The Bride of Anguished English: A Bonanza of Bloopers, Blunders, Botches, and Boo-Boos

As with "Fractured English," this is a great book if you enjoy puns or language manipulation such why isn't a good guy the same as a wise guy. It's also a great gift to give someone who's learning the language because hopefully they'll enjoy it's quirkiness and difficulties. I enjoy all of Richard Lederer's books.

This book is a collection of blunders, bloopers and other mistaken uses of the English language. While it should be required reading for every American, I doubt that many people will read it, which is a shame.

The book is funny and will cause a chuckle, or out right laugh, only if you understand what the mistakes are. I found it a little disturbing that I missed some of the mistakes, because they are so common place that my eye just read what was supposed to be there...not what was actually written.

My only complaint is that the book does start to get redundant after a while, making it more suitable for short stretches of reading. Trying to read this book in a "straight through" manner gets tiring.

This book is easy to read, makes a great "bathroom" book, and could be used to teach about common mistakes in our language. Buy it and let your kids read it. Maybe they will figure out that they can write more clearly

Still, this book is a marvellously funny romp through a collection of snippets of tortured English. Delightful for those capable of seeing the humor in a sign that reads:

No
DOGS
EATING
BICYCLES

My only objection to this book was that I've seen too many of these entries before; between those that are in the chapter-ending "hall of fame" sections, that have appeared in previous books by this author, and those that I have seen in other similar books (Jay Leno's "Headlines" books, for instance) there were just too many that were too familiar to be entirely bizarre. Still, there was plenty of new material, and it was ALL funny, even the recycled parts.

Is this the best of the Anguished volumes? The author Richard Lederer says that he believes "that my Bride is the best written of my four Anguished English books." I totally agree. "Bride" is a fantastic faux-pastiche of verbal blunders, a written equivalent to a whole season of TV's Best Bloopers plus America's Dumbest Home Videos.

Aside from its amusement value, "Bride" is also handy for English teachers and anyone wishing to improve their writing skills. Selected gems from the book can illustrate WHY you need to be careful about dangling participles, careless spelling and mixed metaphors. It's one thing to hold forth on the value of good English grammar, it's another to gaze with horrified astonishment at actual printed headlines such as:

"WOMAN BORN FEBRUARY 29 HAS BABY SAME DAY"
and
"AIRLINE EXPECTS TO BE BACK ON TRACK BY WEEKEND"

These illustrations are far more impressive than memorizing lists of rules or reading "Elements of Style." If you want to brush up your writing skills, it couldn't hurt to have a laugh and also pick up some examples of really bad mistakes you are sure to remember.

There is plenty more good stuff here--including the chapter on stupid headlines, a chapter of the particularly dumb stuff doctors and lawyers write (always rewarding if you like to needle professionals at parties, lots and lots of lawyer jokes here) and the divine comedy from church and Sunday School that informs you that "Amen" really means..."Tha-tha-tha-that's all, folks!"

I sure hope that's not all...we could all use some more Anguish like this. If you liked Richard's previous Anguished volumes, this one will not disappoint you.

As a devoted reader of Richard Lederer's previous "Anguished English" books, I was anxious to see if this book measured up to the previous titles. I was thrilled to find that it did that and more! There is no doubt that "The Bride of Anguished English" is a fantastic book that will keep me laughing for hours on end. Most all of the material is new, but it pays homage to classic English errors in a small "Hall of Fame" section at the end of each chapter. If you enjoy studying and/or laughing at the misuse of English, this is a book for you.