“Do You Still Have that Book I Loaned You?”

Yes, I still have your book. This doesn’t have to be messy.

Currently reading: Paranormality by Richard Wiseman, which looks into why people believe in things like ghosts, spirit mediums and clairvoyance using science and wit. I’m a lifelong enthusiast of things like that – first as an outspoken apologist of the Loch Ness monster and later as a young sceptic with the scoffing power of ten young sceptics – so of course I’m enjoying it.

Essentially an investigation of the brain’s perceptual glitches, Paranormality takes away a sense of wonder with the one hand and almost immediately, with the other hand, gives you a whole new genre of things at which to boggle.

And then offers you instructions on how to deceive, swindle and irritate your loved ones with that knowledge. You know, if you’re into that sort of thing. Which I am.

Here’s Wiseman on how to finish up a convincing séance:

“At the end of the session, thank the group for participating and tell them that research has shown that the spirits may well follow them home and haunt their dreams for the rest of their lives.”

I’m only halfway through, but I’m willing to give this book six stars out of five.

My housemate got me this book on a whim, presumably because it’s exactly the kind of thing you should find on my shelf. It’s a book full of quotes “proving that keeping calm is simply not an option,” some of which are actually little bit helpful: “Clothes make the man. Naked people have very little influence on society.”—Mark Twain “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”—Albert Einstein “Laugh at yourself first, before anyone else can”—Elsa Maxwell and, appropriately: “Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes”—Oscar Wilde 

My housemate got me this book on a whim, presumably because it’s exactly the kind of thing you should find on my shelf. It’s a book full of quotes “proving that keeping calm is simply not an option,” some of which are actually little bit helpful:

“Clothes make the man. Naked people have very little influence on society.”
—Mark Twain

“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”
—Albert Einstein

“Laugh at yourself first, before anyone else can”
—Elsa Maxwell

and, appropriately:

“Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes”
—Oscar Wilde 

Fourteen year old Stephen King‘s 1961 submission letter to Spacemen Magazine for his short story called “The Killer.”  [lavielivre]

Fourteen year old Stephen King‘s 1961 submission letter to Spacemen Magazine for his short story called “The Killer.” 

[lavielivre]

It’s important, I think, to always be wondering what your “classics” may be. Not what school or a magazine says that you should like or feel close to, but what you actually like and feel close to. We should all be curators in our very own libraries. - Matthew Allard

It’s important, I think, to always be wondering what your “classics” may be. Not what school or a magazine says that you should like or feel close to, but what you actually like and feel close to. We should all be curators in our very own libraries.

- Matthew Allard