Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I agree with other 5-star reviews on the content of this book, but the book design makes it *very* difficult to enjoy. It is absolutely packed with useful, wonderful knowledge, printed on thick glossy paper and full of beautiful color. The awkward, unfriendly paperback size (11.1” W by 9.7” H x 1”D) opens to 22” of thick, saggy insanity. Imagine holding the short side of a large rectangular deep dish pizza by the crust, without the pan, and you can imagine what it’s like to hold this book. Take a second and imagine that. If that isn’t good enough for you, imagine taking a plush towel out of the washer mid-soak cycle, folding it without drying, and carrying it with one hand to the towel shelf. Plunk! The page design and typesetting are a travesty, with line lengths far exceeding the limits of comfortable reading. Most 11”W pages contain 8.5” wide paragraphs. It’s like a Highway 66 of words. Want to read it somewhere comfortable? Good luck! It’s like a heavy, saggy and ironically, wet-on-wet paperback coffee table book. I can’t read it in bed because I need a 500 lumen headlamp to see the end of the sentences way over there on the other side of the bed. If you plan on reading it, train your eyes for a grueling marathon where you’ll be competing against some very good content that’s been training for ages. I could go on and on, so I will. Imagine you’re fishing for giant flounder at Lake Linseed with your grandpa. After two days (thanks, Prime shipping!), you feel a sudden, heavy tug on your line. You’ve caught something! Suddenly you discover it’s not a giant fish, but a living copy of this book, flip flopping all around as you pull it from the water. Grandpa slides the giant Coleman cooler, you know, the big red one with the white top, to toss it in. Splornk! Tonight we’re having Alla Prima, Paw Paw! I can’t even enjoy it on a plane unless I’m in the middle seat. I hope the person to my right doesn’t mind finishing the lines for me. I’m currently forcing myself to get through it because it has so much good information and I paid so much for it. I’m giving a 5-star book two stars because the design makes it that unpleasant of an experience.