Controversial Books

This page shows your 100 most controversial books, as measured by the standard deviation of members star ratings. (This is also the source of the Zeitgeist category "25 Books People Can't Agree on.") To be included, a book must have been rated at least 20 times. Work titles are given.

Standard Deviation	Rating	Title
1.299	2.96	Winnie-the-Pooh on Management: In which a Very Important Bear and his friends are introduced to a Very... by Roger E. Allen
1.227	3.03	The 120 Days of Sodom by Marquis de Sade
1.156	3.13	Is It Just Me or Is Everything Shit?: The Encyclopedia of Modern Life by Alan McArthur
1.135	3.64	I Am a Strange Loop by Douglas Hofstadter
1.122	3.61	The Klingon Dictionary by Marc Okrand
1.107	3.85	Patterns of the Hypnotic Techniques of Milton H. Erickson, M.D by Richard Bandler
1.095	3.79	Yes!: 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive by Noah J. Goldstein
1.088	3.78	LaTeX: A Document Preparation System by Leslie Lamport
1.074	3.83	French for Cats by Henry Beard
1.069	3.83	The Loom of Language by Frederick Bodmer
1.068	3.53	Sendmail by Bryan Costales
1.061	3.87	The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement by Eliyahu M. Goldratt
1.056	2.72	Accomodating Brocolli in the Cemetary by Vivian Cook
1.054	3.85	Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig
1.054	3.71	The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich by Timothy Ferriss
1.054	3.59	Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything by Don Tapscott
1.054	3.49	Collins Gem Latin Dictionary by D. A. Kidd
1.039	3.74	The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
1.039	3.49	The 80/20 Principle: The Secret to Success by Achieving More with Less by Richard Koch
1.03	3.85	The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey
1.029	3.45	Catwatching by Desmond Morris
1.023	3.93	The Lucifer Effect by Philip Zimbardo
1.023	3.67	Learning the vi Editor (6th Edition) by Linda Lamb
1.02	3.45	The Timewaster Letters by Robin Cooper
1.017	3.97	How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie
1.012	3.81	Practical Unix and Internet Security, 2nd Edition by Simson Garfinkel
1.007	4	To Have or to Be? by Erich Fromm
1.001	3.86	The Art of Intrusion by Kevin D. Mitnick
0.998	3.44	Politically Correct Bedtime Stories: Modern Tales for Our Life & Times by James Finn Garner
0.993	3.56	Why Do People Hate America? by Ziauddin Sardar
0.986	3.68	How to Shit in the Woods: An Environmentally Sound Approach to a Lost Art by Kathleen Meyer
0.985	4.12	My Secret: A PostSecret Book (Postsecret) by Frank Warren
0.984	3.3	Girl with a One-track Mind: Confessions of the Seductress Next Door by Abby Lee
0.983	3.5	The Physics of Star Trek by Lawrence M. Krauss
0.981	3.89	Usage and Abusage: A Guide to Good English by Eric Partridge
0.979	3.67	Needful Things by Stephen King
0.976	3.81	Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea by Charles Seife
0.97	3.72	Hexaflexagons and Other Mathematical Diversions: The First Scientific American Book of Puzzles and Games by Martin Gardner
0.969	3.97	Yes Man by Danny Wallace
0.968	3.72	DNS and BIND by Cricket Liu
0.967	3.93	The New Bottoming Book by Janet W. Hardy
0.962	3.57	The Pirate's Dilemma: How Youth Culture Is Reinventing Capitalism by Matt Mason
0.962	4.24	Perl Best Practices by Damian Conway
0.962	3.59	The Hundredth Man by Jack Kerley
0.96	3.31	The Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook by Joshua Piven
0.959	4.1	An Intimate History of Humanity by Theodore Zeldin
0.957	3.6	Games People Play: The Psychology of Human Relationships by Eric Berne
0.955	4.03	The New Topping Book by Dossie Easton
0.953	3.87	Losing My Virginity by Richard Branson
0.952	4.06	The Character of Physical Law by Richard Feynman
0.951	3.86	The Ethical Slut: A Guide to Infinite Sexual Possibilities by Dossie Easton
0.951	4.05	The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch
0.949	3.59	Polyamory: The New Love Without Limits : Secrets of Sustainable Intimate Relationships by Deborah M. Anapol
0.948	3.76	The Canterville Ghost by Oscar Wilde
0.943	3.84	The White Rose: Munich, 1942-1943 by Inge Aicher-Scholl
0.938	3.53	Body Language: How to read others' thoughts by their gestures by Allan Pease
0.937	3.98	501 German Verbs by Henry Strutz
0.937	3.55	A Spot of Bother by Mark Haddon
0.934	3.74	Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking by Malcolm Gladwell
0.933	4.21	Trick or Treatment: The Undeniable Facts about Alternative Medicine by Simon Singh
0.932	4.09	Knitting Beyond the Edge by Nicky Epstein
0.931	4.03	First, Break All the Rules: What the World's Greatest Managers Do Differently by Marcus Buckingham
0.929	3.63	Elephants on Acid and Other Bizarre Experiments by Alex Boese
0.928	3.78	Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway by Susan Jeffers
0.927	3.98	The Art of Happiness: A Handbook for Living by Dalai Lama
0.919	3.74	The Meme Machine by Susan Blackmore
0.918	4	The Penguin Dictionary of Curious and Interesting Numbers by David Wells
0.915	4.07	The Design of Everyday Things by Donald A. Norman
0.915	3.91	JavaScript: The Definitive Guide by David Flanagan
0.914	3.47	Running Linux by Matt Welsh
0.912	3.48	The Meaning of Tingo: And Other Extraordinary Words from Around the World by Adam Jacot de Boinod
0.911	3.55	The Google Story by David A. Vise
0.911	4.21	Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu
0.91	3.28	The Business by Iain Banks
0.91	3.83	Why Life Speeds Up As You Get Older: How Memory Shapes our Past by Douwe Draaisma
0.91	3.62	Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays by Stephen W. Hawking
0.908	3.76	Skeleton Crew by Stephen King
0.908	3.5	The Pig That Wants to Be Eaten by Julian Baggini
0.903	3.58	Mastering Algorithms with Perl by John MacDonald
0.902	3.56	I'm OK - You're OK by Thomas A. Harris
0.902	3.83	Innumeracy: Mathematical Illiteracy and Its Consequences by John Allen Paulos
0.901	3.75	Himalaya by Michael Palin
0.899	3.65	59 Seconds: Think a Little, Change a Lot by Richard Wiseman
0.894	4.1	Time Management for System Administrators by Thomas Limoncelli
0.893	4.01	Animal Farm by George Orwell
0.891	3.39	The Tiger That Isn't: Seeing Through a World of Numbers by Michael Blastland
0.891	3.89	Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss what Matters Most by Douglas Stone
0.89	3.9	The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon
0.886	4.1	American Gods by Neil Gaiman
0.885	3.37	Inconceivable by Ben Elton
0.885	4.05	Getting Things Done: The Art Of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen
0.884	3.56	253 by Geoff Ryman
0.883	3.67	Happy Days with the Naked Chef by Jamie Oliver
0.882	3.91	Tricks of the Mind by Derren Brown
0.882	4.01	The Language Instinct by Steven Pinker
0.88	3.83	Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything by Steven D. Levitt
0.88	3.48	Advanced Perl Programming by Sriram Srinivasan
0.878	3.82	The Naked Ape: A Zoologist's Study of the Human Animal by Desmond Morris
0.878	3.92	How to Lie With Statistics by Darrell Huff
0.876	4.08	Knit Fix: Problem Solving for Knitters by Lisa Kartus

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