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    The Areas of My Expertise
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    The Areas of My Expertise
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    The Areas of My Expertise
    Audiobook (abridged)6 hours

    The Areas of My Expertise

    Published by Penguin Random House Audio

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    Borges meets the bathroom book in John Hodgman's bestselling almanac of complete (and fabricated) world knowledge.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateAug 17, 2006
    ISBN9781429586450
    Unavailable
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    Reviews for The Areas of My Expertise

    4/5

    628 ratings37 reviews

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    • 4/5
      This is not a sit-down-and-read-all-at-once book. This is a book to be kept somewhere where you may occasionally need to read a few pages to keep you occupied while waiting -- say, in your car for when the Brooklyn Bridge is inexplicably closed, causing a midnight traffic jam, or when you're at the dentist's office and have forgotten your Kindle.

      Although I found much of this book quite amusing, I was mostly just impressed -- and sometimes flabbergasted -- at his creativity. I really don't know how someone can come up with So. Much. Absurdity. and ridiculous nonsense without the aid of several illegal substances. Funnily enough, there's actually a smidgen of truth in a lot of his sections, just enough to keep me a little off-balance as I read. Good times.
    • 2/5
      Not that funny.
    • 2/5
      Not nearly as funny as I'd have liked it to be. My sense of humor grows impatient with maundering on such things as fuzzy lobsters.
    • 4/5
      This compendium of invented facts is funny, mostly, though a little wearing on the nerves. Hodgman reads in his usual deadpan, which I enjoy, and his reading is musically punctuated by the book's Official Troubadour, Jonathan Coulton. I am glad to report that Hodgman's reading skips over the list of 700 hobo names (that might be at the very end; Hodgman just told me the book ended, but there's another hour of the file--haven't listened to it yet to know what it is). If I'm really curious about the hobo names, though, I'll refer back to the 2006 Best American Non-Required Reading, where the list was reproduced in full.
    • 5/5
      A must-read, especially for those concerned with the coming Hobo Apocalypse.
    • 4/5
      The full title of this book is "The Areas of My Expertise: Which Include Matters Historical, Matters Literary, Matters Cryptozoological, Hobo Matters, Food, Drink & Cheese (a kind of food), Squirrels and Lobsters & Eels, Haircuts, Utopia, What Will Happen in the Future, and Most Other Subjects". It is full of little-known and bizarre facts, all of which were fabricated. It is a sort of an almanac, with information that everyone needs. There is a lot about hoboes, including 700 hobo names and a compendium of hobo signs. Did you know that Yale enforces its will on the world via a capella singing groups? Or the essential differences between cat people and dog people? [Linus Pauling fed massive doses of vitamin C to his Schipperke, "Josef" and Daniel Boone devised forty-six ways of skinning cats (many still used today)] How about five jokes that have never produced laughter, or nine palindromes that aren't quite palindromes? [A man, a plan, a kind of man-made river, planned."] According to TAOME, a cesium-133 atom will oscillate between two hyperfine levels 16,546,737,186,000 times in half an hour. A compendium of fifty-five dramatic situations will provide the basis for any book that you might want to write. Several pages of potents and omens provide a guide for the future. Best of all, almost nothing in the book is true (except for the frequency of the cesium clock). It is all made up (by Mr. Hodgman, who is also "the PC guy" in the Apple commercials), and it is quite funny, in the sort of way that appeals mainly to the warped. I guess I qualify.
    • 3/5
      I picked up this book because the cover was completely plastered with tiny text so ridiculous that I knew I needed it. This is more or less a book of trivia - trivia that is entirely composed of lies. And a weird obsession with hobos. It probably would be better read a little bit at a time rather than straight through like I did, but there were certainly some very funny tidbits of random. I think I was most amazed at the fact that pretty much every single footnote, no matter how absurd, actually did refer to another section of the book. Including, for example, beard trends. Look, I don't know. If you think non sequiturs are funny, this is probably the book for you.
    • 4/5
      A fun book! Hodgman is at his strongest when he finds the humorous in history, managing to turn the mundane into the magical, and the magical into the otherworldly. There is a lot of that in this book. But there are also tedious sections as well, entire passages that are ponderous in tempo and just not all that funny.It is encouraging that the book actually got more interesting as it went along. The sections on hobo history, other secret histories, and the states were particularly good. There are interesting hints about the secret history of the mole men which, I'm sure, the future volumes will cover.And I'll read them. I'm really hoping that the rest of them will seize on the good parts and set aside the bad.
    • 5/5
      To me, surprisingly reminiscent of Calvino and Perec -- Hodgman shares those authors' devotion to cataloging the absurd or magical details of life, as well as the imagination needed to fabricate them. Writers, take note of Hodgman's "failed palindromes," and please do not use them!
    • 4/5
      Such a strange book, as if it were encyclopedic but apparently mostly nonsensical. Offends my need for facts and my sense of what that means. Amazing, if dull at times.
    • 5/5
      I laughed out loud many times while reading this clever book. I am amazed at Hodgman's ability to create baloney that sounds so true! The list of hobo names is worth the price of the book, in my opinion! I will be looking for more of Hodgman's work.
    • 4/5
      Hodgman is a regular on The Daily Show so that sold me first of all. This book is a collection of things Hodgman "knows", such as a broken glass filled snowball is called "The College Boy" and that a secret to successful business negotiations include showing the other party that you have a gun. There is an extensive chapter on the history of hobos (my pick of the available hobo names is Ol' Barb Stab-You-Quick) and an interesting give and take the author witnessed between a Christian lecturer and a member of The Church of Satan.
    • 3/5
      This book was funny in some parts, and I laughed a few times reading it.However, it mostly just annoyed me. The author seems like one of those people who is a loud smart-alack that can't stop talking, thinking that everything they say is hilarious, when it really isn't.I thought he was trying too hard, and didn't like his comedic or writing style.
    • 3/5
      A good read for when you're feeling silly.
    • 5/5
      I learned several important things from [book:The Areas of My Expertise]:* it is possible to sell a book of total nonsense* one can put a funny spin on The Great Depression* I should be more suspicious of the large black squirrel population in my home town.I was mildly disappointed that there wasn't more about pirates in this thing encyclopedia of total world knowledge. Apart from that, I would say that this is not a book to be missed.
    • 4/5
      Well worth getting the audiobook version so you can hear it read by Hodgman.
    • 4/5
      The thing that makes "fact"-filled books like this work so well is that the reader recognizes something in Hodgman: even if he is talking out his ass a lot of the time, that is one extremely intelligent tuckus. The only way a tome like this works is if the creator has both the ability to let brain synapses stray into bizarre directions AND he is already brilliant.Of course, one also needs the sticktuitiveness to follow through on a concept to its end, whether that end ends up proving his genius or becoming painfully laborious. No better example can I point to than the chapter on hoboes, the centerpiece being a list of 700 hobo names. (I hear the audiobook version of the hobo list is especially wonderful, and so to try to replicate it, I read much of that list out loud. Don't worry, my wife was fast asleep.)Truth be told, this book works best as the damned funniest bathroom reader I've ever come across. Though I read most of it in bed (and can speak, by the way, to its utter lack of aphrodisiac qualities), I believe I just might leave a copy of this in the guest bathroom. Of course, I'll have to drill a hole through it for the titanium chain that will attach it to the water pipes.
    • 5/5
      Between the hobo names and the analysis of literature, this is one funny and eternally surprising book that you can go back to when you need a laugh.
    • 4/5
      I don't suppose I need to add a review, but I want to urge this smart wordplay along. An author could have fun writing a book like this, and I hope that Hodgman did. It was fun to read; I read it in sequence on two evenings. The dead pan inventiveness kept it rolling for me and will get me to buy the sequels as they come out in later printings of trade paperback editions.This book should be on the bookshelf of everybody who reads fictional non-fiction.
    • 3/5
      I wanted to like this book, but it was just *too* absurd.
    • 2/5
      I am in love with The Daily Show, so when I saw that one of their "reporters" wrote a book, I had to read it. I like Hodgman's presentation on the show, so I decided to listen to the audio version of the book. This was a mistake. Hodgman works well as the straight man, but he needs someone to play against, to mirror his over-the-top button-down appearance. This is lacking in his book. The idea is very clever-present all the information one could ever need, regardless of whether or not it's true. It's Wikipedia with a better editor, I thought. However, it wasn't funny at all. The oral presentation of the tables, guest readers, and other gimmicks throughout were simply annoying. I'm not sure if the print version is any better and I am loathe to check it out to find out.
    • 5/5
      This is an almanac of COMPLETE WORLD KNOWLEDGE. It will replace all other books on your shelves (by secretly overwriting their text with its own.)It is an essential reference for anyone who is curious about different types of squirrels, American utopian communities, or the mysterious hidden state of Hohoq; is is particularly necessary for anyone creating a bibliography of reference works related to the great nation of Uqbar. The detailed Werewolf Transformation Timetables are also greatly recommended for all werewolf-hunters, as the most accuate of their kind currently in publication.No reader of this book should miss e-hobo.com , at which a group of noted hobo artists have taken it upon themselves to create historically accurate portraits recording for posterity all 700 named hoboes in this book.Also, aid me in combating the dire calumny being perpetuated by the catalogers of our great nation's libraries (in league with the Secret World Government of Yale University), who insist on classifying it under 800 (dewey) or PR(library of congress) as fiction, instead of 001 (knowledge) and AY (almanacs) where it self-evidently belongs.
    • 4/5
      I don't usually pick up books of humour, because I often don't find them funny. I tend more toward clever in print than I do in other media. But Daily Show expert Hodgman has such a brilliantly skewed way of seeing things, that I couldn't resist. It didn't all work for me, but the majority of it did. Most of all, it reminded me of my long-standing awe and envy for comedians.
    • 4/5
      At first glance, this appears to be a series of random silly , though very funny, passages and tables. After reading a few chapters, the entries start to cross-reference. The strange trivia become points of obscure hilarity. An important book for those in search of TOTAL KNOWLEDGE.
    • 5/5
      hilarious! Two owls hoot, who!
    • 5/5
      Five hours into the nearly 7 hour audio production of his dryly funny almanac, Hodgman says, "If you are reading along in your book on page 196 you may now enjoy a visual gag. Those of you listening to the complete instructional audio program will not laugh." But people reading the book will not get the benefit of Hodgman's excellent comic timing, his banter with Jonathan, the studio musician who plays his theme song and musical stings, or Jonathan's invented state songs. (I had "Why why why did Wyoming have to die" in my head for a whole day).
    • 5/5
      The best book of made up facts ever published! It helps that Mr. Hodgman realizes and acknowledges that his facts are made up, for most other books of made up facts do not. There is something amazingly giggle-inducing about the manner in which the mythical city of Chicago and our only hobo Secretary of the Treasury are related. I recommend it for all readers of the English language.
    • 4/5
      very bizarre and funny. a few moments of laugh out loud material, but mostly just a very amusing read.
    • 5/5
      Without this fine book, I would have no knowledge of the breadth and depth of hobo names. Nor would I know of the missing 51st state of the United States. This book is my guide through daily living.
    • 5/5
      This is absolutely one of funniest things that I have read recently. If you like the humor on the Daily Show, you'll love this book -- in fact, John Hodgman periodically does guest reports on the Daily Show.