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

Reviewer: Seattle, eh?

Rating: 4.0/10

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Summary: Nothing major, but a somewhat entertaining follow-up by Lynne Truss. Actual content is mediocre, but tone/vibe is what got me through.

The main reason I got this is because I like Lynne Truss. I like her cheerful, British complaints about the decline of canaries (grammar, manners) in the mineshaft of society. More than the books themselves, I enjoyed seeing her at an appearance on C-SPAN while promoting her previous book. Lucky for me, her entertaining voice comes through loud and clear in her writing.

Ancillary positives:
-Her writing hits my personal sweet spot of "more than a newspaper column, but less than an academic study". I'm a lay person interested in lots of topics and Truss manages to arouse my curiosity and engage it without boring me with minutia. She openly acknowledges the long history of complaining about manners, but still manages to make it interesting to me.
-Bonus points for referring to newspaper columns she's written without using them for the entire book. That's a peeve of mine that should be easily avoidable, but has bitten me a few times (see: Paul Krugman).

So what's the book about? Oh the usual complaints: a "me first" society as reflected by the loss of manners and general consideration for others. How some of this loss isn't that bad (all the class politics baggage), but some of what is being lost really does serve a useful purpose.

Date Reviewed: November 14, 2005

Last modified: February 25, 2006