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

Frankly, I'm surprised that a book about how rude people have become is only 200 pages.

After her hilarious book about punctuation, Lynne Truss has assembled all of her crotchety old woman-styled rantings and ravings into a very intelligent and well-researched book on how we, as a society, are getting ruder. I expected nothing less; after all, before her, `hilarious' and `punctuation' were two words I didn't think went very well together.

The new collection, "Talk to the Hand," is a brilliant book for anyone who has ever passive-aggressively dreamt about backhanding someone for lacking manners. The book details 6 different behaviors people have begun exhibiting more and more that are leading to the death of the world and what we should do (if we can do anything) to combat these behaviors. Rather than a self-help angle, though, Truss focuses more on the root causes of the rise in these behaviors, and offers her own theories, which involve most of the usual grumpy old people answers like television, mobile phones, the internet, etc.

Sure, it may not have as much to offer in the way of life advice as her last, but even if you're not a grouchy person who mourns the death of manners, you're bound to enjoy the prose in this piece. Truss' trademark subversive wit and sardonic jibes kept me laughing all the way through; she's like a humorous grandmother spouting off about youth today and why they suck, but she's younger and a lot less illogical.

I did not enjoy this book. It read to me as an undisciplined rave with no depth, few interesting illustrations, and no wider vision or philosophical comment to make. One might at least have hoped for some interesting vocabulary to redeem it, but one hoped in vain. Truss writes about rudeness, and yet I consider it an impertinence to bother us with such an uninformed rant. She was highly entertaining in "Eats Shoots and Leaves", and has assumed that she can write what she likes thereafter and still make sales.
I was bored with her self-indulgence and couldn't finish it fast enough. She was trying to be funny and failing to succeed.

I found this book very interesting, and I believe it meant a lot to me because I see the lack of courtesy today as an indication of the looming decay of civilization! My blood pressure goes up when I hold open a door and people walk past me as if I wasn't there. I rant for hours after somebody throws a cigarette butt on the ground.

I was surprised so many people did not enjoy it. My guess is that the people who did not enjoy the book aren't bothered or worried about the rudeness in our culture. It's surprising to me, but there must be a lot of people who don't see a problem with the current state of courtesy. Those people wouldn't like this book.

So, if you think people are generally rude, and there are deeper implications associated with rudeness, I think you will like this book. If you do not think rudeness is a problem or that it's not a serious problem, you will probably think Ms. Truss is crazy.

Witty, smart and a good second to Eats, Shoots & Leaves.
If you are a writer, you love this book.

I did not like this book. I thought I would read a funny satirical book, however, the author is having an affair with a thesauras making the book long winded and definitely not funn.