The Complete Idiot's Guide to Pro Wrestling (2nd Edition)

Rating:
Summary: I love this book
Review: As my title suggests, the idea behind an Idiot's Guide to the sport of professional wrestling is excellent, but I must mimic what others are saying about this book. I couldn't even finish the work, because it was chocked full of more errors than any such book of its kind. Names were wrong, dates were wrong, winners were wrong, federations were wrong, and that's just scratching the surface. I'm a longtime fan and scholar of professional wrestling, I'm a bigtime news man on several of the bigger sites devoted to the sport, and I'll read almost anything about it, but halfway through this one I just couldn't do it anymore. If you're trying to learn about the sport, check out Jeff Archer's book or PLEASE go and purchase the yearly Pro Wrestling Illustrated Almanac (may already be unavailable for this calendar year) and do it that way. Check out the three real autobiography projects, Mick Foley's by himself, and Page's and Rock's with assistance. That's my two cents, until next time.......................

Rating:
Summary: Good Idea...Rather Poor Execution
Review: As my title suggests, the idea behind an Idiot's Guide to the sport of professional wrestling is excellent, but I must mimic what others are saying about this book. I couldn't even finish the work, because it was chocked full of more errors than any such book of its kind. Names were wrong, dates were wrong, winners were wrong, federations were wrong, and that's just scratching the surface. I'm a longtime fan and scholar of professional wrestling, I'm a bigtime news man on several of the bigger sites devoted to the sport, and I'll read almost anything about it, but halfway through this one I just couldn't do it anymore. If you're trying to learn about the sport, check out Jeff Archer's book or PLEASE go and purchase the yearly Pro Wrestling Illustrated Almanac (may already be unavailable for this calendar year) and do it that way. Check out the three real autobiography projects, Mick Foley's by himself, and Page's and Rock's with assistance. That's my two cents, until next time.......................

Rating:
Summary: This book is terrible on all fronts, wrestling smarts
Review: Do not buy this book unless you want to vent your frustrations by ripping it apart or trying out your new red teacher's pen correcting and circling all the spelling errors. It is so full of bad grammar, spelling mistakes, and factual errors it makes for a slow and confusing read. For a book whose aim is supposed to be to enlighten new fans of the sport it does more to confuse them to help them. Sure it gives a pedestrian account of the olden carnie days but poorly covers everything else. If you want a detailed response to any question you have go to a trusted internet wrestling site or rec.sport.pro-wrestling. This book was just written to coincide with the wrestling boom and has no lasting worth as a wrestling-based work. A much better book is "Professional Wrestling: Sport and Spectacle" by Sharon Mozer.

Rating:
Summary: Basic, basic, basic
Review: If you're a complete wrestling addict, this book will fail to enthrall you. There are a few nuggets of entertaining information, but for the most part, this book is for people who really don't know much about the world of sports entertainment. The bios on the wrestlers are dated and are angled from the character's aspects, rather than the real life stats of the wrestlers themselves.

Rating:
Summary: Pretty awful
Review: It is quite sad that Lou Albano, who had such long history in wrestling, is apparently clueless as to what the current state of wrestling is about. And what is up with Bert Sugar? I can't stand that guy. His commentary on boxing is horrible, and his commentary on pro-wrestling is even worse. This book is full of grammatical and factual errors remarks. Not recommended for ANY wrestling fan, even the most casual and naive marks.

Rating:
Summary: Basic, basic, basic
Review: This book is so badly-written as to make me wonder exactly who the market audience would be. The only person I could really see benefitting from Albano's and Sugar's frequent factual errors and glossing-overs would be someone who has seen wrestling on TV a few times, found it to be less awful than they expected, and want to know more about what they're watching. Anybody with more than a passing interest in this form of entertainment will be left sorely disappointed.

So many things about this book bugged me: the fact that half the time, the authors act as if wrestling is real (especially Albano, when he is recounting his days in the WWF)...the fact that they suggest that the reader only follow one federation (so we don't bite off more than we can chew, supposedly)...the fact that their description of "the moves of pro wrestling" don't explain that the moves for the most part DON'T hurt the opponent...the fact that they consistently refer to Real Life in wrestling as "real-real" (when any mark or carny knows it's "shoot") and to the bad guys as "villains" (not "heels," as they're known to wrestlers). A thousand factual errors share pages with a thousand typographical errors.

Basically, this is a book which purports to be an "insider view" of professional wrestling, but which is written by two people from the outside who feel the need to keep the illusion of "wrestling as real-life violence." There's some interesting information about the earliest days at the turn of the 20th century, but it's hard to believe it as gospel when ten pages later the authors are telling you that Kane and the Undertaker are really brothers, that the first ladder match was in ECW, that Onita's barbed-wire cage uses real live electricity, and not just fireworks.

Rather than really explain what goes on in the industry (from backstage to in the ring), they try to get the reader to choose one of the two major companies (now, of course, there's only one) and believe that it's real. This may have been the way fans were in the 70s, but by now, for some reason, we are all in on the gag. All of us, apparently, except Albano and Sugar.

If you are in fact a Complete Idiot, and you need to spend 19 bucks to have someone tell you that you can look up a favorite wrestler on search engines for more information, then go ahead and buy this book. Otherwise, steer clear or get it at a Salvation Army like I did.

Rating:
Summary: Consider the title to be a WARNING:
Review: This book is so badly-written as to make me wonder exactly who the market audience would be. The only person I could really see benefitting from Albano's and Sugar's frequent factual errors and glossing-overs would be someone who has seen wrestling on TV a few times, found it to be less awful than they expected, and want to know more about what they're watching. Anybody with more than a passing interest in this form of entertainment will be left sorely disappointed.

So many things about this book bugged me: the fact that half the time, the authors act as if wrestling is real (especially Albano, when he is recounting his days in the WWF)...the fact that they suggest that the reader only follow one federation (so we don't bite off more than we can chew, supposedly)...the fact that their description of "the moves of pro wrestling" don't explain that the moves for the most part DON'T hurt the opponent...the fact that they consistently refer to Real Life in wrestling as "real-real" (when any mark or carny knows it's "shoot") and to the bad guys as "villains" (not "heels," as they're known to wrestlers). A thousand factual errors share pages with a thousand typographical errors.

Basically, this is a book which purports to be an "insider view" of professional wrestling, but which is written by two people from the outside who feel the need to keep the illusion of "wrestling as real-life violence." There's some interesting information about the earliest days at the turn of the 20th century, but it's hard to believe it as gospel when ten pages later the authors are telling you that Kane and the Undertaker are really brothers, that the first ladder match was in ECW, that Onita's barbed-wire cage uses real live electricity, and not just fireworks.

Rather than really explain what goes on in the industry (from backstage to in the ring), they try to get the reader to choose one of the two major companies (now, of course, there's only one) and believe that it's real. This may have been the way fans were in the 70s, but by now, for some reason, we are all in on the gag. All of us, apparently, except Albano and Sugar.

If you are in fact a Complete Idiot, and you need to spend 19 bucks to have someone tell you that you can look up a favorite wrestler on search engines for more information, then go ahead and buy this book. Otherwise, steer clear or get it at a Salvation Army like I did.

Rating:
Summary: OK, but outdated in an instant!
Review: This is a good reference for the world of pro wrestling, and I enjoyed the parts about the feuds, the types of matches, the superstars, and several other elements. However, the book is already outdated. For instance, Rocky Maivia is now, of course, The Rock, and The Giant is now The Big Show. If the book were to be rewritten, the authors could add some of the new stars of today, such as Jeff Jarrett, Chris Benoit, Chris Jericho, Sid Vicious, Raven, and The Sandman, among others. Anyway, fair book, and I know plenty more about wrestling than I aleady do.

Rating:
Summary: Wrestling deserves better than this.
Review: To paraphrase Bret Hart, professional wrestling is a lot more real than people realize. It is a highly competitive and physically demanding endeavor, both unrecognized art form and brutal, sleazy sideshow. The Complete Idiot's Guide does little to capture this essence of pro wrestling, instead treating in the same half-hearted manner that so many books and articles have in the past. To make matters worse, the Guide contains several factual errors and gaps, most glaringly when dealing with the legitimacy of wresting as an actual physical contest. The reality is that no one really knows when wrestling became "fake," in the sense of matches having pre-determined outcomes and workers co-operating with each other. The real, factual history of pro wrestling will probably never be known. We do know, however, that the wrestling of today is a direct ancestor of 19th century carnival wrestling, where match outcomes were, at best, manipulated.

It is ironic that this book came out only a few months before Mick Foley's Have a Nice Day. The two books could not be more different. Foley is insightful, never talking down to the reader, and avoids the huckster's wink that seems to accompany most wrestling books, including the Idiot's Guide. The very last thing wrestling needs is another "fun send-up."

As alternatives, I would suggest in particular the Foley book, the new Dynamite Kid autobiography, and Dave Meltzer's Tributes. If you can find it and are interested in the early history of pro wrestling, I strongly recommend Fall Guys: The Barnums of Bounce. Though written in 1937, it seems to be describing the wrestling of today.