PRPG:

Your 2018 Uncle John’s and Portable Press Holiday Gift Guide

November 20, 2018

The holidays are coming, and you’ve got a long gift list. Let us handle that for you.

For those who seek knowledge: Uncle John’s Actual & Factual Bathroom Reader

For more than 30 years now, Uncle John and his crack team of BRI stall-warts have delivered a 500-plus page volume of, well, a little bit of everything. The latest, Uncle John’s Actual & Factual Bathroom Reader keeps up the tradition, offering little known-stories and fascinating facts from the worlds of history, movies, music, inventions, and more, with plenty of wordplay, weird news, and brainteasers thrown in to keep your lucky gift recipient occupied in the bathroom (or other, less important rooms).


For the lover of fine cheese: Dad Jokes

You don’t have to have fathered a child to like puns, jokes, quips, and cracks so cheesy and corny that they go all the way around from being unfunny to being funny again. In other words, “dad jokes,” because these are the kinds of jokes goofy dads around the world and throughout time love to tell. That reminds us: Knock-knock. (Who’s there?) Amarillo. Amarillo who? Amarillo old-fashioned cowboy!


For the cinephile: Best Movies of the 80s

Packed with photos and memorabilia of Hollywood stars, this collection of classic cinema blockbusters offers summaries, release dates, trivia, and fun facts on each motion picture. This book covers the invention of massive-budget action films, the Brat Pack, and even popular foreign flicks of the day. Nobody puts this book in the corner—you’ll be donning your Ray-Bans and immersing yourself in gnarly nostalgia from the neon-colored 1980s in no time!


For truly wondrous ladies: I Am a Wonder Woman

Now here’s a book that will inspire anyone lucky enough to be gifted it. Inside are the (delightfully illustrated) stories of some of the most interesting, influential, and remarkable women who ever lived. The young reader on your gift list will find history comes alive as read, answer questions, and do some text-related activities. To be frank, we think it’s pretty “wonder”-ful.


For the crafty: Toilet Roll Activity Book

And here all this time, you and that special someone on your gift list have just been using toilet paper for its, well, “intended purpose” and then throwing out (or at least recycling) the round cardboard tube inside! This book will show you how to turn trash into treasure, and challenge, entertain, and delight with its many project and craft suggestions on how to better use that tube. (For example, hold it up to your eye, and you look just like a pirate!)


For those who like it weird: The Strange series

We probably don’t have to tell you that it’s a big, beautiful, and totally weird world out there. Every day, stuff happens that mystifies experts, pundits, and people who ought to know better. And we cataloged hundreds of them into our strange book series, or rather our Strange book series. Whether your gift recipient is a (baffling) history buff, a (bizarre) science, or just to read about really dumb things people did while (trying) to commit a crime, we’ve got the books for you, with Strange History, Strange Science, and Strange Crime, respectively. (How very strange!)


For the unabashedly old-fashioned: Top 100 Classic Radio Shows

Long before there were far too many TV shows, streaming shows, and podcasts to get to, there were way too many fun radio shows to listen to. With this exhaustive book on the history of the golden age of radio, anyone can harken back to the good old days of the 1930s and 1940s, when families gathered in front of a big radio to listen to shows like The Shadow and The War of the Worlds and picture the action as it unfolded in front of them.


For the listmakers: The Top 10 of Everything 2019

Santa only made one list this holiday season, while the trivia elves at Portable Press made hundreds. Who doesn’t love lists? There’s so much information out there in the world, and here’s a big book of it, with everything broken down into the best and most prominent top 10 for easy reference. (It’s also impossible to put down, because after you read about the top 10 bestselling video games, you’ll want to check out the top 10 fastest cars, and then you’ll flip and discover the top 10 most popular movies…and so on.)