A review by jcpdiesel21
Maphead: Charting the Wide, Weird World of Geography Wonks by Ken Jennings

4.0

A nicely balanced, enjoyable mix of information and humor. Jennings tackles a wide number of facets within the topic of geography though research, interviews and witty writing, even touching on his own love of maps in the process. This book introduced me to many fascinating geographical subcultures and practices such as International Map Collectors' Society, fictional world creation (both for fun and for fantasy writing), Travelers' Century Club, Highpointers Club, roadgeeks, map rallying, geocaching and Degree Confluence Project. It was also neat to learn about the benefits and pitfalls of Google Earth, GPS and Rand McNally road atlases. I greatly enjoyed the chapter covering the National Geographic Bee; I have always felt that this bee never gets the attention that it deserves in comparison to the Scripps National Spelling Bee despite being far more challenging. I found this to be a fun, educational read on par with Jennings' other books.