Customer Reviews

Would It Kill You to Stop Doing That: A Modern Guide to Manners

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Part essay and part on-the-street "comic investigation," this book sees Alford trying to improve the world's manners. It's no small task. He wages a "reverse-apology" campaign, saying aloud the apologies that others owe him; he becomes an online etiquette coach for his friends; he works as a tour guide for foreigners who are visiting New York City ; he asks people in various professions what unintentionally rude questions they are often asked. Throughout, he conducts a broader discussion of manners that is both anecdotal and historical. Great fun.

It's always fun to read Henry Alford's books (Big Kiss, How To Live). Only problem that arises for me is his writing is so mirthful that I tend to overlook what might be a serious important point. (Yes, folks, there are points that don't merit levity).

With his latest book Alford focuses on etiquette or good manners, very specific to our time. Here you'll receive pointers (if you stop laughing) on the most thoughtful way to conduct yourself on the internet, cell phone use and more - subjects way beyond the ken of Emily Post.

Alford begins his observations by recalling a visit to Japan, a country he calls "the Fort Knox of World Manners Reserve." There we hear the amazing story of a man who locked up his shop after Alford inquired about the location of a restaurant. The man accompanied Alford on a three block walk in pouring rain in order to show him the exact location. Chances of that happening in NYC?

Read carefully when the topic is becoming a mannerly participant on Facebook or other online sites and appropriate business e-mail responses. Alford hopes to make the world a more civil place by offering suggestions re thank-you notes, meeting someone for the first time, RSVP responses, how to chat with oldsters, and other daily occurrences.

Along the way he shares what he refers to as expert advice from Miss Manners and Tim Gunn. For this reader Henry Alford is the expert, a wise and witty one.

- Gail Cooke

Alford has written for Vanity Fair, The NY Times and The New Yorker. He has written three books and is often heard on NPR. The pros: I loved the writing and his rapier wit. The book is filled with colorful stories, anecdotes, surveys, experiments and interviews. He also offers up some thoughtful recommendations on appropriate manners and etiquette.

The challenges? I anticipated some logical sequencing and organization prior to opening the cover of a book on manners or etiquette. However, this is not your Mother's Reference Manual on Etiquette & Manners. This witty book is a random walk on the subject where often times you get lost in the story missing the etiquette punch line altogether. The author lurches from discussions involving the appropriateness of slurping noodles in Tokyo, to accepting all friend requests on Facebook to asking how much rent you pay in Manhattan, to stealing a cab.

A number of recommendations were thoughtful:

* Don't return a phone call with a text. "There's an implicit hierarchy of communication. If you go lower on the hierarchy, people will think there's a subtext."

* Don't overuse the word "thx" in emails especially to a sender that has spent considerable time sending you an email. Take a moment to use the sender's name and spell out Thanks. Tone is often lost in email and it's important that the recipient not misconstrue your intention.

* If someone sends you a gift certificate, why not send that person a photo of what you bought or at minimum tell them what you bought.

* Is it rude if someone refuses to accept your friend request? If you've actually met in the flesh, then yes, it sounds like it is. It's rude, too, in instances where you have not actually met, but have enjoyed a long period of correspondence or phone calls, or have heard about each other for years and years through mutual friends. However, before we become offended, it's important to consider the snubber's FB modus operandi. Some people on FB only friend family or people they are offline friends with; others want to friend every single person they can possible get their cyberpaws on.

A taste of his humor:

* If two people are staying in a hotel room, it is highly hospitable if one or the other of them gets into the habit of sometimes using the bathroom located off the hotel's lobby, particularly for lengthier sit-downs. To do so is to reduced aroma and anxiety, disperse foot traffic, and inject mystery into the relationship.

*(Teaching foreigners how to steal a cab) You've got to be out in the traffic. Out in the traffic but not run over. But you've got to be a little brazen. And the rule for stealing a cab is that you've got to walk at least a block upstream. So people don't see you. (Setting aside that there might be) a harried-looking businesswoman also trying to hail a cab (and you've just jumped the line)

This is definitely not old school manners but it's terrifically funny. He hits on a few pretty salient points about returning calls and emails in this day and age of so much technology. Also to be noted are his observences of communication at parties. I may follow a few of his pointers to appear more interested in others.

Part etiquette-based adventure, part essay, and completely void of any of the preachiness one might typically associate with the "Manners" genre, "Would It Kill You To Stop Doing That: A Modern Guide To Manners" by Henry Alford was a true joy to read. Throughout the book, Alford is simultaneously funny and thought provoking; at one moment he's describing a Japanese restauranteur's outfit, which puts a large emphasis on outerwear and leather straps, as "very Gay Ski-Lift Operator," the next he's poignantly outlying just how poorly the rest of the world thinks of American's manners.

Alford's exotic etiquette experiments (acting as a tour guide for foreigners visiting New York City, offering manners advice to his Facebook friends, soliciting the various types of rude questions encountered in various professions) are entertaining enough simply in their ideas and execution, but turn to pure gold when relayed with his wit and intelligent observation.

Alford has clearly spent a good amount of time ruminating on how we might better treat one another and his vision for a more polite world is random-acts-of-kindness inspiring. Best of all, his behavioral suggestions don't come off as being handed down on stone tablets, but more like something that cropped up a great lunch conversation with your very funny, very smart, and very self-critical best friend.

First off, the main downside to this book: Not enough time spent with my own two preferred manners mavens, Tim Gunn and Miss Manners. I found the sections spent interviewing them to be quite fun, but sadly short - similar to attending a dinner advertising a "sumptuous mousse dessert" and then you get your serving: a tiny teaspoon. Tastes good, but you were expecting a good bit more of it.

As to the book itself - short, sharp-tongued, and occasionally scathing. There is some language towards the end (he is a NYC greeter, and likes to shock his overseas visitors by taking them by the booth selling "effing" shirts.) There is also a bit of a better than thou tone throughout, but strangely enough, it humanizes rather than irritates. The section on his "retaliatory manners" especially hit me square in my own often passive-aggressive tendencies, and made like him all the more because of our shared failings.

Overall, nothing earth-shattering, and most certainly not exhaustive or even complete, but a very enjoyable short and sassy addition to the voices of those calling out for a continuation and furtherance of modern manners.

This is a very funny book. Alford has the self deprecating humor of David Sedaris but written with greater cleverness and erudition.
While it won't replace Emily Post, you will have a much better time reading it and you will come away with information that Emily Post didn't even know you needed.
Just don't read it will slurping those noodles, you might snarf, and that would just be bad manners.

The author does a good job of pointing out the way that much of the formality of politeness has been lost, as well as pointing out the protocols that replaced them. Be ready for him to answer a lot of questions you might never have known to ask --or who to ask them of. I bought this after seeing an interview with the author on television as he promoted his book. I found that it was a wise purchase and I'm glad I bought his book. Alford reveals a dry wit as he educates us on how to conduct ourselves in a wide variety of situations. It's a good book, but not quite what one might expect if they were looking for a self-help manual. Or, maybe it is!

Don't waste your time reading this. The only interesting chapter was the beginning one about Japanese etiquette. After that, it's all down hill. Don't bother purchasing the book; even a library copy was a waste. Henry Alford is amusing, and he is obviously his biggest fan. Why make a point in 2 sentences when 2 pages will do. Too much extraneous, non-manners related info. Too much emphasis on his gay life, which has nothing to do with this so-called "modern guide to manners". This book could have been condensed to a magazine article. I thought of returning the book 1/3 of the way through but wondered if I would miss something funny. I was wrong. Paging through it to find the end revealed nothing of value. Oh, and the "Touch the Waiter/Waitress" game is rude, disrespectful, sexually harassing, juvenile and completely conflicts with Henry's supposed value of having manners and being considerate of people. Crass. As "they" say, "there's no accounting for taste".

In my opinion the central theme of this book was Americans are brutish animals. I'm not sure that I can entirely disagree with that sentiment, but what I do disagree with is the author's reliance on passive-aggressive behavior as the remedy for poor behavior. Exasperated apologies and lectures don't set an example of good manners, it encourages defensiveness and the very egoism that the author denounces. When bumped by another person, it would be better to say something like "please be more careful" in a calm voice instead of launching into a monologue about apologizing for someone else so at least someone has apologized. The former is asking the person to be more respectful of your space while the latter is telling the person to be ashamed of his or her behavior. That is just one example of many from the book in which passive-aggressiveness is passed off as "good manners."

The only redeeming content in this book is the small descriptions of different social customs used by different groups both in America and abroad. Otherwise, there is really nothing of value to read in this book.