THE WORST-CASE SCENARIO TRAVEL HANDBOOK

Joshua Piven, THE WORST-CASE SCENARIO TRAVEL HANDBOOK

Just in time for summer travel, the hyperimaginative and slightly paranoid authors of The Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook, 1999's favorite gift book, deliver what will no doubt become popular airport reading for stranded passengers in 2001. Starting with the cheery statistic that "more than 50 percent of all travelers run into problems," and the basic advisory to "always be ready for the worst," the book presents concise and extremely knowledgeable "how-to" assistance on a range of topics: e.g., stopping a runaway train, surviving a hostage situation, escaping from a car hanging over the edge of a cliff, surviving in a plummeting elevator, navigating a minefield, crossing a piranha-infested river, treating a severed limb, removing a leech and even foiling a UFO abduction. Like their earlier handbook, the success of each entry is based on the authors' ability to provide detailed and truly helpful advice on even the most outlandish or horrific situation and make the reader think, "Sure, I could successfully crash-land a small propeller plane on water, or easily climb out of a deep well, or locate and treat individual bleeding arteries on the stump of a severed arm. Nothing to it!" Their delivery evinces a calm precision that even the most worried traveler will find reassuring if faced with one or more of these eventualities, such as trying to escape when tied up ("When your captives start binding you, expand your body as much as possible") or encountering an extraterrestrial biological entity (EBE), unlikely as that might be: "Firmly tell the EBE to leave you alone... Go for the EBE's eyes (if they have any)—you will not know what its other, more sensitive, areas are." Although some appendixes on strategies for packing, etc., seem boilerplate, overall this is another eminently practical, enjoyable survival guide. Watch out for those tsunamis! Illus. (May)

Forecast: The Worst Case Scenario Survival Handbook was a runaway bestseller. This will be, too.

DETAILSshareBUY THIS BOOK

close

Details

Reviewed on: 03/05/2001

Genre: Nonfiction

Open Ebook - 176 pages - 978-0-8118-7358-1