Why Schott's Original Miscellany is Possibly the Best Book Ever

that's hyperbole, of course, but it's pretty damn nifty!

I rented this slim tome by Ben Schott from my local bibliotheque. It was the best use of seventy-five cents on my part in a long time. The book, which I suppose falls under the category of non-fiction, contains numerous facts and trivia. Par example: a table of James Bond films, including the actor playing Bond, the villain, Bond girl and actress, as well as the Bond-mobile. A list of nine Q words without Us (very good for scrabble!). A very complex chart listing many facts about US presidents, including their party affiliation, astrological sign, salary, age at which they took office, whether or not they had red hair or won a Nobel Prize (not really an either/or, but so far, there's np cross-over between the groups), et cetera. I'm also enamored of the sampling of final words from the National Spelling Bee. Some of them seem pedestrian, like lyseum and kamikazi, but that's probably why they don't have twenty-somethings in the bee! My grade school had some sort of screening process as clandestine as the election of the popes. Despite being an excellent speller, I was never allowed to participate in the school bee. I digress. The list of Liz Taylor's husbands, in chronological order, is also amusing. I strongly recommend Schott's. It is clearly worth the $14.95 publisher's recommended retail price.