Friday, December 11, 2015

Book Review: Life, a Warning

(Regretfully reclaimed from Blogjob.)

A Fair Trade Book
Title: Life: a Warning 
Author: Stephanie Brush
Date: 1987
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Length: 173 pages
Quote: "Being twelve (and knowing everything) is probably the most difficult because you have to endure a lot of relatives telling you almost twenty-four hours a day that you have become Very, Very Big..."LOOK AT HOW BIG SHE IS," they say to each other. "How did she get to be SO BIG?"
In Life: a Warning, Stephanie Brush jokes her way through the stages of life from "Birth Order" to "A Look at the Future."
"A child is told things like 'virtue is its own reward,' but he feels that 'a system of cash rebates' would be much more effective, based on what he's seen of the world."
"Trivial Pursuit is an SAT test in disguise--except that nobody ever sends your Trivial Pursuit scores to five Major Ivy League Universities."
"Of course, if you listened to the voice of reason, you would never get behind the wheel of an automobile for any purpose...Driving is dangerous, hazardous, perilous, and dangerous. In fact, if no one ever drove, most American transportation deaths would occur in plane crashes, where they belong."
"The world is divided up into two kinds of people: those who pay their bills, taxes, and library fines on time, and those who say, 'Try and find me'...For some reason, those who never pay their bills rarely get caught."
"If you are one of those people who have decided not to have children, people always want to ask you, 'Why not?' No one ever asks you, 'Why don't you want to be Pope...and go over Niagara Falls in a teacup?'"
"According to modern adherents of Darwin, when all other life forms have died off in the future, the only creatures that remain will be worker ants, roaches, segmented worms, and the people holding the service contracts on your cars and home appliances."
Naturally, some of these wisecracks are distinctly from the 1980s; the most dated part of Life is of course the predictions that Princess Diana would still be dodging paparazzi, and Evel Knievel would still be jumping motorcycles, today. Nevertheless, the book still makes me chortle.
If you want to share the jokes, why should you buy the book from me for $5 per copy + $5 per package?
Bear with me, Gentle Readers, I'm still fairly new at this site. Paypal buttons don't appear on "Blog" pages because the system is set up to use them on "Store" pages. Right. This link goes to my very first Blogjob "Store" page: https://blogjob.com/priscillaking/store/products/stephanie-brush-book-life-a-warning/
You might find a better deal somewhere else, but if you buy it here, I'll send $1 per copy to Stephanie Brush or a charity of her choice.
(Ewww, what's that mess? That was supposed to be a picture that would link to a page where you could check prices on Amazon. Well, here's the correct picture, anyway, courtesy of amazon.com/images/I/41vcGHefMTL.jpg .)

(Wordpress tags: 1980’sEvel Knieveljokes about life in general,Princess DianaStephanie BrushTrivial Pursuit,women’s humor. To buy the book here, please send $5 per copy, $5 per package, and $1 per online payment, to either of the addresses at the very bottom of the screen--below the Amazon gift card widget. If sending a U.S. postal order to that U.S.P.O. box address, of course, you don't send me the $1; the post office will collect its own surcharge when selling you the form and envelope.)

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