Summary

Hey, Boys!Want to have some fun? Maybe learn how to land an airplane in an emergency? Or fight off an alligator? Escape from being tied up? How about taking a ride on one of America's scariest roller coasters? Learn how to make fake blood or turn a real bone into a pretzel. What if you could find out how to identify some of the world's most horrifying creatures? Or learn the secret of making a blockbuster movie? What about guessing the top 11 greatest moments in sports history? Find buried treasure? And once you've found the treasure, find out just how much it would cost you to buy one of the world's most expensive cars.You'll find all this-and much more-over 250 pages of the biggest, baddest, and best information on just about everything. Plus we've placed a special, mind-bending, solve-the-code puzzle on random pages throughout the book that will lead you to a really cool solution! Now, that's fun!

Author Biography

Marc Aronson is an author, editor, publisher, speaker, historian, and book producer. He writes a monthly column for School Library Journal on nonfiction for younger readers, and frequently speaks about boys and reading. Marc has written a number of award-winning books for younger readers, including SIR WALTER RALEIGH AND THE QUEST FOR EL DORADO, the first book to win the Robert F. Sibert Award for the best in children’s nonfiction, and THE REAL REVOLUTION: THE GLOBAL STORY OF AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE, a School Library Journal and Kirkus best book. In 2006, he was given the ALAN Award by NCTE for service to teenagers and was named the local spokesman for History Channel’s Save Our History program. He lives with his wife and two sons in Maplewood, NJ.

HP Newquist has authored more than a dozen books for both children and adults, including the critically acclaimed THE GREAT BRAIN BOOK (Scholastic, 2005). To prepare for this book, Mr. Newquist went scuba diving with sharks in Australia, climbed the Great Pyramid in Egypt, drove some really fast cars, learned a few magic tricks, and read more books than he can count.

Introduction 6 * Reader! Before You Start This Book, Stop Right Here! 9 * Supercars 10 * History's Weirdest Disasters 12 * Monsters and Dinosaurs 12 * How to: Fight a Shark 13 * Odds Are . . . 14 * Sports Puzzlers 14 * Mark Your Calendar! 16 * What Do You Eat? 16 * Bone Pretzel 16 * Pizza Stats 17 * Dates to Know: Snacks in America 18 * How to: Land a Plane in an Emergency 20 * Fun Math Tricks 22 * Oobleck 23 * Most Venomous Snakes 24 * Most Dangerous Snakes 25 * Explorers and Adventurers 26 * Ultimate Frisbee 30 * Fear Factor: America's Scariest Amusement Park Rides 32 * Dates to Know: Attractions and Amusement Parks in America 34 * Nature's Deadliest Poisons 36 * Brain Teaser: The Missing Money 37 * Great Mysteries: What They Left Behind 38 * Weapons That Changed History 40 * Fake Blood 42 * Card Trick 1: "The Flipped Card" 43 * How to: Escape From Being Tied Up 43 * Spies 44 * Detective Stuff 46 * How to: Collect Fingerprints 46 * Dental Evidence 47 * Chromatography 47 * Blood Testing 48 * DNA Testing 49 * How to: Get out of Quicksand 50 * What Are You Really Worth? 50 * Word Games 51 * Codes: There is Danger May Come Very Soon 52 * Card Trick 2: "The Math Genius Magic Trick" 53 * Presidents 54 * How Does It Work? Satellites 58 * Brain Teaser: The Four Triangles 60 * Liquid Rainbows 60 * Secrets for Drawing in 3-D 60 * How to: Win at Rock, Paper, Scissors 61 * Top Eleven Greatest Moments in Sports History 62 * Athletes Who Changed the World--Literally 64 * Amazing Comeback--Upset--Refuse-to-Lose 66 * Best Individual Performance 68 * Dates to Know: Sports in America 72 * Treasure: Buried or Otherwise 74 * Wonders of the World 80 * The Two Most Horrifying, Hideous, and Disgusting Creatures in the World 84 * The Great Game of 21 86 * Fantasy Wars: Who Would Win? Vikings vs. Pirates 88 *Crushing Conquerors 90 * Fantasy Wars: Who Would Win? Aztec vs. Inca 92 * How 3,000 Men Beat 50,000, and Other Great Battle Stories 94 * Fantasy Wars: Who Would Win? Mongols vs. Romans 96 * How Does it Work? Cell Phones 98 * Computer Byte Sizes 99 * So You Want to Be a Rock Star 100 * The Only Four Sports Dynasties Worth Mentioning, and Why No One Will Ever Top Them 104 * Major League Brothers 105 * Largest Sports Facilities in the United States 106 * The Most Successful Movies Ever Shown in America 112 * Earth's Extremes 114 * Moon Man Facts 116 * Road to the Red Planet 117 * Space Distances 118 *Cool Things to Expect in Your Lifetime 120 * Great Mysteries: Fake 121 * Video Games 122 * Do Not Trade or Throw Out! 126 * Billions 126 * Rich 127 * Great Mysteries: Spooky 128 * World's Greatest Daredevils 130 * Speed Records 132 * Speeds . . . in Miles Per Hour 133 * Dates to Know: Transportation in America 134 * How Does it Work? MP3 Player and iPod 136 * Monster Hunting 138 * Things to Remember Your Whole Life 142 * U.S. States and Capitals 143 * People, People Everywhere . . . 148 * Baseball's Best 148 * All-American 149 * Predators--Kings of the Hill 150 * Kings of Ancient Hills 151 * How to: Fight Off an Alligator 152 * Diseases You Definitely Don't Want to Get 153 * The Biggest Man-Made Things on Planet Earth 154 * Things You Didn't Know (But Probably Should) 156 * The Simple Coin Vanish 157 *

Supplemental Materials

What is included with this book?

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Excerpts

“That is so interesting.”

“Wow!”

“I didn’t know that.”

How many times have you said these things, when you landed on a neat Web site, or glanced at a magazine? Harvey and I are writers who love discovering new things. We thought it would be fun to have a book about the most interesting stuff we could find. Not a record book with endless tables of facts. We wanted a book that would be as filled with adventure and the unexpected, as all the snakes, and battles, and sports cars, and ridiculously poisonous dart frogs we talk about. This is a book to get lost in, and find your own way out—and don’t be sure that when you’ve read a page once, you’ve seen all that’s there. Look again, look back, look ahead! There are things here to do, to see, to think about; codes to break, puzzles to solve, even mysteries we couldn’t figure out, which we hope you can. And while you do all that, we’re gathering even more amazing entries for next time.—MA

Cool stuff is all around you—adventure, sports, animals, magic, warriors, movies, video games, and even danger. A lot of it you learn about in school and at home. But sometimes you just want the really good parts and nothing else; you don’t want to sit through the boring junk. Marc and I know that—it’s the way we’ve felt ever since we were kids. So when we wrote this book, we made sure it would have only the best stuff. We skipped everything else. And on those occasions where we had different ideas on what was the very best, we put it all in to let you decide. So there’s something to do, mind-boggling to figure out, and cool to learn on every page. We’ve got bloodthirsty barbarians, sports heroes, vicious predators, ancient mysteries, and daredevils all over this book. And that’s just the beginning . It’s a big world out there, with a lot of amazing things for you to explore. Welcome to the coolest place to start.—HPN

Excerpted from For Boys Only: The Biggest, Baddest Book Ever by Marc Aronson, H. P. Newquist
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.