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choirqueer's review against another edition
5.0
A new friend recently asked me, "What is something you get excited about, that maybe only 6 other people get excited about?" The first thing I thought of was "punctuation". If you are one of those 6 other people, you will love this book as much as I did. If you are not, perhaps you will find it interesting anyway. Each chapter of this book addresses the history of one punctuation mark, offering the reader unimaginable depths of information about these symbols we encounter ever day (and a few that we encounter, perhaps, considerably less frequently than that). The book is cleverly written, with a generally serious tone which makes the periodic sprinkling of humor all the more delightful. If you are the kind of person who finds this sort of thing mindblowing, PREPARE TO HAVE YOUR MIND BLOWN.
anzunagi's review against another edition
3.0
3.5 stars
There was always something interesting about each of the characters but I tended to find the punctuation marks mostly developed by the Greeks less interesting for some reason. This book was also pretty funny (but in that way where you need to read the text closely to find it).
There was always something interesting about each of the characters but I tended to find the punctuation marks mostly developed by the Greeks less interesting for some reason. This book was also pretty funny (but in that way where you need to read the text closely to find it).
amy_mancini's review against another edition
2.0
The book is interesting and full of trivia that speaks to my nerdiest grammatical self. However it is dry and the chapters take many wandering tangents.
meghanc303's review against another edition
5.0
Textual criticism meets punctuation meets a dry and understated sense of humor--is it any wonder I loved this book? If you care about writing, printing, book history, or even just have a passing curiousity for how the now-prevalent hashtag came into being, this is the book for you.
Recommended to: people who enjoyed Eats, Shoots & Leaves, the punctuation snob you are/know, anyone with a taste for literary history and textual detection
Recommended to: people who enjoyed Eats, Shoots & Leaves, the punctuation snob you are/know, anyone with a taste for literary history and textual detection
tracyzim's review against another edition
3.0
Is it so bad that I want to learn about punctuation marks that aren't stupid?
glasses's review against another edition
4.0
I thought I had another half-book of reading left, turns out those are the Acknowledgments.
A fun read, lots of information, delightfully chronological. A history of punctuation is exactly what's missing from your bookshelf, go pick this up!
A fun read, lots of information, delightfully chronological. A history of punctuation is exactly what's missing from your bookshelf, go pick this up!
edythemighty's review against another edition
4.0
The perfect book for typography nerds. The author tracks the history of different typographical marks. The stories often drift around quite a bit. Sometimes it works, other times I wonder why I read several pages of seemingly unrelated filler. Overall, I enjoyed it.
canislatrans's review against another edition
4.0
Very entertaining! Well, to me, anyhow... I guess there are people in this world who don't care for tales of typographic history and practice, amusingly told. This book is just that. Houston takes his marks' stories all the way from cuneiform to Twitter. And don't worry, he doesn't rehash the Oxford Comma Debate here.