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Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Boese, the "curator" of www.museumofhoaxes.com, here collects some of the more fascinating hoaxes from medieval times to the dot-com era. After an initial "gullibility test," designed to show how hard it can be to detect actual hoaxes, Boese organizes his entries chronologically, arguing that hoaxing styles and subjects reflect an era's overall mood. Thus, in pre-modern times, the "concept of truth" was treated "allegorically and spiritually," so hoaxes (such as Sir John Mandeville's fantastical beasts) were not as scientifically involved as our modern frauds (Rorvik's 1978 cloning of a man or the 1999 Piltdown Chicken). Happily, Boese minimizes his theorizing, letting readers just have fun browsing through a few centuries of human trickery. While most of these hoaxes are entertaining (England's Mary Toft, who in 1726 "began to give birth to rabbits" or the South Seas fatu-liva bird that laid square eggs "which remarkably resembled dice"), a handful are disturbing (the 1987 Tawana Brawley case, involving an unsubstantiated act of racial hatred) or even deadly (e.g., the case of the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, which was used to justify anti-Semitism). While short accounts of a variety of hoaxes won't satisfy aficionados, the general public may find it useful to know how some familiar hoaxes e.g., the Loch Ness monster were unmasked, and Boese's "suggested reading" list will help intrigued readers dig deeper. Photos and illus.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
Times may change, and conventional wisdom may evolve and mature, but one thing people never seem to grow out of is the desire to put one over on unsuspecting victims. Boese's Museum of Hoaxes is an amusing catalog of tricks, pranks, publicity stunts, and outright scams that people have played on each other over the years. From fossils that contradicted accepted science, to the woman who gave birth to rabbits (guess how that trick worked), to newspaper reports of life on the moon, Boese describes each trick's appearance, how the perpetrators did it, and its effect on the general public. The book is organized by time period; each chapter begins with an introduction that puts the hoaxes into context, explaining what was believed possible at the time--a helpful inclusion, since many will seem like obvious frauds to modern readers. Whether it is picked for cover-to-cover reading or occasional browsing, readers are sure to find many laughs. Gavin Quinn
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
See all Editorial Reviews
Boese, the "curator" of www.museumofhoaxes.com, here collects some of the more fascinating hoaxes from medieval times to the dot-com era. After an initial "gullibility test," designed to show how hard it can be to detect actual hoaxes, Boese organizes his entries chronologically, arguing that hoaxing styles and subjects reflect an era's overall mood. Thus, in pre-modern times, the "concept of truth" was treated "allegorically and spiritually," so hoaxes (such as Sir John Mandeville's fantastical beasts) were not as scientifically involved as our modern frauds (Rorvik's 1978 cloning of a man or the 1999 Piltdown Chicken). Happily, Boese minimizes his theorizing, letting readers just have fun browsing through a few centuries of human trickery. While most of these hoaxes are entertaining (England's Mary Toft, who in 1726 "began to give birth to rabbits" or the South Seas fatu-liva bird that laid square eggs "which remarkably resembled dice"), a handful are disturbing (the 1987 Tawana Brawley case, involving an unsubstantiated act of racial hatred) or even deadly (e.g., the case of the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, which was used to justify anti-Semitism). While short accounts of a variety of hoaxes won't satisfy aficionados, the general public may find it useful to know how some familiar hoaxes e.g., the Loch Ness monster were unmasked, and Boese's "suggested reading" list will help intrigued readers dig deeper. Photos and illus.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
Times may change, and conventional wisdom may evolve and mature, but one thing people never seem to grow out of is the desire to put one over on unsuspecting victims. Boese's Museum of Hoaxes is an amusing catalog of tricks, pranks, publicity stunts, and outright scams that people have played on each other over the years. From fossils that contradicted accepted science, to the woman who gave birth to rabbits (guess how that trick worked), to newspaper reports of life on the moon, Boese describes each trick's appearance, how the perpetrators did it, and its effect on the general public. The book is organized by time period; each chapter begins with an introduction that puts the hoaxes into context, explaining what was believed possible at the time--a helpful inclusion, since many will seem like obvious frauds to modern readers. Whether it is picked for cover-to-cover reading or occasional browsing, readers are sure to find many laughs. Gavin Quinn
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
See all Editorial Reviews
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First Sentence:
Today it's become commonplace to declare that we live in the Age of Information. Read the first page Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
New York, Catholic Church, Civil War, Soviet Union, Taco Bell, World War, United States, Benjamin Franklin, Jonathan Swift, Alan Abel, Joey Skaggs, Liberty Bell, National Geographic, Social Text, April Fool, Cordell Hauglie, Los Angeles, Mark Twain, Prester John, Adolf Hitler, Cold War, David Manning, Loch Ness, Mary Toft, Piltdown Man New!
Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Today it's become commonplace to declare that we live in the Age of Information. Read the first page Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
New York, Catholic Church, Civil War, Soviet Union, Taco Bell, World War, United States, Benjamin Franklin, Jonathan Swift, Alan Abel, Joey Skaggs, Liberty Bell, National Geographic, Social Text, April Fool, Cordell Hauglie, Los Angeles, Mark Twain, Prester John, Adolf Hitler, Cold War, David Manning, Loch Ness, Mary Toft, Piltdown Man New!
Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Citations (learn more)
This book cites 70
books:
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5
books
cite this book:
- The Description of the World (2 Vol. Set) by Marco Polo on page 16, Back Matter (1), and Back Matter (2)
- The Invisible Man and The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells on page 128, and Back Matter
- The War of the Worlds (Penguin Classics) by H.G. Wells on page 128, and Back Matter
- The Cruise of the Kawa: Wanderings in the South Seas by Walter E. Traprock on page 117, and Back Matter
- War of the Worlds( in German) by Wells on page 128, and Back Matter
See all 70 books this book cites
- There's a Customer Born Every Minute: P.T. Barnum's Amazing 10 "Rings of Power" for Creating Fame, Fortune, and a Business Empire TodayGuaranteed! by Joe Vitale on page 29, and Back Matter
- Degunking Your Email, Spam, and Viruses by Jeff Duntemann on page 289
- Encyclopedia of Fraud, 2005 Edition by Joseph T. Wells on page 479
- Lake Monster Mysteries: Investigating the World's Most Elusive Creatures by Benjamin Radford on page 24
- Tropes for the Past: Hayden White and the History / Literature Debate (Internationale Forschungen zur Allgemeinen und Vergleichenden Literaturwissenschaft ... & Vergleichenden Literaturwissenschaft) by Kuisma Korhonen on page 103
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