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From the inquisitive mind behind the #1 international bestseller A Brief History of the World in 47 Borders, all the facts you didn’t know you wanted to know—and the stories of how we’ve come to know them
In this illuminating compendium of far-ranging information, no topic is too trivial for serious consideration, from how one might determine the most average-size country in the world to the details of humanity’s most ridiculous wars and the answer to who would win in a fight between Harry Potter and Spider-Man.
Elledge’s Nontrivial Trivia covers the breadth and depth of human experience, weaving its way through words and numbers, science and the arts, the spiritual and the secular. It’s a feast of facts for a hungry mind, including entries on the cosmos, the human planet (and the lines we draw on it), questions of measurement, history and politics, the natural world, leisure, and many “oddities” that don’t fit elsewhere. Bizarre, brilliant, and filled with things you didn’t know you didn’t know, Elledge’s Nontrivial Trivia evokes a sense of wonder at the scale of this planet, and the universe in which it sits.
Publisher’s note: Elledge’s Nontrivial Trivia was previously published in the UK as The Compendium of (Not Quite) Everything.
“Praise for the UK edition
"I loved it. Jonn Elledge is a charming and outstandingly nerdish guide. A big, generous, fascinating book, best dipped into on a rainy Sunday.”—Robert Webb, comedian, actor, and writer
“I love Jonn Elledge’s brain, and his tireless quests to boggle everyone else’s. I strongly suggest you hitchhike a ride with this book, which is a travelogue of the weird and wonderful, a galaxy of things in our world and beyond that I simply didn’t have a clue about. I am now slightly less clueless, much more entertained, and I briefly understood the Beaufort Scale. That alone causes me to break out the adjective ‘indispensable.’”—Marina Hyde, Guardian columnist
“A hyper-nerdy, tightly written masterpiece. . . . It sucks you in like a fucking tar pit.”—Ian Martin, writer of The Thick of It and Veep
“It sounds like a mess until you realize it's actually the world that is a mess and this fascinating, funny book is the only fixed point of sanity we've got.”—Hugo Rifkind, columnist for The Times
“An unholy cross between Douglas Adams and Bill Bryson, this compendium of strange, funny, and surprising facts is the perfect look book.”—Helen Lewis, staff writer at The Atlantic
“If you ever wondered what a parsec was, or how language developed, or how many wars have been fought over cows, or whether a large straw goat has ever been held in a secret location by Swedish police, I heartily recommend this book. Elledge’s natural curiosity has been brilliantly harnessed, answering questions you didn’t know you had with more clarity and wit than is fair for any single writer to contain.”—Linda Tirado, author of Hand to Mouth
“Consistently both entertaining and fascinating. Jonn has explored a lifetime's worth of 2am Wikipedia holes so that you don’t have to.”—Ahir Shah, award-winning comedian
“Joyous, mind-expanding, laugh-out-loud funny, and full of nerdy gusto.”—Ian Dunt, columnist for The i Paper
“Open this book at any page and you will learn new things. Jonn somehow manages to make the world seem at the same time more orderly and ungraspably huge and varied.”—Helen Zaltzman, podcaster and writer
