't standing right there. (pet peeve).They were talking about how hot some famous guy was. They then went on to describe what they would do with said hot guy if they got their hands on him. Nice. Since I was standing right there, I figured I was included in this conversation so I asked the if they knew whether the guy was nice. What? They looked at me with confused faces. Speaking more slowly as this was obviously a difficult concept for either to grasp, I asked again if he was a nice person how did he treat women? After an awkward pause, they went back to their fantasies. Oh well, I tried.

"Click it or ticket." I hate seeing these signs on the highway. Surely they could come up with a nicer way to remind people to wear their seatbelts.

That's it for now.





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Very funny look at rudeness in modern society, particularly in the UK.

The attempts at humor are a little too forced; the conclusion is achieved quickly with not much argument. Not as good as Eats Shoots and Leaves.

A great many amusing anecdotes and some very good thoughts, but jumbled and ill-organized. She started a lot of thoughts and pulls out a lot of theories, but never conclusively decides to follow any of them to any logical end. She muses on manners and civility and ethics and morality and social mores and how that impacts the world and is the internet to blame for rudeness and such and so forth, but it feels likes she is just throwing everything out there so as not to miss a possible theory, but without actually picking one and trying to prove why and how that relates to the subject. That was frustrating for me. I enjoyed reading the stories of her and other people's encounters with rudeness more than her musings, and would have liked more of that. In the end, there was no real conclusion other than that the world is rude and ill-mannered and uncivil and growing worse. And until we take the time to truly consider how our behavior impacts other people, it will not be improving.

P.S. I love her section on self-service at stores and automated menus! I could not agree more - utterly true.