Definitely not for 9 year-olds! This is a book of lists and word games - trivia games, fill in the blanks, etc. Not stand-up-and-run-around games, but sit-down-and-write-the-answer games. For adults, might be fun, especially if you were into Trivial Pursuit. As a teaching tool or brain-teaser, OK. For a kids party, un-fun.

As a writer and a goofball, I use this book both to help me name characters and to tease my friends about people's weird associations with their names. The premise of showing the results of a survey of people's opinions of others names is certainly interesting. However, a majority of the associations are pop culture references and therefore constantly changing--necessitating an update that hasn't come. For my purpose it is a fun and helpfull reference, but if you plan to use it to name your child I think it would be less usefull.

This fascinating book is based on a national survey of 75,000 parents--the largest name research project ever. It reveals the images and stereotypes associated with 1,400 popular and unusual names. Find out what people think of the names your considering, so you don't make a harmful mistake. This invaluable book reduces the worry of picking a name for your baby. And, it's entertaining to read. A must for every new parent.

I picked this book up many years ago and have had a lot of fun reading the consensus on the image conjured up with each name. In most cases I find my opinion close if not exactly in line with the associations collected from the survey. Now I am pregnant with my first and would love to consult an updated version of this book to help me in the selection process for the "perfect" name. Alas, I have discovered no updates.

Before becoming a dad (well, I will be one in October), if you paid to me I would have never guessed I'd be reading a book on this topic today, but you see: here I am, browsing through a handful of books off of the shelves looking for ideas. Here's our case: my wife and I wanted to name our baby with a beautiful name (how original, huh?) that is not repeated anywhere near (family and close friends) and that plays well both ways, in English AND Spanish without anyone needing to twist their mouths to pronounce it.

I had a chance to check out this book and found it to be a waste of anyone's time and one with a misleading title. After a few lists of top 10 and top 100 names under different criteria (which you can get off the Internet without much effort) it goes into a list of names supposedly from different countries that, more than names sound like figments from the author's imagination. Here goes the worst example of what I don't want to see anyone named: for a boy, "STARBUCK". This is an actual suggestion from the author!! I am NOT kidding. When I saw this, I closed the book. It officially topped the list of worst baby name books I reviewed today. I recommend "A World of Baby Names" or "From Aaron to Zoe".

In the lists of names from Scandinavia, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Iceland about halv of the names are not first names. Many "names" are unknown as names and words at all. There are a lot of surnames. Ola is not a girl's name, but a boy's, and Bodil, Inger, Mette and Valborg is not a boy's name. Kari is not a typical Danish name,but a Norwegian. Also some misspellings.

For other languages I find that Charles is German, that Che is Spanish for José, Ivar is a variant of Ivor og Ivo, Yves is a French form of Ivar. Van (p. 381) and Von (p. 383) are short forms of first names. Mac is a Scottish first names for boys. All this do no correspond to my information from other sources. In the lists of German, French and Spanish first names there are a lot of surnames. But may be all the surnames in the English-list also is used at first names for boys?

Having seen so much of the world, I have become very interested in giving my future kids very meaningful names. It is nice to see the inclusion of names from countries other than Europe and North America.

It seems like an oxymoron, but there are many other books that have more substance than this "Light" book of light verse. Sure, this book has a smattering of selections from the light verse legends like Nash and Parker. However, a quick search will show many other books with more legendary light verse, and less, or no examples from unknowns (such as the editor who insists on including his banal efforts). I recommend you bypass this books for better examples of the genre.

The book consists of short poems by Ogden Nash, short poems by Richard Armour, and short poems by Nash/Armour wannabes. What's wrong with that? Personally, I think many of them are very funny. This seemingly not very erudite editor has put together a funny book. I am buying at least one more copy to give as a gift. I recommend it highly.

There's no pretense of inclusiveness -- no Dorothy Parker that I could see, no Alexander Pope, indeed almost nobody much before the modern era. So what? These are not the 100 funniest short-short poems in the English language -- just 100 that, on the average, are rather funny. Well, at least the quatrains are on the average very funny. Some of the longer ones are more labored.

Bottom line: It's funny. A book of short poems is necessarily short. And I've never seen a book of humor that didn't have a number of duds or failures. So I think the book's readers and reviewers should, er, lighten up.

This book is so easy to give as a gift and is perfect for almost anyone. It will appeal to those who know poetry, it will appeal to those who are unfamiliar with poetry.

There a great many other party game books out there that have more content, more fun, and are a better deal than this ill-conceived title. I would recommend passing this book by and choosing something that gives you more for your money.

This is an aweful book and a waste of the paper it is printed on. The few pages that it has is duplicated for tear out sheets, and it has only 3 games in it. It is not the Best and I regret spending my money on it.

This book is a great tool for parents who worry they won't have enough activities to keep a bunch of crazy kids busy. If you're planning a birthday party, BUY THIS BOOK!!!

To fill up this bloated book, the author seems to have crammed in any set of letters that could pass for a name. It's about as much help as picking random Scrabble tiles. You can't read it like a book, you can't browse productively...it's no help at all for generating ideas. Sigh.

...and that's not a big compliment. Yes,there are over 93,000 names in here,but in usual Lanksy fashion,the book is cluttered with "kreativ spelygns" and created names (the K chapter is one of the worst-Krystalee,Krystalyn,Kyler,Kylynn,Kymber,Kymberlin,etc). People who are interested in these type of names generally don't need help in creating names. How much more interesting the dictionary would have been if Lansky had focused more on names from other countries (they are included,but the ones I saw were found in other-and better-name books).

I knew I was taking a chance when I ordered this book,but I was hoping for something other than Lanksy's usual tricks.

With children's poetry books, it is often the case that the illustrations are weak and the poetry carries the day. Not so with this title. The illustrations by Stephen Carpenter are a delight, but are dragged down by the weakness of Lansky's poetry. The author only knows one meter, but he has trouble keeping that regular. It usually falls somewhere between iambic pentameter and the theme song to "Gilligan's Island." What's worse, there is nothing at all clever about the verse. I would love to see more of Mr. Carpenter's work. I only hope that he finds a more appropriate poet to work with.

We bought this book after my son loved No More Homework, No More Tests, another poetry book that Lansky wrote. This one was a bit of a letdown though still enjoyable. As others have commented though the illustrations are wonderful. I will say that I did not find bathroom humor to be such an overwhelming theme as some of these folks did.

This is a great book and the best poem in it is My Violin. I love it it is great!!

What the heck was the author thinking writing a book this atrocious?

What the heck was the publisher thinking?

And what the heck was I thinking buying this book for my twin sons after scanning one poem about a dog?

At least I can say that I never read any of the "poop" poems before purchasing it. What excuse do the other two have?

I was not impressed by this attempt at children's poetry. This book made me think that an author might consider that writing children's poetry is easy. This book makes it obvious that it's not. Why you would publish a collection of such poorly executed poetry is beyond me. The material looks as if it were written by young children, as opposed to for young children. The illustrations were cute though.

I'm prompted to write this review after reading the others. Yes folks, Lansky's topics are crude. Poop figures heavily, as does snot (in fact, that's the topic of my favorite poem in this collection). However, Lansky's poems are both funny and clever. They make my kids laugh out loud (and me too). If your sensibility is to fine to be crude or if you have moral objections to bodily fluids (and I suspect that is the case with the other reviewers) then this isn't for you. But, if you're looking for funny, readable verse that kids will like, this is a great one.

Why write a book of frequently regurgitated light verse? The only answer I could come up with was that the editor wanted to slip some of his own efforts in amongst the over-used classics of this genre. The publisher should never have allowed the editor to take this liberty. The editor's job should have been to choose the very best, and perhaps original, examples of light verse. His ego must have got the better of him if he thought that his verse could stand in good company with Ogden Nash or Richard Armour. My recommendation is that the publisher find an editor who can keep his editorial duties in mind and his ego in perspective.

Books should be a gift, but when the only reason for the existence of a book is as a gift then it better have value. If someone gave this book to me as a gift then I would ask for the receipt so I could make a quick exchange. I don't see any point to this book except as a reason to regurgitate the same old poems (and some new ones by the editor that don't deserve to see print). I also have to comment on the amount of white space in this title. They could have printed the same amount of material in 1/10 of the number of pages. This is called padding a book and we shouldn't have to kill more than a single tree to print a title that is this insubstantial.

There are books of substance and books of no substance. However, when you knowingly purchase a book of no substance you expect something else in exchange-perhaps a chuckle or two? There was indeed a chuckle in this book. However, that single chuckle was offset by tedium. I would recommend that the editor stick with the known quantity of wits such as Nash and Armour, and dispense with his own attempts at humor. They don't work. One should have certain expectations, even for a book of no-substance.