The Theory of Everything Else: A Voyage into the World of the Weird

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Why are we here? Do ghosts exist? Did life on Earth begin after a badly tidied-up picnic? Was it just an iceberg that sank the Titanic? Are authors stealing their plotlines from the future? Will we ever talk to animals? And why, when you’re in the shower, does the shower curtain always billow in towards you?

And I did try a Ouija board once and definitely still kind of think it worked (it knew the name of my dead grandma which no one else in the room knew).

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Dan Schreiber, of QI & No Such Thing As A Fish brings us a love letter to the odder side of life, from Aliens to murder-solving plants, from time travellers on the Titanic to Native Americans on the English south coast - these facts and ‘facts’ will keep you laughing and gasping. You may just realise how weird you are, how weird we all are - and when we can all accept our weirdness and be weird together - that could be world changing. A new mystery is afoot in the third book in the Thursday Murder Club series from million-copy bestselling author Richard Osman. Quite fun. Some interesting “theories”, some anecdotes of weird shit happening, some really funny chapters.

A pleasure. ... Schreiber is at his best when he’s digging into renowned loci of weirdness. ... Suitable for beach reading or for mainlining before a dinner party. Schreiber brings a formidable amount of research to bear." — Dan Piepenbring, New York Times Book Review This book is a testament to how unorthodox thinking has often been at the forefront of science and the development of humanity. How some of the people regarded as our "greatest mind" had many crazy theories: some that brought innovation, and some that were arguably "bat shit" and maybe taken too far. Where would the world be without these eccentric thinkers? We don’t know the answers to any of these questions (that includes the shower-curtain one, which is a mystery that has eluded scientists for decades, and which they are still trying to solve). But don’t worry, no matter what questions you have, you can bet on the fact that there is someone (or something) out there, investigating it on your behalf – and this book collects their latest findings. Io da piccola pensavo che di notte la Terra si scoperchiasse dal suo cappuccio celeste per lasciare spazio al cielo blu della notte e che per piovere la procedura fosse più o meno quella espressa dal cuoco neo climatologo, o meglio, ci fosse un cappuccio pieno di acqua. Poi non riuscendo mai ad assistere all’esatto momento del cambio di coperchio ho lasciato stare questa mirabolante idea.Insomma, il suggerimento iniziale di questo saggio è “Fate quello che volete nel vostro privato, ma quando le conseguenze delle vostre idee non riguardano soltanto voi, attenti a credere sulla fiducia.”

Questo libro racchiude teorie che per fortuna al momento sono molto meno pericolose di questa che vi ho appena raccontato (quella di Rugiati, non la mia) ma che ai loro tempi hanno scatenato dibattiti infiniti di scienziati e improvvisati tali.

The writing was however under par, which I didn’t expect from Dan Schreiber, being a No Such Thing as a Fish fan. It felt like a book full of “have you heard of this? O wait, this is fun as well! And now I’m thinking of ghosts. And of presidents. Have you heard of …”. Many of the chapters and anecdotes did not really feel rounded, without a clear purpose. Life is strange, and you never quite know how it’s going to play out nor where your big adventure may take place.” We don’t know the answers to any of these questions (that includes the shower-curtain one, which is a mystery that has eluded scientists for decades, and which they are still trying to solve). But don’t worry, no matter what questions you have, you can bet on the fact that there is someone (or something) out there, investigating it on your behalf—and Dan Schreiber collects their latest findings. I do sometimes think I’ve predicted what will happen that day (usually something that was very likely to happen anyway - we don’t talk about that). Alternately admiring and critical, unvarnished, and a closely detailed account of a troubled innovator.