The Visual Miscellaneum: A Colorful Guide to the World's Most Consequential Trivia [Paperback]

David McCandless (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0061748366 | ISBN-13: 978-0061748363 | Publication Date: November 10, 2009 | Edition: 1

The Visual Miscellaneum is a unique, groundbreaking look at the modern information age, helping readers make sense of the countless statistics and random facts that constantly bombard us. Using cutting edge graphs, charts, and illustrations, David McCandless creatively visualizes the world's surprising relationships and compelling data, covering everything from the most pleasurable guilty pleasures to how long it takes different condiments to spoil to world maps of Internet search terms.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“For those drowning in the digital age’s information glut, Visual Miscellaneum, the new eye-popping book of infographics …makes the perfect antidote. … By turns alarming and humorous in its revelations, it’s a timely, if meandering, look at the state of our world.” (Coolhunting.com )

“...like a Harper’s Index that’s sprung to life....For a book that’s as much about the online universe as it is a product of it, The Visual Miscellaneum is surprisingly timeless....The Visual Miscellaneum is not only required reading, but a book that rewards any number of re-reads.” (EyeWeekly.com )

“Dangerous…to have on your desk if you have other work to get done….[T]he visuals will draw you in, and the sharpness of the questions some of them attempt to answer—and the efficiency with which they can communicate complex comparisons in a single page—will keep you hooked.” (Omnivoracious )

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Harper Design; 1 edition (November 10, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061748366
• ISBN-13: 978-0061748363
• Product Dimensions: 9.7 x 7.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (37 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,752 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #5 in Books > Education & Reference > Fun Facts > Trivia
  • #51 in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Puzzles & Games

More About the Author

David McCandless is an award-winning writer, journalist, and copywriter. He has written for The Guardian, the Independent, Maxim, Stuff, and Wired; and has won two Webby awards.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

56 of 57 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Needs an editor, November 24, 2009

By 

Robert Shaver (Madison, WI) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Visual Miscellaneum: A Colorful Guide to the World's Most Consequential Trivia (Paperback)

I love this book - creative and thought provoking - Thank you.
A few of the pages alone are worth the price of the book - political left vs political right, creationism vs evolutionism, nature vs nurture. Access to the web site for updates is a great idea.

Suggestion for author's consideration: please clean up the errors and omissions. This should be a five star book. For example: the visually beautiful and useful index excludes several pages of the book; Pages 60 to 65 are missing a number of details. As a result, the pages make no sense.
My advice to the reader - wait for a revised edition or hope that someone replaces the printer.

128 of 142 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Full of examples on how NOT to present information., November 25, 2009

By 

Christian Rudder (Brooklyn, NY) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Visual Miscellaneum: A Colorful Guide to the World's Most Consequential Trivia (Paperback)

This book's charts are very pretty to look at, but the quantative approach in many of them was so bad and so confusing that for the first 50 pages I thought I was reading a spoof.

On page 10, an area representing $21B is larger than one representing $27B, and $60B looks to be about half of $230B. On pages 60 - 65 the charts have no labels whatsoever, and so there's literally no way to tell what they're trying to say: it's just six pages of colorful polygons. You'll find these kinds of blunders on almost every page; I've just chosen a few early examples.

I know it seems like I'm nit-picking, but for a book claiming in its subtitle to be some kind of statistical "guide," such flaws are fatal. If you're at all interested in examples of beautifully presented and accurate information, please read Beautiful Evidence or The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, 2nd edition instead.

42 of 47 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful, but..., December 2, 2009

By 

duisenburg2 (Germany) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Visual Miscellaneum: A Colorful Guide to the World's Most Consequential Trivia (Paperback)

As pointed out in other reviews and in comments on the Website [...], there are mistakes in this book that make you question the validity of many of the graphs. There are incorrect figures and scaling errors. For example, why does an area representing $60B look about half as large as one for $230B?

I want to make it very clear that the approach to visualize information this way is excellent, but the author seems to have given priority to artistic expression rather than accuracy.

Also, there are labels missing on several pages, due to a technical fault. ([...]) I would wait for a new edition with corrections.