The Daily Show with Jon Stewart Presents Earth (the Book): A Visitor's Guide to the Human Race
Jon Stewart, David Javerbaum, Rory Albanese, Steve Bodow, Josh Lieb, editors
Grand Central Publishing
Nonfiction, History/Humorous Nonfiction/Politics/Science
Themes: Cross-Genre
*****
Description
Humans represent the pinnacle of evolution, the only species to claw its way from prey to apex predator, from mere beast to cognizant being... from
merely being a part of the natural world to being its number one enemy, and ultimate destroyer.
Yes, we finally succeeded. We managed to do to ourselves what we did to the dodo, the Caspian tiger, and the 8-track. (What can we say? Driving species
to extinction was a popular hobby.)
But we weren't all bad. We had some good ideas, now and again, and deep down beneath all of our vices was the potential (never realized) to become forces
for good, not unlike those gods we liked to think we resembled. For future aliens who come to investigate the ruins left behind by our train wreck of a
lifespan, this book offers a glimpse of what life was like on planet Earth... you know, before we self-destructed.
Review
Written by the brilliant comedy team behind TV's The Daily Show, this book tackles the entire planet and the whole of human history. Not unlike a DK Eyewitness book, it keeps its information (and its jokes) short and sweet, never overstaying its welcome on any given topic. Needless to say, the easily-offended or humor-impaired would do well to steer clear. For the rest of us, this is a hilarious page-turner, generating more laughs per page than I've had for many a moon.