212 degrees: the extra degree (2005)
this book was the 'book of the month' at FedEx Office when i went to pick up the programs for my concert. I leafed through it out of idle curiosity, and i was amazed at how absurd the book was. It's one of those self-motivation self-help sort of things, the premise being something like (iirc) "most people may go 211 degrees, you need to go 212 degrees, go that extra degree because it's only one degree that changes water from hot to boiling." the book was done in all strong bold large font text meant to be all inspirational and energizing and other sort of nonsense.
some byline at FedEx said that this was a New York Times Bestseller which i found utterly fascinating. How does a book that basically just finds a clever way to say "try harder" manage to make a best seller list? how does a book like that actually instill change in people's lives that they wouldn't have found on their own?
maybe i'm being too hard about it because i'm generally not a deflated sort of individual that needs that sort of external kick in the arse to get motivated about something, but it seems to me that if i *were* the sort that needed that external kick, i'd try to find it in something that was able to give me more substance and less infomercial.