For my full book review, go here: https://thebeerthrillers.com/2022/02/01/book-review-1339-quite-interesting-facts...

For a quick excerpt:

The facts come at you hard and heavy and fast in this quick to read but compact and dense volume. There is four facts per page and there isn’t an exact order to any or all of them. You’ll go from Tolstoy learning to ride bike at 67 to The Swiss are the only Europeans to eat dog meat.

Which right there is one of those spurious ‘facts’ as I mentioned earlier. Firstly, its an extremely over generalized comment / fact. Secondly, its extremely loosely defined. I understand what the ‘fact’ above is saying – that the culture of Swiss people accepts eating dog meat and do so regularly; but it also feels – especially now in the modern (2020’s) era, that its just a massive simplification and over generalization. Especially also throwing out the “only Europeans” part too.

Moving on, we come to one that as a “myth” has been debunked by many many many people over the past decades. From page 215:

The lower the ration between a man’s index and ring fingers, the longer his penis will be.

This has been debunked so often throughout the history of sexual knowledge and education. Its also one of the most regularly Googled things (men looking for help on the size of their penis, if their big enough, if their too small, how do you know the size of a man’s penis by looking at him, is there a correlation between feet size and penis, is there a correlation between finger length and penis size, etc etc etc etc). And time and time again it has been shown that there is no correlation.

But here it is in print…. but don’t worry, they have a site you can use to get more information and to fact check right? Oh…. oh no….. that leads a to a ‘404 Not Found’.

Hmmm, so just how many other facts aren’t really facts?

Some more facts:

It is illegal for US Citizens to eat Penguin meat. (217)
Nostophobia is the fear of going home. (83)
Turning up the music 22% in a bar makes people drink 26% more. (97)
Earthworms have five hearts. (129)
One in every seven minutes spent online is spent on Facebook. (268)
You can only see a rainbow if your back is to the sun. (305)

And there is plenty more.

This is a fun volume, and lots of the ‘oh cool’ or ‘oh thats interesting’ or ‘hmmmmmm’ type of trivia and facts. Part of the problem with volumes like this though, is that the facts are presented so fast and furious at you that there’s no real way to retain any of it all. (Outside of looking up these facts, I wouldn’t remember them.) And thats just a hindrance of the style and format of books like this, not necessarily an indication of this book in particular.

Its a perfect book to quick read on the ‘john’ or for car rides and things like this. Its super quick to read if you just read it straight through in a couple of sittings. And its perfect as an accompaniment to things like Mental Floss YouTube videos and the such. Sadly I find that the facts might be things you could quibble on, find fault in, or might be wrong. And as per their own book and site, you can’t fully fact check them, so that’s a big problem for me right there. But I guess, luckily, you are far likely not to remember too many of the facts afterwards anyway, so its a ‘wash’. ( )

A series of occasionally interesting facts by the authors of the far superior QI books (such as "The Book of the Dead" and "The Book of Animal Ignorance"). My favorite fact of the 1339 was that Fletcher Christian and William Wordsworth attended school together in Cockermouth, Cumberland but knowing that "Lalochezia" is using swearing to relieve stress or pain is very useful for me to know, while the pedant in me needs to note that the fact "80% of plane crashes occur in the first three or last eight minutes of a flight" is somewhat odd, as surely 100% of plane crashes occur in the last minute of flight. ( )

Another collection of 'quite interesting' facts and trivia from the makers of the television show QI. This is slightly bigger than the previous instalment, with 1,339 facts to the previous 1,227, but it is still a very quick read.

Rather, I should say there are 1,338 facts, because one on page 321 – St. Nicholas resurrected three small boys who had been cut into pieces and pickled in brine." – cannot be called a 'fact' so much as a 'belief' or a 'story'. At the very least, the statement should have an "Allegedly" or an "According to legend" prefix to qualify. But even this would have been a bit dishonest, for it is this sort of editorial intervention which compromises some of the other facts. A good number of the facts are, if you look closer, just rather ordinary facts or statements that have been dressed up as something 'amazing'.

This gives the book a more flighty quality than 1,227, sacrificing some of the intellectual responsibility of its predecessor just to provide a bit more padding. There are still a lot of good facts to get your attention, and the sourcing to be found online at www.qi.com/1339 is again welcome. But this book screams 'stocking-filler', whereas the previous one just whispered it discreetly and gave a knowing wink." ( )

1,339 QI (Quite Interesting) Facts To Make Your Jaw Drop is jam packed with funny, interesting and quirky facts that you'll want to read aloud to anyone within listening distance.

There's a combination of facts that flow logically on from each other without being broken down into specific chapters (e.g. animals, human body, history etc) that made for a seamless, uninterrupted read.

I borrowed this book from the library and everyone who saw it in my living room couldn't resist picking it up and then reading out a snippet or two. Perfect!

Here are three of my favourite facts from the book:

It's impossible to hum while holding your nose. Page 76

Burning Mountain, Australia, is a natural coal fire that has been alight for 6,000 years. Page 146

A group of kittens is called a 'kindle.' Page 148

Dubai's Burj Khalifa skyscraper is so high, and its lifts are so fast, that you can watch the sun set at ground level, travel to the roof and watch it set again. Page 225

1,339 QI (Quite Interesting) Facts To Make Your Jaw Drop is a brilliant coffee table book presented in a small hardback edition perfect for throwing in your bag and taking with you to pass the time.

Highly recommended for a variety of readers, young and old. ( )

I challenge anyone to read this book and not feel the urge to blurt random facts at people. ( )