Another six star book that does nothing but make you a less productive member of a society that can be pretty shitty, in places. Favorite (probably garbled by now)line:

PR firms make one thing and one thing only - Shit Up.

I hoped this would be an in-depth look at marketing and customer service tactics. Instead it was mostly a now-dated rant about the Bush administration.

informative ranting with no real solutions. loved it.

I couldn't get past the first chapter of this book. What I did read came off as totally pretentious. Also, Penny used the word "bullshit" so many times it was mind-numbing (unfortunately, I think she did this in an attempt to show how clever she is). Surely there is a better written book out there on the same topic.

Bone up on how bullshit works, and begin to inoculate yourself. A small, hilarious, and easy to read book.

Not only is Laura Penny extremely funny, clever, and topical but every one of her chosen subjects have direct and genuine relevance for all of us living in a culture which is profoundly saturated with state of the art commercial propaganda and playground to entire industries devoted to the subtle manipulation of the public mind (that's you, cowboy and cowgirl American - your so-called Rugged Individualist mentality was, paradoxically for you, formed within your culture -- and besides, this mentality is largely based on misunderstandings since we are hardly Self-Interest Maximizing Agents but rather social animals evolved to help each other).

Excellent all around.

The author tries to come across as outraged, but she generally just seems to be miffed. Not worth more than a few hours reading. I was hoping for personal experience narratives and got armchair quarterbacking.

Overall, I liked this book; unfortunately it is very USA-centric. It makes you feel lucky that you are not condemned to live in the USA, but I am sure that there is LOTS of BS from all over the world.
There are some sections where I disagree with the contents and with the style of the book, but there are also very nice and striking examples of BS that constitute a real eye-opener.

A great read, but with several minuses, such as the fact that it uses bullshit to dig up bullshit. I suppose it takes one to know one. Another minus might be the limitation of the themes and their interpretation, but there's only so much one can wright about.
Nevertheless, it is strikingly honest and, even from a Romanian reader, brutally familiar.

Laura Penny was one of my profs (or 'tutors' as they are known at the University of King's College). She was the cool prof - the one in funky clothing who would smoke with the other cool kids during our break. She had the most distinctive laugh and could make even the most obscure philosophy relatable. When I heard about this book I was over-the-moon excited, and it did not disappoint. If you have a sense of humour you will laugh yourself silly, but more importantly, it will make you think.

Strongly recommended.

"If the minimum wage had inflated as much as CEO pay or margin debt, cashiers and rib-joint ladies would be making hundreds of dollars an hour."

"In 1980, CEOs made 42 times the average worker's pay; by 1990,it had doubled; by 2000 their compensation had increased to 531 times the average salary."

Interesting stuff - a must read!

I'm enjoying the wit much more than the railing against the system but I recognize that the author makes good points amidst left wing propaganda. I'm also really enjoying that it's written by a Maritimer ensuring less US centrism than usual in the anecdotes.

It was a bit slow and the young author used bull shit far too many times in the beginning. I gave up on this one three chapters in...