The Experts' Guide to 100 Things Everyone Should Know How to Do

Rating:
Summary: a great resource, for yourself or as a gift
Review: Samantha Ettus has done readers a service in providing us with her light-hearted, concise and extremely practical guide to ordinary things we should know how to do. You'll enjoy leafing through it, and will be both surprised and enriched as you learn from experts---you may even find that there is a much easier, more efficient way to do something other than the way you have always employed!

With the holidays approaching, I'd recommend this book as an excellent, all-purpose gift for anyone on your list. (Granted, it doesn't tell you how to make appealing, tasty fruitcake, but maybe she's saving that for another volume!)

Tie that tie for a formal gathering? Wash your hands in the best way to avoid coming down with the flu? Kiss your date? It's all here.

(An old proverb states that a woman should do three things in her life: Plant a tree, write a poem, and bear a son. Speaking as someone who has accomplished these, I'd say: In her next book, Ettus can include directions on how to plant a tree. For writing poems, though, you are on own creatively....and for bearing a son, well, nature will take charge once you have instigated the process.) For many of those other matters where proper technique may have eluded you, this is the book to read!
Five stars.

Rating:
Summary: My Parental Duty is Complete
Review: After reading it at the store, I bought a copy for each of my four children, and one for me. Now I can say to myself, "I have taught them everything they need to know." And at 55, I open the book to find the things my parents did not teach me. I will be buying any new follow-up as well. Maybe I missed something.

Bob Kumse

Rating:
Summary: Who couldn't use an expert in their back pocket??
Review: Don't we all share Samantha's sentiment that "the list of things I don't know only seems to be growing as I discover how much more there is to learn"?? The Experts' Guide is an excellent way to relieve some of the stress from all the things we keep putting off to learn when we have "more free time". In just a few fun minutes you can become your own tailor, learn how to properly pick up your rice with chop sticks, and absolve your guilt from jumping straight to the Sunday Styles when reading the newspaper. This book definitely has something for everyone & is certainly the perfect gift when you just don't know what to get!!

Rating:
Summary: Great book, lousy cover
Review: I got two copies of this book for those impossible to shop for people. What you can't tell from the picture online is the insert (yellow section) of the cover is actually a square cut out of the blue dust jacket. Both of mine arrived from Amazon ripped, one very badly. This is a great gift, but if you are getting it at the last minute, opt for the pick up in store option just to be safe.

Rating:
Summary: Life explained for dummies!
Review: Ms. Ettus gives invaluable advice on everything you always wanted to know how to do in everyday life but were afraid to ask, or just never got round to learning to do. From basic etiquette to manual transmissions, she tells it all. This is fun to read even if you don't need or use all of the advice! Move over, Heloise!

Rating:
Summary: DIDN'T REALIZE HOW HARD EASY TASKS ARE
Review: Samantha Ettus' book really goes into great depth on how to do things that most of us have been doing for years without even thinking about it. I mean how many of us really think about how we make conversation, read, or sleep. I'm not so sure how much of this is expert advice as opposed to common sense, but sometimes common sense is not an easy thing to have.

You'll be surprised on some of the things you'll learn or, maybe more aptly put, remember, about some every day tasks we take for granted. Still the sections on rembering names, etiquette, etc are quite useful if you deal with people on a daily basis.

Sections about washing one's hair may be a bit trite but they're at least done with a bit of tongue-in-cheek flair and still fun to read.

Rating:
Summary: Great idea
Review: This book is a wonderful idea. I'm a big believer in expertise and found this book to be quite a charm. I learned things that I didn't even intend to learn. I'm currently starting a business and found tips from a variety of the experts to be very helpful. I also found Stop Working by Rohan Hall to be helpful in this pursuit. It's always good to learn from the experts.

Rating:
Summary: You Won't Want This Book to End
Review: This book is like some sort of delicious, chocolatey, rich dessert - I want to consume it as slowly as possible because it is so good! Every time I pick it up I have plans to read just a couple of chapters, but so far, find myself intrigued to keep reading just ONE more, and then just ONE more.............finally I force myself to stop at six or seven chapters - I don't want it to end too soon. While I have learned many, many new things, my favorite so far is the chapter on how to wash hair - all these years, more than 10,000 hair washings, and I never knew you should alternate shampoos several times each week. Something so simple, but makes a big difference. Mmmmmmmmmm..........wonder what I'll learn tomorrow!

Rating:
Summary: Plenty of good information to pick from!
Review: This is a good little guide by various authorities in their fields, even if they don't go into a lot of depth. I especially liked the chapter on speed reading, and while it wasn't an "Evelyn Woods Reading Dynamics Course", it was pretty effective for me. Ira Glass' chapter on how to tell a story was fun and concise, also.

This is not meant to be a ponderous guide to life, just a collection of helpful tips by various experts. If you know all this infomation already, get the book for clueless teenagers you might know.

Rating:
Summary: A great gift!
Review: What a great idea! This book provides advice from 100 of the world's leading experts in their field. Larry King writes "How to Listen". Donald Trump writes "How to Negotiate". Peggy Post writes "How to set a formal dining table". The Head Groundskeeper of Fenway Park writes "How to mow a lawn". The first American to summit Mount Everest writes "How to keep warm". The chapters are addictive and topics range from a couture wedding dress designer teaching us how to sew a button to the head of the Center for Disease Control telling us the right way to wash our hands. This is not a serious, overly detailed "how to book" --- each of the 100 chapters provides a fun 3-4 page overview. Even in the areas that I thought I knew it all I learned a whole bunch of new tidbits.