Talk to the Hand: The Utter Bloody Rudeness of the World Today, or Six Good Reasons to Stay Home and Bolt the Door by Lynne TrussMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
My day began with an innocent browsing of the shelves at a local bookstore and ended with an impulse buy. To my horror, I had purchased a book in which I might have no interest. I chided myself for that moment of weakness until I began to read. The misgivings I had over my purchase faded as I read the words of author Lynne Truss. Satisfaction washed over me as I realized I was “hooked” even before I had finished reading her brief three-pages of acknowledgments.
In Talk to the Hand, Truss attacks the failings of our society with the same humor and aplomb she employed in her earlier best seller, Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation. With her focus on the rudeness of today’s society, she combines her powers of observation with a liberal amount of scathing wit to lambaste the people of the world for their errant behavioral flaws. Although her writing is laced with humor and sarcasm, her underlying message is never far from sight or thought. Talk to the Hand is a scolding that is as harsh as it is well deserved. The author systematically presents her case, and one cannot help but admit individual and collective guilt. As the prosecutor in the high court of manners, etiquette, and decorum, Truss makes it impossible to mount a credible defense for our inexcusably rude behavior.
Are courtesy and kindness dead? Things of the past? Perhaps, but one can hope they are only napping. Truss has given her readers much to contemplate and ample reason for repentance. There are few faults to find in Talk to the Hand unless one is inclined to complain that the author has provided far more than the promised SIX good reasons to stay home and bolt the door. And wouldn’t complaining of that just be… rude?
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