Author: Judy Reiser

ISBN: 0740751093

The following review was contributed by: Ernest Dempsey,  pen name of Karim Khan. To read more of Karim's Review CLICK HERE 

Ever heard of someone who makes holes in her socks? A person who irons his newspaper? What about a cat who runs a treadmill? These and many other quirks are now available in one book to tickle your sane nerve. Author Judy Reiser brings to public notice the many quirks and idiosyncrasies of people in her recent book Admit It, You’re Crazy! (Andrew McMeel Publishing, Missouri, 2005).

Judy Reiser’s book is a collage of interview clips of numerous individuals, all adults, in first person. These run the gamut of humor from real crackers to slightly off-the-track peculiarities of living. Obsessive thinking and resulting compulsion is the recurring motif in most of the instances included. At times, the behavior will not seem so irrational as some of the persons relate it to their early experiences and some of them definitely reflect the reader’s own quirks.

As far as goes the fun part of the book, it will depend on the reader’s own rationality whether the instances scribed elicit a guffaw or a sigh out him/her. More matter-of-course response from the reader, more reason to suspect one’s normality. Grins! But the book is certainly unique in that the author’s absence is nearly fixed (except in occasional questions); in some ways a short coming because after reading over fifty pages you feel lost in a deluge of voices popping in and out incessantly.

One beautifying feature of the book is the adornment with colored headings, fun figures, and vignettes that go in perfect accord with the business of going bananas. Money, eating habits, bathroom behavior, travel, and germ-response stories are presented with the profession, gender, and age of the people involved. Judy Reiser has done a nice job in letting people put on the make-up of self-critical smile before they stand under their shower. Wink!    

PS: Judy Reiser is open to receiving more quirks and idiosyncrasies from people. She can be reached by e-mail given at the end of her book.