How the Hell Did This Happen?

How the Hell Did This Happen? PDF Author: P. J. O'Rourke
Publisher: Open Road + Grove/Atlantic
ISBN: 0802189385
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 211

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Book Description
The iconic humorist offers his take on the stranger-than-fiction (and stranger-than-fact) 2016 presidential election and its equally unbelievable aftermath. The 2016 election cycle was so absurd that celebrated political satirist, journalist, and die-hard Republican P. J. O’Rourke endorsed Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. As P. J. put it, “America is experiencing the most severe outbreak of mass psychosis since the Salem witch trials of 1692. So why not put Hillary on the dunking stool?” In How the Hell Did This Happen?, P. J. brings his critical eye and inimitable voice to some seriously risky business. Starting in June 2015, he asks, “Who are these jacklegs, high-binders, wire-pullers, mountebanks, swellheads, buncombe spigots, four-flushers and animated spittoons offering themselves as worthy of America’s highest office?” and surveys the full cast of presidential candidates including everyone you’ve already forgotten and everyone you wish you could forget. P. J. offers a brief history of how our insane process for picking who will run for president evolved, from the very first nominating convention (thanks, Anti-Masonic Party) through the reforms of the Progressive era (because there’s nothing that can’t be worsened by reform) to the present. He takes us through the debates and key primaries and analyzes everything from the campaign platforms (or lack thereof) to presidential style (“Trump’s appearance—indeed, Trump’s existence—is a little guy’s idea of living large. A private plane! A swell joint in Florida! Gold-plated toilet handles!”). And he rises from the depths of despair to come up with a better way to choose a president. Following his come-to-Satan moment with Hillary and the Beginning of End Times in November, P. J. reckons with a new age: “America is experiencing a change in the nature of leadership. We’re getting rid of our leaders. And we’re starting at the top.” “Where are we going? Where have we been? P. J. O’Rourke casts his gimlet gaze on the circus of clowns-people foisted on us by the 2016 election—and demands to know How the Hell Did This Happen?” —Vanity Fair

How the Hell Did This Happen?

How the Hell Did This Happen? PDF Author: P. J. O'Rourke
Publisher: Open Road + Grove/Atlantic
ISBN: 0802189385
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 211

Get Book Here

Book Description
The iconic humorist offers his take on the stranger-than-fiction (and stranger-than-fact) 2016 presidential election and its equally unbelievable aftermath. The 2016 election cycle was so absurd that celebrated political satirist, journalist, and die-hard Republican P. J. O’Rourke endorsed Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. As P. J. put it, “America is experiencing the most severe outbreak of mass psychosis since the Salem witch trials of 1692. So why not put Hillary on the dunking stool?” In How the Hell Did This Happen?, P. J. brings his critical eye and inimitable voice to some seriously risky business. Starting in June 2015, he asks, “Who are these jacklegs, high-binders, wire-pullers, mountebanks, swellheads, buncombe spigots, four-flushers and animated spittoons offering themselves as worthy of America’s highest office?” and surveys the full cast of presidential candidates including everyone you’ve already forgotten and everyone you wish you could forget. P. J. offers a brief history of how our insane process for picking who will run for president evolved, from the very first nominating convention (thanks, Anti-Masonic Party) through the reforms of the Progressive era (because there’s nothing that can’t be worsened by reform) to the present. He takes us through the debates and key primaries and analyzes everything from the campaign platforms (or lack thereof) to presidential style (“Trump’s appearance—indeed, Trump’s existence—is a little guy’s idea of living large. A private plane! A swell joint in Florida! Gold-plated toilet handles!”). And he rises from the depths of despair to come up with a better way to choose a president. Following his come-to-Satan moment with Hillary and the Beginning of End Times in November, P. J. reckons with a new age: “America is experiencing a change in the nature of leadership. We’re getting rid of our leaders. And we’re starting at the top.” “Where are we going? Where have we been? P. J. O’Rourke casts his gimlet gaze on the circus of clowns-people foisted on us by the 2016 election—and demands to know How the Hell Did This Happen?” —Vanity Fair

What the Hell Did I Just Read

What the Hell Did I Just Read PDF Author: Jason Pargin
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
ISBN: 1466835443
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 384

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Book Description
John Dies at the End's "smart take on fear manages to tap into readers' existential dread on one page, then have them laughing the next" (Publishers Weekly) and This Book is Full of Spiders was "unlike any other book of the genre" (Washington Post). Now, New York Times bestselling author Jason Pargin is back with What the Hell Did I Just Read, the third installment of this black-humored thriller series. It's the story "They" don't want you to read. Though, to be fair, "They" are probably right about this one. To quote the Bible, "Learning the truth can be like loosening a necktie, only to realize it was the only thing keeping your head attached." No, don't put the book back on the shelf -- it is now your duty to purchase it to prevent others from reading it. Yes, it works with e-books, too, I don't have time to explain how. While investigating a fairly straightforward case of a shape-shifting interdimensional child predator, Dave, John, and Amy realized there might actually be something weird going on. Together, they navigate a diabolically convoluted maze of illusions, lies, and their own incompetence in an attempt to uncover a terrible truth they -- like you -- would be better off not knowing. Your first impulse will be to think that a story this gruesome -- and, to be frank, stupid -- cannot possibly be true. That is precisely the reaction "They" are hoping for.

How the Hell Did This Happen?

How the Hell Did This Happen? PDF Author: PJ ORourke
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781611856217
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description


Heads You Win

Heads You Win PDF Author: Jeffrey Archer
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
ISBN: 1250172519
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 446

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Book Description
Heads You Win is international #1 bestseller Jeffrey Archer’s most ambitious and creative work since Kane and Abel, with a final twist that will shock even his most ardent of fans. Leningrad, Russia, 1968: From an early age it is clear that Alexander Karpenko is destined to lead his countrymen. But when his father is assassinated by the KGB for defying the state, Alexander and his mother will have to escape Russia if they hope to survive. At the docks, they have an irreversible choice: board a container ship bound for America or one bound for Great Britain. Alexander leaves the choice to a toss of a coin... In a single moment, a double twist decides Alexander’s future. During an epic tale, spanning two continents and thirty years, we follow Alexander through triumph and defeat as he sets out on parallel lives as Alex in New York and Sasha in London. As this unique story unfolds, both come to realize that to find their destiny they must face the past they left behind as Alexander in Russia.

Fall; or, Dodge in Hell

Fall; or, Dodge in Hell PDF Author: Neal Stephenson
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062458736
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 1051

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Book Description
New York Times Bestseller A New York Times Notable Book The #1 New York Times bestselling author of Seveneves, Anathem, Reamde, and Cryptonomicon returns with a wildly inventive and entertaining science fiction thriller—Paradise Lost by way of Philip K. Dick—that unfolds in the near future, in parallel worlds. In his youth, Richard “Dodge” Forthrast founded Corporation 9592, a gaming company that made him a multibillionaire. Now in his middle years, Dodge appreciates his comfortable, unencumbered life, managing his myriad business interests, and spending time with his beloved niece Zula and her young daughter, Sophia. One beautiful autumn day, while he undergoes a routine medical procedure, something goes irrevocably wrong. Dodge is pronounced brain dead and put on life support, leaving his stunned family and close friends with difficult decisions. Long ago, when a much younger Dodge drew up his will, he directed that his body be given to a cryonics company now owned by enigmatic tech entrepreneur Elmo Shepherd. Legally bound to follow the directive despite their misgivings, Dodge’s family has his brain scanned and its data structures uploaded and stored in the cloud, until it can eventually be revived. In the coming years, technology allows Dodge’s brain to be turned back on. It is an achievement that is nothing less than the disruption of death itself. An eternal afterlife—the Bitworld—is created, in which humans continue to exist as digital souls. But this brave new immortal world is not the Utopia it might first seem . . . Fall, or Dodge in Hell is pure, unadulterated fun: a grand drama of analog and digital, man and machine, angels and demons, gods and followers, the finite and the eternal. In this exhilarating epic, Neal Stephenson raises profound existential questions and touches on the revolutionary breakthroughs that are transforming our future. Combining the technological, philosophical, and spiritual in one grand myth, he delivers a mind-blowing speculative literary saga for the modern age.

Age and Guile

Age and Guile PDF Author: P. J. O'Rourke
Publisher: Open Road + Grove/Atlantic
ISBN: 1555847064
Category : Humor
Languages : en
Pages : 368

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Book Description
The political humorist shares his transformation from dirty hippie to conservative middle-aged grouch: “An incorrigible comic gift” (The New York Times Book Review). The #1 New York Times–bestselling author of Give War a Chance was at one time a raving pinko, with scars on his formerly bleeding heart to prove it. In Age and Guile: Beat Youth, Innocence, and a Bad Haircut, P. J. O’Rourke chronicles the remarkable trajectory that took him from the lighthearted fun of the revolutionary barricades to the serious business of the nineteenth hole. How did the O’Rourke of 1970, who summarized the world of “grown-ups” as “materialism, sexual hang-ups, the Republican party, uncomfortable clothes, engagement rings, car accidents, Pat Boone, competition, patriotism, cheating, lying, ranch houses, and TV” come to be in favor of all of those things? What caused his metamorphosis from a beatnik-hippie type comfortable sleeping on dirty mattresses in pot-addled communes during his days as a writer for assorted “underground” papers? Here, O’Rourke shows how his socialist idealism and avant-garde aesthetic tendencies were cured, and how he acquired a healthy and commendable interest in national defense, balanced budgets, Porsches, and Cohiba cigars. From a former editor-in-chief of National Lampoon and frequent NPR guest, this hilarious essay collection shows that there’s hope for all those suffering from acute bohemianism.

The Hell Candidate

The Hell Candidate PDF Author: GRAHAM. MASTERTON
Publisher: Telos Publishing
ISBN: 9781845839727
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 328

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Book Description
I opened my eyes. I wasn't dreaming. I was awake. And right beside me, Jennifer was panting and moaning and bouncing up and down on the bed. I stared harder into the darkness, chilled with fright, and against the dim gray light that filtered in through the closely-drawn drapes, I saw an outline on top of Jennifer that made me cram my hand into my mouth to stop myself from screaming. It was a huge, bulky outline, as dark as sin. But its eyes glowed slanted and orange, like the eyes of a wolf, and on its head were two curved horns. It stank of stale incense and animal sweat, and it was grunting with grotesque delight. When businessman Hunter Peal decided to run for President of the USA, they said he didn't have a chance in Hell ... but they were wrong. Initially he seemed pleasant and moderate ... but then everything started to change. As his popularity grew, so did his ability to influence people, sending them weeping to their knees, and seeing sights which no cameras could capture. And what of his opponents and the strange 'accidents' which befel them? Indeed, Hunter Peal was not the man he once was ... one of the denizens of Hell has made a pact with him, and on his inauguration, all Hell will be let loose. Literally. Telos Publishing is proud to present a superb new edition of this long out-of-print 1981 novel. A horrific tale of lust and greed and power from one of the genre's greatest writers, Graham Masterton. 'If you like horror novels, the kind that make you catch your breath at certain parts, can change your perception of the temperature in the room and leave you with impressions that can't be unseen for days - if ever - then this is your book. It really is an absolute masterpiece and in my opinion one of the weirdest, most twisted horror tales ever told, where the message, "Be careful who you vote for" really makes a hell of a lot of sense.' Cat DeSpira, Retrobitch

The Funny Stuff

The Funny Stuff PDF Author: P. J. O'Rourke
Publisher: Grove Press
ISBN: 0802160654
Category : Humor
Languages : en
Pages : 215

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Book Description
A compendium of quotes and riffs from more than four decades of writing by P.J. O’Rourke on subjects ranging from government (“Giving money and power to politicians is like giving car keys and whiskey to teenage boys”) to fishing (”a sport invented by insects and you are the bait”) to apps (“we need a no-app app—let’s call it a nap”) to be published on what would have been his 75th birthday. “P. J. O’Rourke was the funniest writer of his generation, one of the smartest and one of the most prolific. Now that he belongs to the ages, P.J. takes his rightful place along with Oscar Wilde, Mark Twain and Dorothy Parker in the Pantheon of Quote Gods.”—Christopher Buckley from his introduction When The Penguin Dictionary of Modern Humorous Quotations was published in 1994, P. J. O’Rourke had more entries than any living writer. And he kept writing funny stuff for another 28 years. Now, for the first time, the best material is collected in one volume. Edited by his longtime friend and member of the American Society of Magazine Editors Hall of Fame Terry McDonell, THE FUNNY STUFF is arranged in six sections, organized by subject in alphabetical order from Agriculture to Xenophobia. From his earliest days at the National Lampoon in the 1970s, through his classic reporting for Rolling Stone in the 80s and 90s to his post-Trump, pandemic, new media observations of recent years, P.J. produced incisive, amusing copy. Not only did P.J. write memorable one-liners, he also meticulously constructed riffs that built to a crescendo of hilarity and outrage—and are still being quoted years later. His prose has the electric verbal energy of Tom Wolfe or Hunter Thompson, but P.J. is more flat out funny. And through it all comes his clear-eyed take on politics, economics, human nature—and fun. THE FUNNY STUFF is a book for P.J. fans to devour but also a book that will bring new readers and stand as testament to one of the truly original American writers of the last 50 years.

A Short Stay in Hell

A Short Stay in Hell PDF Author: Steven L. Peck
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780983748441
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 104

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Book Description
A damned man struggles to find meaning in a library, the dimensions of which are measured in light years.

Happy Hour in Hell

Happy Hour in Hell PDF Author: Tad Williams
Publisher: Hachette UK
ISBN: 144473864X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 542

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Book Description
Bobby Dollar has a problem or four of epic proportions. Problem one: his best friend Sam has given him an angel's feather that also happens to be evidence of an unholy pact between Bobby's employers and those who dwell in the infernal depths. Problem two: Eligor, Grand Duke of Hell, wants to get his claws on the feather at all costs, but particularly at all cost to Bobby . Problem three: Bobby has fallen in love with Casimira, Countess of Cold Hands, who just happens to be Eligor's girlfriend. Problem four: Eligor, aware of Problem three, has whisked Casimira off to the Bottomless Pit itself, telling Bobby he will never see her again unless he hands over the feather. But Bobby, long-time veteran of the endless war between above and below, is not the type of guy who finds Hell intimidating. All he has to do is toss on a demon's body, sneak through the infernal gates, solve the mystery of the angel's feather, and rescue the girl. Saving the day should just be a matter of an eon or two of anguish, mutilation and horror. If only it were that easy.