Customer Reviews

Who Cut the Cheese?: A Cutting Edge Way of Surviving Change by Shifting the Blame

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Spencer Johnson's Who Moved my Cheese left a bad taste in my mouth, and this book helped to clear my palate.

Who Cut the Cheese is a very funny book. I laughed out loud in public as I was reading it. The antics of the puny people as they deal with rats, the cheese famine and flatulence are quite entertaining.

Who Cut the Cheese provides a cynical comment on the modern workplace, especially on managers who compensate for their incompetence by being cruel and manipulative. Sometimes the book hits a bit close to home. The advice it gives is accurate and very applicable in today's corporate world, and if you have no scruples, you could go far by applying it. If the book didn't approach the subject with humour, it would be depressing.

Mason Brown has written a funny and puny tome that takes coporate backstabbing and the art of covering your ... to a whole new level. I laughed. I cried. (Because I was laughing so hard.) I thoroughly enjoyed this book. So much so that I bought additional copies for my "corporate" relatives who are sure to appreciate this tantalizing treat when it pops up in their Christmas Stockings.

A must read for all! Especially, those sick of the... feel good, new age, business tomes that have been increasingly and annoyingly showing up on the Best Seller Lists across the country.

Mason Brown's "Who Cut the Cheese?" is a hilarious book depicting corporate America in its truest light. The book is wonderfully funny! I enjoyed it so much that I couldn't resist buying more copies to send to my friends and relatives. It's a great stocking stuffer if you like funny gifts.

Anyone who doesn't appreciate this humor didn't read the original book (and therefore don't understand the utter stupidity and why it deserved to be mocked by the creation of this one).

The original, "Who Moved my Cheese?" Is the biggest piece of garbage ever written... so of course it's a bestseller. One should probably read this (but for God's sake, don't buy it!) before reading this book.... and once you do, you'll be glad you did.

I noticed that one reviewer didn't appreciate the humor, so I just wanted to point out that this was a parody: it is meant to have the crude humor that it used, because as crude as it is it isn't anywhere as crude as the technique used in the original. =)

As for me, I relate to the hands... (read the darn book to understand =) )

-J.H.C.

My boss forced me to read the original, and it practically killed me.

This book took some of the pain away (though not the recurring nightmares).

As for some reviewers charges of "crudeness" and ethnic stereotyping, I found Brown's coarser jokes to be a refreshingly politically incorrect tonic. It's also what I would expect from the managing editor of National Lampoon. Funny and edgy.

I also liked the parallels to "Heart of Darkness," and the progression into madness and death, but maybe that's reading too much into a parody book with a fart pun for a title.

I picked up Mason Brown's "Who Cut The Cheese?" on a pre-jury duty visit to my local bookstore. I had been looking for anything to pass the time at court - and I ended up discovering this comic gem! It's been a long time since I have laughed out loud from a book, but "Who Cut The Cheese" had me giggling in the jury waiting room. Several other prospective jurors wondered what I was reading, and I ending up sharing the book with three other people. Thank you Mr Brown, you made jury duty a lot more fun for us!

Mason Brown's parody only occasionally uses "toilet humor"; vulgarity is used no more than any other literary device in this short volume. Rather, the whole point of Brown's writing is to expose how extended and simple-minded allegories are used to smuggle into a conversation indefensible premises. Flatulence is only one of many unpleasant implications of the WHO STOLE MY CHEESE? allegory. Brown shows what would happen if people in real life fully accepted the premises of American corporate culture: cutthroat competition, the acceptance of any "change" authority hands out, and the cult of the CEO. The painful passages are not about gassy diets but at the end where the references to HEART OF DARKNESS as middle management jerks cut each other down and tear down civilization.

In addition to "vulgarity" and sophistication, there are nice subtle touches, such as sly references to real life corporate disasters like Long Term Capital and Swedish Match Company. Brown is listed as the author of fictional books teaching the same quick fix cutthroat lessons of corporate business for other parts of life; my favorite is: CRY WOLF AND WIN! HOW TO FALSELY ACCUSE RELATIVES OF MOLESTATION AND GAIN ATTENTION AND SYMPATHY. Brown shows us that such immoral tactics are the ultimate meaning of the Jack Welch Way.

WHO CUT THE CHEESE? is, in short, a brilliant morality tale for our times.
By the way, someone should tell Amazon that the Forward's author, Krubenaker, is not a real person.

Any book as bad as Who Moved My Cheese? deserves to have not just one, but two parodies written about it, and probably to have both of those parodies read. This is definitely the better book -- it's as bold and outrageous as the original was trite and ridiculous. If you've ever wondered how your boss got to be your boss and still is, READ THIS BOOK! If you have a boss whose motto is, "Do as I say, not as I do," READ THIS BOOK! Or if you really just want a good laugh about the way things really work in corporate America, READ THIS BOOK! You won't be disappointed!

Who Moved the Cheese is ripe for a parody. I've only read a little bit of the original, but Mr. Brown's book is devastating and funny. I'm surprised that someone let him get away with it. People don't write books like this anymore.

Mason Brown has done it again. Normally his witty talents are left to such magazines as Shwing and Maxim, but this time they're showcased in a hilarious send up of the business world's current manifesto. The book is hilarious and intelligent. If you liked, "Who Moved my Cheese?" you'll love, "Who Cut the Cheese?" Finally, a book that shows the true mindset of corporate America. You'll laugh. You'll cry. You'll buy it for all your friends.