No joke: Quirk does not consider itself a humor publisher. "We try to avoid books that will go into the humor section," Rekulak said. "We tend to do books that exist in other parts of the store but happen to be funny." David Borgenicht called these titles "irreference books: hybrids of humor and reference. They are two concepts of books mushed together like Reese's Peanut Butter cups. We take two things that don't go together and create something new that works."
A crucial element of these is that there is a serious side to the books. As Borgenicht put it: "They have real substance that and are not just a joke. The reader learns something from them."
One example is The Baby Owner's Manual, which contains the kind of information from a pediatrician found in other parenting books but has a kind of presentation that seems like "something translated from English to Japanese and back to English," as Rekulak put it. The book, published in 2003, has "no contractions, no jokes," he continued. Because it reads and looks like a TV manual, it had appeal around the world, selling more than 400,000 copies in the U.S. and has been translated into 22 languages. Like The Worst-Case Scenario Handbook, it has given birth to a series of books such as The Dog Owner's Manual and The Sex Instruction Manual.
Still, Borgenicht noted that although the company has "gravitated toward more quirky substantive books, we sometimes do a ridiculous humor book because we have to." One example is The Quotable Douchebag, which has a September 1 pub date. The book features "brash and arrogant" quotations from famous men and women.
"Some bookstore accounts don't want to go near The Quotable Douchebag," Rekulak said. "If I were a sales rep, maybe I couldn't present it to some accounts, but with others I couldn't wait to show them."
Another example of ridiculous humor is Penis Pokey, a 2006 board book with no text and holes strategically placed on each illustrated page. The proposal came in the slush pile, and Rekulak thought it would not work. But, he said, "Everyone came in to borrow the dummy to show others," an unusual response. Already more than 150,000 copies have sold.
This fall's list includes what one might call Son of Penis Pokey: The Penis Pokey Activity Book, which includes a pen (!) to be used on some connect-the-dot pictures, a maze and blank pages. Other titles are Dirty Jokes Every Man Should Know, The Secret Lives of Great Composers and Everyday Astrology by Gary Goldschneider, author of The Secret Language of Birthdays. Together with Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, they should make this a quality season for Quirk.