Customer Reviews

The Big Sleep: True Tales and Twisted Trivia About Death

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is an entertaining enough book to keep in the bathroom, but it's written in a cutesy style that I found off-putting. (I expected and wanted it to be witty, but the authors frequently settled for jokiness.)

Some of the facts are wrong -- for example, they perpetuate the myth that Jayne Mansfield was decapitated in the car wreck that killed her. She wasn't. In other places, there's just not enough information. They mention China's "Festival of the Hungry Dead," but instead of explaining what it is we get two paragraphs on how China's communist regime prevented the celebration of religious holidays. Snooze.

This book is cute, but for a more entertaining and in-depth exploration of death, check out Paradox Press's "The Big Book of Death" ...

I could not put this book down! Went through it in one sitting and I go back to it and read it again and again. When I'm not reading it, friends and family are always borrowing it. Full of facts and funnies.

Do you have any thoughts on how you will leave this Earth? After reading this book, you will most certainly question the thought. You will read and re-read chapters with such curiosity. Examples of freak accidents, gruesome serial slayings, Mother Nature, plagues and epidemics, poltergiest, genocide, and Spontaneous Human Combustion just name a few of the documented stories covered. This light-hearted book is full of death stories, ancient traditions, and phenomina. If nothing else, you'll be wondering how you will go. As it is, all life does come to an end. Oh yeah - interested in learning what happens to a body within the first few weeks of death? Check it out!

Perfect for the death enthusiast. I really enjoy the "famous last words" segments. Also includes trivia tidbits and short stories.

The Big Sleep is the kind of weird, funny, fascinating book that keeps you saying, "Just one more page." Some of those chapters really knocked me out . . . like "Death Styles of the Rich and Famous" or "Hell No, We Won't Go". It's far from some morose book on the realities of death. I loved the quotes, the jokes, and those incredible factoids. Hey, who knew that Balanchine died from a form of Mad Cow disease or that the Marquis de Sade died in an insane asylum. Crazy stuff.

This book was very interesting and keeps you wanting to read more. It's very well put together and I enjoyed it throughly. I look forward to more book by the authors.