The Big Bento Box of Unuseless Japanese Inventions
Meet Kenji Kawakami, designer, pathological mail-order enthusiast and author of this book. Kawakami is the founder of Chindogu, the art of the 'unuseless' idea and the tome's premise. He's developed an entire philosophy around bizarre gadgets. There are 10 tenets of Chindogu; man-made objects that have broken free from the chains of usefulness.
Good Sex Illustrated
In 1973 French writer Tony Duvert conducted a close reading of a series of children's sex manuals with the aim of revealing how the ‘sex-positive' culture of the 1960s had been officially rerouted into promoting the nuclear family. Perhaps because of his passionate belief in the integrity of unpoliced sex and pleasure and the contention that sex education retards what might otherwise be naturally developed sexual behaviour and attitudes, Good Sex Illustrated was met with controversy.
The Abstinence Teacher
Teacher says oral sex OK!
In The Abstinence Teacher, Tom Perrotta (Election, Little Children) takes an average North American town and adds an evangelical congregation called the Tabernacle, whose fearless leader believes Lara Croft is an ‘abomination' and deems ‘hot [marital] Christian sex' the only sex acceptable.
Tropical Hot Dog Night
Why does the word eclectic get bandied around so much? Does everything that’s even slightly diverse have to be considered eclectic? In light of this we can’t use that word to describe Tropical Hot Dog Night. But then THDN is more than just one word, it’s actually quite a few words strung together which makes a welcome change from your average music blog.
Monocle 1st Birthday Issue
Birthdays are good for you. They must be because the people who have the most birthdays live the longest. So it is with unreserved celebration that we congratulate Monocle on a stellar first year in print. In this short time it has turned the whole idea of magazines and news reportage on its head.
Torpedo
Torpedo, the first offering from independent publishing house Falcon vs. Monkey, Falcon Wins, is very pretty. And, unlike a human, it gets prettier when you look inside it. The pretty things inside Torpedo are provided by local drawing types Eirian Chapman, Pat Dalton and Tim Molloy. However, not only is Torpedo packed with glorious illustrations, it is packed with similarly luminous short fiction.
E.W. Cole: Chasing the Rainbow
Edward Cole, creator of Cole’s Funny Picture Book, was not a conventional Victorian fellow. An entrepreneur and idealist, he took it upon himself to spread love and rhetoric to all who might pass through the doors of his Bourke Street Book Arcade. In line with its proprietor’s progressive attitude to living, Cole’s was several floors worth of whimsy and readables, complemented by an in-house brass band, a hall of mirrors, a tea salon and reading chairs that would put the modern-day book barn to shame.
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