If you grew up in the 70s or 80s, you were guaranteed to have at least one copy of the Guinness Book of World Records, most likely ordered through Scholastic at school.
While QCing the Mountain View audiobook (coming soon!), I was reminded of this passage, when the narrator walks into his old friend’s room back home:
I checked under the bed. The stack of porno mags was gone. The bookshelf was filled with trophies, framed photos, and model cars. There was only one book: The Guinness Book of World Records.
I took it off the shelf and started thumbing through it. There were the fat twins riding motorcycles—with the plaid pants and cowboy hats. Then there was the guy who was so huge they had to bury him in a coffin the size of a piano case. 1,069 pounds. Why did they put the fat people up front? I flipped to the cool color photo section in the middle and saw the guy with the fingernails. They were each about three feet long and they were twisted and had these strange stripes. I had nightmares about that guy when I was a kid.
Did you have a copy of the Guinness Book of World Records? What do you most remember from it?
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