奇葩排行：2016年最没用的“自助类”书籍

Reading is good! Sadly, most books are bad. Especially in the self-help genre, which encourages simplistic ideas dressed up to sound profound, inept writing, plus all sorts of gimmicks trotted out to push titles onto best-seller lists and keep them there as long as possible.

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life by Mark Manson

Says the guy who wrote a fucking book and put an asterisk in the word "fuck."

[Inspirational megachurch voice]: All you gotta do to LIVE better… is THINK better! [Woman collapses on stage, is healed]

Oh, well if you're on The Universe's list, step right on in, there's loads of trust fund money and mimosas by the pool on your left.

Life is nice, but the user experience leaves something to be desired. This book is the poor man's version of "learn to code," and is based on a Stanford class, so it must be good.

No, you're an adult who bought a coloring book. Though "totally inappropriate" is unintentionally accurate.

Apparently the secret to persuading someone of something, anything, is the critical moment before you start your pitch. Oh. Who knew? No joke: The Amazon blurb says you can use these techniques for "online marketing campaigns and even effective wartime propaganda." Goebbels says, "I love this book!"

Welp, Deepak Chopra's writing about beauty now. Somebody has to stop this guy, he's printing money with all the pseudo-scientific bullshit he puts his name on these days.

Sooooo this book promises to reveal why terrorists are successful? And also investors? And CEOs and generals? Turns out these people can see and feel "networks." Huh. Spoiler: This book also reveals that Bruce Willis has been alive the whole time.

Self-help and get-rich-quick schemes are inextricably linked.

Technically not self-help, but aren't all Tim Tebow books some kind of self-help? And how are there MULTIPLE Tim Tebow books?

The author of The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up offers an illustrated guide for those readers left confused by the "don't keep so much freaking stuff" message of her revolutionary first title.

Haven't we had enough TED Talks?

OK, this is actually a pretty good troll.

"For readers of #GIRLBOSS and viewers of Shark Tank." Yikes. "Rich in every way" mostly means "rich in money," if you couldn't guess.

There's "rich" again. In just 15 minutes!

Fantastic, I look forward to hearing about the resolution to Hilbert's eighth problem. This book was written by three dudes. Excuse me, three PARTNERS AT GOOGLE VENTURES.

It must not be THAT powerful, because this book is about becoming and staying rich.

Praise must be heaped on "personal growth entrepreneur" Vishen Lakhiani for creating the Platonic ideal of a self-help book in 2016. This one has it all: a call-out to "coding," hints at disruption, an appeal to the unconventional in the relentlessly banal, the steadfast belief that someone reading a self-help book truly can make his mind extraordinary, "laws," references to both "evolutionary biology" and "modern spirituality," reliance on "computational thinking," and, of course, success, which means money. This book is a green juice at a sober dance party hosted by Snapchat sponsored by UNIQLO and DJed by Avicii, that's how zeitgeisty it is.