Customer Reviews

Don't Try This at Home: How to Win a Sumo Match, Catch a Great White Shark, Start an Independent Nation and Other Extraordinary Feats (For Ordinary People)

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Imagine calling Fort Knox and asking the best way to break in and steal the gold. Don't have the guts for it? Don't worry, because Hunter Fulghum has done it for you. He has contacted everyone from the U.S. Dept. of Energy to his local alien experts to find out how you would do everything from Swim the English Channel to Borrow the Mona Lisa to Start an Independant Nation.

Aside from being funny and quite interesting, the book is very well written; I highly recommend it.

I've found Don't Try This At Home to be lighthearted and fun. It's also impractical and seems to be based largely on complete fantasy. What is it about you ask? Think of it as a 264 page Do-It-Yourself guide for the armchair adventurer.

Megalomaniacs will want to skip right to "Form an Independent Nation". In just 8 short pages, Fulghum describes the steps you'd need to complete. Like most of the items in the book, Forming an Independent Nation does have a large number of prerequisites. For example you will need "hard currency", especially if you choose to acquire your nation through peaceful means. Well no worries, just check out Fulghum's section on stealing gold from Fort Knox.

Thrill seekers, there's plenty of material here for you too. Good starting points are "Fly Through the Eye of a Hurricane" or "Guide and Surface a Nuclear Sub through Ice". My personal favorite is "Drive a Tank through a Tornado". Fulghum says the tank is "available from the US Army, contact the Pentagon to arrange purchase or lease". Does anyone have a phone number?

This book will definitely raise a few eye brows when people catch this in your library. I myself wanted to catch a great white shark and name him Fred. It's funny because it takes everything so seriously and makes you think. But over all don't expect yourself to sit down and read it in one setting. It for me at least didn't hold my attention that long. I ended up and just browsing through it with a 'hmm' expression. It's interesting but not worth spending your money on.

Definately intersting, and definately just for fun. Many items are common sense if you take the time to stop and think about them, but there are a number of items that have little gems of information that a layperson would never have known to try should they ever encounter such a situation.

Fun, if ultimately impracical.

Some are more realistic than others, but all are entertaining. I'll certainly allow this book when I start my own nation off the coast of Africa.

So help me, a lot of this stuff might actually work... Of course most of their ideas would take more time, money and resources than i'll ever have, but they're fun to think about!

I glanced at this while browsing in a small-town bookstore in Mystic, CT. It's a very interesting guide to doing the near-impossible, explained very seriously, which adds to the laughter. Breaking into Fort Knox? Starting your own country? (Tip: find an island nobody's yet claimed, or buy a little one from another country.) Very good.

OKAY, HOW MANY SHARKS AM I GOING TO FEND OFF IN MY LIFETIME? IT DOESN'TMATTER, BECAUSE I'VE READ ABOUT IT A HUNDRED. BRING IT ON
THIS IS A GREAT BOOK. IF YOU'RE LOOKING FOR SOMETHING SIMILIAR ABOUT WAITING TABLES, CHECK OUT CLAMCHOWDER.BIZ. THIS BOOK IS FANTASTIC.