Lost at Sea: The Jon Ronson Mysteries

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He's met a man who tried to split the atom in his kitchen and another who's preparing to welcome the aliens to earth. He doesn't even stick with his subjects over the short term: whenever there is a class that lasts ten weeks, he misses several of the sessions, so the material presented is spotty and incomplete. He has the ability to ask questions people don't normally ask, and root out surprising responses or telling evasions. It's the same concept, and even has one or two character crossovers, but is a lot more in depth and better written - Ronson's penchant for simple present tense really grates (in my view) and makes it read like the witterings of a madman more often than not. Well, I'm sure Ronson has spoken to a lot of black people at any rate, and therefore is very well equipped to tell the world in his books what men like Frantz should and should not be worried about.

He is the author of many bestselling books, including Frank: The True Story that Inspired the Movie, Lost at Sea: The Jon Ronson Mysteries, The Psychopath Test, The Men Who Stare at Goats and Them: Adventures with Extremists. Because telling the world that Frantz's priorities are wrong will definitely help people to respect him better! My brother in law is not a reader but I know he will enjoy the different quirky stories with Robson’s inimitable take on things. Jon Ronson has been on patrol with America's real-life superheroes and to a UFO convention in the Nevada desert with Robbie Williams. Ronson also goes on a cruise to meet psychic Sylvia Browne, a woman who goes on TV to tell parents of missing children (often incorrectly) their kids are dead, and finds out, surprise surprise, she’s not just a fake but an unpleasant old bag as well.

Quotation panels, featuring many of Churchill’s well-known sayings and comments, and the opinions of his well-known contemporaries, such as Stalin, are scattered liberally throughout. The people he talks to in Lost at Sea are strange, and rather than indulge them, Ronson asks the tough questions and gets to the root of things. I enjoyed the format of this book and the wide variety of subjects it covered although I did find the last section pretty tedious and also distinctly more serious/disturbing than the rest of the book! They include a couple of murder/suicide cases, the economic class issues in America, and the sad story of Richard Cullen who committed suicide after becoming hopelessly in debt. I'm looking forward to expanding my little expedition into the world of weird much further after this book.

This is a collection of journalism by Jon Ronson, published in various places and over a period of around 20 years. Ronson uncovers in each story the various phobias, compulsions, and peccadilloes that fill the world with oddity and mystery. Not every essay gripped me in the same way, but I thoroughly enjoyed this collection of Ronson's work. His work includes the international bestsellers Them: Adventures With Extremists and The Men Who Stare at Goats, which was adapted into a major motion picture starring George Clooney, Ewan McGregor, Kevin Spacey and Jeff Bridges.There are a couple of cases in this book that he didn't even attempt to find apology for, and with good reason. This kind of material fascinates me, and this book scratched that itch in the back of my brain for just learning about people. Ronson manages to get into people's lifesand extract amazing,weird and interesting "stuff" about them. The underlying thread is "Ronson’s desire to report on and attempt to explain human dysfunction in its various, colorful forms. He goes to a UFO convention in the Nevada desert with Robbie Williams, asks Insane Clown Posse (who are possibly America's nastiest rappers) whether it's true they've actually been evangelical Christians all along and rummages through the extensive archives of Stanley Kubrick.

While parts of “Lost at Sea” have been published in Ronson’s other books - more than half have been printed in “Out of the Ordinary” and all but one have been printed in “What I Do” – and numerous other articles have appeared in GQ magazine and the Guardian newspaper, for those who’ve not read Jon Ronson extensively, this is an excellent collection of his journalism in one handy volume. If you have days when you wake up and like Keanu Reeves feel spat out of the Matrix (which I do most of the time) and despite the desire to try to fit in - you find it hard to live in the planet from which the Common Sense was exiled a while ago - then Ronson is the right author for you. I've much preferred his other books, but this is perfectly readable if you're a Ronson fan and want more. Ronson offers his own view of the victims' horrifying descriptions of their rapes: "I always find it hard to look Jonathan in the eye after hearing some detailed recital of his sexual behavior.I think that's because it's the least cohesive, as a range of magazine articles, that aren't really connected. The only one I'd read before was his cruise with Sylvia Browne, the psychic who specialized in feeding false and harmful information to grieving parents. I’ve Thought About Doing Myself in Loads of Times… A really dark exploration of family men who lose it and kill their entire families and themselves.