View Full Version : Book: Cheap Laffs: The Art of the Novelty Item


The_Princess_of_Bozonia
03-06-2007, 03:52 PM
http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/P/0810955997.01._AA240_SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg
Cheap Laffs (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0810955997/clownforum0a-20)
Remember when you zapped your friend with a joy buzzer? Planted fake vomit on the dining room table for your unsuspecting mother to find? Who could resist the hours of entertainment promised by the artificial ink spot? Cheap Laffs plunders pop culture's sub-basement to chronicle the aesthetic and cultural achievements of the novelty item.
Sharply designed, jam-packed with illustrations, and written with a touch of irony, this book celebrates a thriving, if marginal, industry devoted to the creation of a modest product of questionable quality, taste, originality, and necessity. The Whoopee Cushion, The Smoking Monkey, fake worms, chickens, eggs, butter, nails, and pencils-we can only marvel at the outlandish ingenuity of these objects seemingly concocted in a frenzied atmosphere of pop cultural temperature-taking and reckless dementia. How else can we even begin to explain the mouse-shaped eraser, the enormous vibrating eye, or the miniature baby in a celluloid peanut? Unearthing the best, oddest, and most intriguing novelties of the past century, this highly entertaining, nostalgia-filled book is sure to appeal to all consumers of kitsch and visual culture. AUTHOR BIO: Mark Newgarden, creator of the 1980s Garbage Pail Kids for the Topps Company, is a visual artist whose work has appeared in publications ranging from RAW to The New York Times Op-Ed page. He has conceived, scripted, and designed programming for Nickelodeon and the Cartoon Network. PictureBox, Inc., a visual content studio and publishing house composed of Peter Buchanan-Smith and Dan Nadel, produces the annual book of pictures and prose The Ganzfeld.

Has anyone read this? If so please post a review.

Chance Marmalade
03-06-2007, 07:00 PM
Sounds like a a great book! I think I am going to have to go look for it!

whowe82
03-06-2007, 08:16 PM
http://product.half.ebay.com/_W0QQprZ30531351QQcpidZ1223056469

ibimus
03-07-2007, 04:49 PM
Haven't read it, but it is at Barnes&Noble, so I'll look for it next time I'm down there.

AuzzyDee
11-19-2009, 05:10 PM
Here is a review I found on Amazon. Amazon.com: Karina Montgomery "ma...'s review of Cheap Laffs: The Art of the Novelty Item (http://www.amazon.com/review/RPF5PP8RN3C0K)

Auzzy Dee8-)

Pickles
11-19-2009, 10:22 PM
I think I know what Santa's puttin' in my stocking this year!!!

Dusty B
11-20-2009, 10:37 AM
I think I know what Santa's puttin' in my stocking this year!!!

Coal? Or some non-fossil-fuel equivalent? :D

Nettie Belle
11-20-2009, 10:11 PM
It sounds good, so I bought it. I got it on half.com for 75 cents and $2.99 shipping. Such a deal, huh? At that price, even if I don't like it, I didn't lose too much money ... THANKS for the info. I'll let you know when I receive it.

Pickles
11-21-2009, 12:27 AM
It sounds good, so I bought it. I got it on half.com for 75 cents and $2.99 shipping. Such a deal, huh? At that price, even if I don't like it, I didn't lose too much money ... THANKS for the info. I'll let you know when I receive it.

Well, I got mine for TWELVE CENTS!!! Of course, then I had to pay $3.99 for shipping, so I guess you still got the good deal.

AuzzyDee
11-21-2009, 12:43 AM
I really want to order this book,but I am in Canada and I am afraid they are going to charge me duty. I don't know a whole lot about duty charges does anyone know the cost usually?

Thanks,

Auzzy Dee