The Encyclopedia of Guilty Pleasures: 1,001 Things You Hate to Love

by Julia Spalding, Sam Stall, Lou Harry

Book Overview

What do Neil Diamond, Touched by an Angel , Pamela Anderson, The Boy in the Plastic Bubble , White castle hamburgers, Benny Hill, Thomas Kinkade, and the song "You Light Up My Life" have in common? They're all guilty pleasures--and they're all celebrated in this massive A-to-Z encyclopedia. Authors Sam Stall, Lou Harry, and Julia Spalding have unearthed fascinating trivia about literature ( Valley of the Dolls, The Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue ), television ( The Real World, Land of the Lost ), fashion (Members Only jackets, the WonderBra), and more. Every page features a sophisticated two-column design and handy guide words for quick at-a-glance reference. Best of all, we've illustrated 100 of the guiltiest pleasures with the same portrait style used by the Wall Street Journal . Complete with 1,001 entries, it's the ultimate guide to everything you hate to love

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1931686548
• ISBN13: 9781931686549
• Release Date: September 2004
• Publisher: Quirk Books
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 0.92 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.6" x 7.2"

Customer Reviews

Actually VERY Good

Well-written, well-selected, and often very funny. The entries do a good job pinpointing the appeal of their respective cultural oddities, and the array is pretty dazzling. Heavily weighted toward the generation that came of age in the eighties, but hey, where else can you go for so much guilt in one place? Our colleges should consider giving it to foreign graduate students on their way through customs--it's a guide to all that's 'essentially useless', the hidden flotsam and jetsam of our culture. I got this as an 'extra' gift from a friend, and expected to find it moderately amusing, something to thumb through. Surprise: My partner and I were so impressed with the book that we both wound-up reading through the entire thing.

Afterthought ends up being great purchase!

I bought this book simply to bring my purchase up to the free shipping total, but it ended up being a great purchase! It's a hilarious look at all those guilty pleasures we all harbor. Don't pass up this little gem of a book. You'll be laughing for hours! It's illustrated, too.

This book is itself a guilty pleasure

What's not to like? Three hundred pages of your favorite trash, elevated to nostalgia, handily packaged, and punchily, pithily, wittily written. Makes a great gift! (see "Infomercials")

meandering through silly memories

I loved this book, particularly the illustrations which I have found out were actually done by the creator of the wall street journal portait hedcut, Kevin Sprouls. I have admired his work for years and was delighted to find him working in a less serious venue. The book's descriptions were bright, sharp and quick. It was an ironic pairing with Sprouls' serious style and made for a more humorous mix. buy it.

I'm guilty...I loved it.

Bought on a lark, this book was absolutely, dead on and beyond funny. As I read it on a flight, I at first tried to keep my chuckles to myself. But, I soon abandoned the effort and was annoying fellow passengers with full belly laughs. It was easy to read, and I found all of my own guilty pleasures listed and summed up with amazing accuracy. I read it cover to cover, but also loaned it to a friend who is enjoying it as much as I did but is just randomly choosing entries.