The Meaning of Liff

Rating:
Summary: Now my liff has a real meaning!!!
Review: (Attention, if not warning: this comment contains two or so profanities. When confronted with them, just block your eyes then, eh??! OK, great!!:)

I've tried 'em all, Webster's, Oxford's, Cambridge's, but none of those dictionaries ever really made sense to me. I mean, I could not possibly care less how many people live in a town named Aalst (nothing personal, Aalst, but that's where I always gave up)??! It wasn't until I found a small, black, paperback with some graved letters on the cover, that I was able to enjoy anything else more than the phonebook!!!

I didn't, for example, know that I ski with Zeal Monachorum before I read THE MEANING OF LIFF. Nor did I know that Aird of Sleat was placed upon Heathrow Airport!! Thanks for warning me, Doug and John!! Also, this little black book can help all of us, when, for example, confronted with a glossop, or what we did, when someone says we've just commited a wigan. Now I can play golf AND enjoy it as well!!! Instead of the frustrating how-many-bogies-have-I-got count, I just count Whaplode droves. Then this once-useless game finally has an amusing purpose.

No, really. This book, alongside being pantwettingly funny, is, in my opinion, an honest and respectable attempt to save the English language from a violent and tragic destruction. For English, as it exists today, is becoming a language of three words: .... This book, and indeed the Deeper Meaning Of Liff as well, is a guide to help us all to save this beautiful language (as all languages are).

At least my Liff has a Deeper Meaning now.

Rating:
Summary: A Lot Of Fun...
Review: ...that's what this book is. It is there when you've got a dentist appointment and have to sit around for ages to give you a chuckle. It's there for that God awful plane journey. It's there to keep you occupied. If you don't like reading 30 page chapters before you go to sleep at night then this is for you. Just read a page and guaranteed you'll find some thing you can relate to, and/or find amusing. This is a book that takes town names and gives them everyday meaning for things there are no words to explain. For example: you're walking down a corridor and see someone you recognise. But wait, have they seen you, should you wave or, perhaps ignore them until there're close enough for you to say hi, or nod. This is in fact covered by many different names in the book, all intertwind, making it all hugely funny.
On many occasions the names are very funny and appropriate.
I'm fairly sure that you will love this book. And, when I'm writting this, Amazon are doing a 'buy Meaning Of Liff and Deeper Meaning Of Liff together' offer which I advise you take advatage of- I did.
Anyway, buy this book if you like the sound of it, and feel free to chuckle.
I hope I've been of service... Toodle Pipskie (is that how you spell it?)

Rating:
Summary: Possibly the best Joke Book ever
Review: Although a number of your friends may think you a bit weird if you tried to retell them. This rates as one of the few books that makes me laugh out loud (very loudly). A collection of explanations of strange & bizarre place names from around the world, Mr Adams and Mr Lloyd truly show off their incredibly imaginations and pure wit. While the reader may need a "Monty Pythonish" (or even a Hitch-Hikers Guide!) sense of humour, this is a genuinely very funny book

Rating:
Summary: Possibly the best Joke Book ever
Review: Although a number of your friends may think you a bit weird if you tried to retell them. This rates as one of the few books that makes me laugh out loud (very loudly). A collection of explanations of strange & bizarre place names from around the world, Mr Adams and Mr Lloyd truly show off their incredibly imaginations and pure wit. While the reader may need a "Monty Pythonish" (or even a Hitch-Hikers Guide!) sense of humour, this is a genuinely very funny book

Rating:
Summary: The meaning of Liff, explained.
Review: If you like words, you'll love this book. It's crammed with absolute gems that will have you laughing out loud from page to page. Adams and Lloyd take previously useless place-names and assign them appropriate meanings, taking care of all the things in life (liff) that lack their own defining words, with hilarious results. You'll love this book!

Rating:
Summary: Sniglets, British style
Review: Monty-python-esque approach to language...this is the British version of what in America are called "sniglets", little neo-logisms invented for things and situations which don't have proper words to designate them but ought to. The difference is that these creations ala Douglas Adams & John Lloyd use already existing town names in the UK and re-define them to make them useful (and funny)...this is altogether different from American sniglets like "bevemirage" (the black plastic bottom of a liter bottle of dark cola that fools you temporarily into thinking there is more cola left in the bottle than there actually is), which tend to be creative word-fusions of already existing words. The only U.S. linguistic construction I can think of that comes close to what Lloyd and Adams are doing here is the phrase "in a New York Minute", aka "really fast". Though there is no collorary such as "in a Topeka minute" (or whatever) to mean slow, drawn out (but maybe there ought to be). I bought this book in the UK for £4.99 GPB, but it seems it's out of print here in the USA, alas. Probably out of print in Britain also. Well worth it, if you stumble across a copy!

Rating:
Summary: Sniglets, British style
Review: Monty-python-esque approach to language...this is the British version of what in America are called "sniglets", little neo-logisms invented for things and situations which don't have proper words to designate them but ought to. The difference is that these creations ala Douglas Adams & John Lloyd use already existing town names in the UK and re-define them to make them useful (and funny)...this is altogether different from American sniglets like "bevemirage" (the black plastic bottom of a liter bottle of dark cola that fools you temporarily into thinking there is more cola left in the bottle than there actually is), which tend to be creative word-fusions of already existing words. The only U.S. linguistic construction I can think of that comes close to what Lloyd and Adams are doing here is the phrase "in a New York Minute", aka "really fast". Though there is no collorary such as "in a Topeka minute" (or whatever) to mean slow, drawn out (but maybe there ought to be). I bought this book in the UK for £4.99 GPB, but it seems it's out of print here in the USA, alas. Probably out of print in Britain also. Well worth it, if you stumble across a copy!

Rating:
Summary: Very clever!
Review: The real title of the book is "The Meaning of Liff", not "The Meaning of Life". The Meaning of Liff is a special dictionary, where Douglas (THHGTTG) Adams and John Lloyd take English proper nouns and assign each of the the meaning of some fealing or thing you previously lagged a word of. Many of these word's definitions are very funny, and you are actually tempted to use these words in your own texts afterwards. Nothing like The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy or DNA's other books, but defenitely worth reading.

Rating:
Summary: Good book, Wrong title
Review: The real title of the book is "The Meaning of Liff", not "The Meaning of Life". The Meaning of Liff is a special dictionary, where Douglas (THHGTTG) Adams and John Lloyd take English proper nouns and assign each of the the meaning of some fealing or thing you previously lagged a word of. Many of these word's definitions are very funny, and you are actually tempted to use these words in your own texts afterwards. Nothing like The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy or DNA's other books, but defenitely worth reading.

Rating:
Summary: Very clever!
Review: This is a brilliant little book. It contains words for all those annoying things that there ought to be words for but aren't. For example: 'the precise distance between your outstretched fingers and the ticket sticking out of the machine at the gate entrance to a parking lot'. If you want something to make you giggle, this is the book!