Customer Reviews

An Incomplete and Inaccurate History of Sport: . . . and Other Random Thoughts from Childhood to Fatherhood

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

 

 

This book was a great read. With Kenny Mayne's quirky sense of humor, splashes of childhood stories, drawing by his daughters, and touching moments through his life, I couldn't put the thing down. Seriously it took me like 3 or 4 days to finish the book. The chapter about his Dancing with the Stars appearance was one of my favorites.

if you are a fan of his Mayne Event segments on ESPN you will love this book

Overall, Kenny Mayne cracks me up. I love his Dance Center segments on ABC's Dancing With The Stars. I've long enjoyed him on SportsCenter as well.

I expected more of the same stuff in this book, and that's exactly what I got. Even though it's supposed to be an incomplete and inaccurate history of sport, I honestly expected a little more about the sports themselves. Instead Kenny seems to segue a lot into childhood memories.

While I wanted more of his quirky take on sports, I found myself really enjoying the look back to childhood. His talking about wiffle ball, and it being the second greatest sport of all time really made me laugh because it sparked memories of my own. While I can't claim to have hit 843 home runs in a single summer, I laughed and reminisced about my own childhood while reading through his.

There were chapters in there that seemed a little like filler and nothing more, and frankly, I wouldn't have minded more about the relation to sports growing up.

Overall though, it was a quick, fun read. I was done with it in a day. If you like Kenny Mayne's sense of humor, you'll enjoy the book.

If you're a fan of Kenny Mayne and or sports this is a MUST read.

My Father bought me the book and warned me that I could not stop reading it once I started. For everyone who loves Kenny's unique sense of humor and that "special way" of reporting sports and other stories at ESPN, the book is every bit written with the same humor only much more. One does not have to be a sports fanatic (although I am) to enjoy the book. It only requires wanting to be entertained for a couple hours and forget about the ills of the world for awhile (especially the election crap) The book tells a lot about Kenny Mayne, his family and his life in a very humorous way. My father who is 61 years of age told me he could identify with almost every sport mentioned. He also said that he (Bob Carper Ashley,Ohio 1958 holds the record (988) for wiffle ball home runs in a summer in case Kenny reads this review. But at 28, I must say, I loved the book. BUY IT! YOU WILL NOT REGRET IT! THANKS FATHER! AARON CARPER.

This book is just what you'd expect. Kenny Mayne at his finest. Truely hilarious with no effort at all. Written excerpts describing 60 or 70 sports in his own special way. Best part - hes is not inhibited by 4 letters (ESPN) and has written anything he likes.

I am a Kenny Mayne fan and I enjoyed his book. Parts had me laughing out loud. Other parts made no sense. Much like Kenny's segments on NFL Countdown. The drawings by his kids were a great extra.

I bought this book because I like Kenny's sense of humor. I was right, it was funny and a quick delightful read.

... because zero is not an option. I picked up the audio book for a drive from the Tampa area to Miami and back and immediately regretted only picking up one book since I was stuck listening to it. I am a sports fan and enjoy writers like Dave Barry, Colbert, etc. but this rambling, repetitive, non-insightful book is a mess. Now I know that his calling us idiots for buying and/or listening to it is supposed to be funny but it got old long before the tenth time he mentioned it. It is a good thing an editor did not get near it since it would have taken up only 1 CD instead of 5!

I picked this up on audio book loan from Cracker Barrel. For the first time in ten years, I returned it early.

Kenny Mayne seems like a nice guy with some flashes of real writing talent. Sadly this book is misguided and weird stream of consciousness that doesn't work out. His jokes fall flat and his wordsmithing is third-rate. His style is that of a poorly imitated Dave Barry. He is at his worst when he's making stuff up.

He is excellent when he tells stories of things that actually happened. Kenny should write a memoir. Until then save your time and money and avoid this half-baked, ill-concieved effort.

If you love Kenny Mayne's goofy, dry sense of humor then you may enjoy this humor book. It's not a serious look at the history of sport (though there are a few "relevant facts" tossed in) but rather a humor book in the style of the recent books from Jon Stewart and Steve Colbert. Because it lacks any focus and hyper-actively jumps from thought to thought with little development of any single idea the book ultimately is only for those male readers who have a short attention span and probably don't like to read much.

He covers traditional and oddball sports, including badminton, bocce, rowing, dodgeball and wiffle ball. There's also a section on carnival games. These chapters range from a a couple paragraphs to five pages, so none are really developed enough to make much of a point.

He includes pictures drawn by his daughters, shares some personal information (which we don't know if it's true because so much of the book is written in a mocking style), and even spends time talking about Dancing with the Stars. It may make a good book for dad for Christmas or Father's Day.

Unless you are a huge Kenny fan the book is probably not your thing. There isn't enough solid information in it and the joking tones gets old really fast. It would have been better if he would have truly done some solid research, presented an interesting perspective on sports history and then tossed in some humor along the way. Instead he has written a book that ends up being just one big joke--and it isn't that funny.