I guess if I'd seen the tiny size of this book, or the words 'Esquire presents...' emblazoned across the top, I might have thought twice about buying it. But I didn't, so I did. It sounded like such a brilliant concept: rounding up a group of people who have experienced things most people never will, and asking them to explain what it was like. What does it feel like to be struck by lightning, or gored by a bull? To be bitten by a shark or held hostage? To have leprosy or live with multiple personalities?

But it just falls flat. Some pieces are better than others - Buzz Aldrin's experience of walking on the moon is very lyrical, for example. The piece describing what it feels like to be an executioner at a Mississippi gas chamber was heartbreaking, the one about giving birth eloquent and uplifting. But there are others, ones that should have been fascinating, that were dull as anything. The tale of a man being bitten by a venomous snake pretty just went 'I was bitten. Someone took me to hospital. They gave me the antidote.' Each essay could have been so much better structured, fleshed out to give the reader a more complete picture of the incident, the feelings, the experience as a whole, to make us feel the nerves, the adrenaline, the sadness or elation. The book just didn't deliver any of that.

If you're going to read it, do yourself a favour and get it out of the library! ( )

Really interesting and insightful. It's great to read about fascinating people's lives and unusual experiences. I think AJ Jacobs is a far better journalist than author... ( )

The description given on the book is Humor, but this is what I call a Read along book, meaning a perfect book to keep someplace where you can pick it up, read a chapter, and put it aside until next in the mood, or you wake up at 3 a.m., or can't get to sleep, or have a few minutes waiting on something to cook or at the doctor's office. I'm a big fan of A.J. Jacobs, and I had noticed this series that he edits in Esquire Magazine -- it really piqued my curiosity! The little book is an excellent example of those pick up/put down books; it caters to the curious, and it delivers! ( )

Ever wonder what it feels like to be hit by lightning? Turns out it hurts. OK, that’s a simplification. This book, published by Esquire magazine, collects essays from people who have experienced the painful, the miraculous, the exciting and sometimes just plain bizarre. There’s nothing truly unexpected, but it’s a fun read nonetheless.

Esquire Presents... was pretty good but a disappointment as well. I hadn't actually seen the book before I bought it and so I didn't get to look though it at all. Anyway, the content of the book was pretty good; it had some good topics: what it feels like to be in a tornado, be a mob hitman, be in an orgy, go through an exorcism, have a sever stutter, change from a male to a female (and vice versa), get shot in the head, give birth, be an albino... but the actual accounts were pretty bad. There's not a lot of description. The whole basis of the book is that they tell you what it feels like so you don't have to go through the same experience. But even after reading it you don't feel like you've lived through any of it at all! Well, the walking on the moon one was pretty good, and so was the giving birth one, and starving... anyway. Some are good, some are bad. And some are appallingly bad. Each account is very short, maybe only 200 words, if that. Even then they don't always get right to the point. At any rate, it was a pretty interesting read, if not a particularly good one. ( )