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Press Releases
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: January 8, 2008Contact: Ken Siman, 212-994-3077 ksiman@virgin-books.co.uk SISSY NATION: HOW AMERICA BECAME A CULTURE OF WIMPS & STOOPITS by John Strausbaugh SISSY OF THE WEEK: Hillary Clinton Shell shocked, frustrated, enraged, her sense of entitlement badly bruised by Iowa, Hillary Clinton pulled out the last stop the night before the New Hampshire primary vote: she choked up. She played the vulnerable, sensitive woman—and it worked. Oh you American sissies… — John Strausbaugh Praised by the New York Times Book Review For being “persuasive [and] provocative,” John Strausbaugh reveals in furious, funny, ferocious strokes, America's decline from a nation of warriors to a nation of wimps and worriers: sissified, soft, and scared. Strausbaugh offers straight up solutions to snap us out of the servitude of sissydom. Holy Testosterone! After I read this, I wrestled a supermodel and had sex with a bear! Maybe I got those backwards, but I so wanted to prove my manliness that I didn’t care! — Morgan Spurlock “Impassioned yet brilliantly humorous” (London Evening Standard), John Strausbaugh is a contributing writer to the New York Times and host of their video podcast series “Weekend Explorer.” Throughout the Presidential campaign, he’ll be choosing the “Sissy Candidate of the Week,” “Stoopit Candidate of the Week,” and “Stand-Up Candidate of the Week” on his blog at www.sissynation.us. And in Sissy Nation: How America Became a Culture of Wimps and Stoopits (Virgin Books || Hardcover; $16.95 US/$18.95 CAN, February 5, 2008), Strausbaugh introduces us to a new species—The American Sissy. The American Sissy cocoons in a safe, virtual world—Fundadome. He plays with online friendsters and he plays with himself, anything to abate the pall of anxiety hanging over his head about everything from terrorists to spinach to air and sunshine. He votes for sissy leaders who bully the world&mdash sissies in tough guy drag. He’s so afraid of death and illness, he doesn’t really live—he overmedicates himself and overprotects his kids. And he’s so preoccupied with the lives of the rich and famous that he forgets all about having a fulfilled life of his own. “I don’t mean sissy as girly man versus manly man,” Strausbaugh says. “The kind of sissiness I’m talking about is not characterized by a lack of muscles, but by a lack of courage and conviction, spine and balls. And unless we stop acting like such sissies, soon enough some lean, angry barbarians from somewhere out Beyond Fundadome are going to overrun us, ramming their bayonets in our fat guts like fingers poking the Pillsbury Doughboy, and we won’t be giggling.” Strausbaugh leaves no sacred cow untipped. He is as nonpartisan as he is straight shooting, taking equal aim at Democrats and Republicans, gays and straights, PETA fanatics, and the Christian right. But all is not lost. Sissy Nation offers “modest proposals” for restoring the gumption that made this culture great. Sissy Nation: How America Became a Culture of Wimps & Stoopits by John Strausbaugh Virgin Books - Hardcover - $16.95 US/$18.95 CAN ISBN: 978-1-9052-6416-2 - Publication date: February 5, 2008 Very funny. It hit me where it hurts. I feel unmanly now. &mdash John Leguizamo 10/12/07 “Weekend Explorer” John Strausbaugh is On the Trail of Brooklyn's Underground Railway Follow a freedom trail through Pre-Civil war Brooklyn, from a church basement in Brooklyn Heights to a safe haven in Crown Heights.  » GO TO THE TOUR « “Weekend Explorer” Does Hell's Kitchen: with John Strausbaugh The New York Times strides a new beat thanks to pop-culture's bad-boy writer, John Strausbaugh, who saunters through the streets of New York as though marking territory. It's Strausbaugh's (former DJ, Editor of the New York Press and author of controversial sellers, Rock Til You Drop, Black Like You and the upcoming Sissy Nation) distinctive idea of a history lesson. As your personal video tour guide, Strausbaugh takes the idea of an informal stroll to a new level, casually pointing out stretches like Death Avenue, where people were routinely run down by trains that couldn't, or wouldn't, stop. He waves in the direction of the sites of particularly grizzly knifings and gang violence, and takes us into basements where victims' bodies were chopped up and cemented into the walls and floor—basements of establishments whose new owners swear that the ghosts of butchered Irish gangsters come out at night. Routinely, Strausbaugh loses his cameraman in his unexpected dodges through city traffic. The Times is fully invested in the multimedia experience and ready to meet the demands of an iTune nation; “Explorer” videos can be viewed on the Times' website, and block by block walking tours, narrated by Strausbaugh, come complete with printable maps and mp3's conveniently downloadable to your iPod. The Hell's Kitchen pod is fun, a little creepy—um, educational—and, best of all, free!  » GO TO THE TOUR « The New York “Explorer” Series adds “Art & Unrest in the East Village”: More Grit and Great Music! Strausbaugh follows up on his Hell's Kitchen premiere with an equally popular second segment of "Weekend Explorer," Art & Unrest in the East Village, which took the #1 most e-mailed video arts spot the day of its release and can now be found on sites ranging from YouTube to Juxtapoz. We'll send you to the source, The New York Times, with its accompanying article and downloadable walking tour. "Art & Unrest" is a lively jaunt, and the music is terrific. Be forewarned, Strausbaugh is not your old History teacher, but he is deadly serious; in a look-this-is-what-happened-here, now let's go find something else interesting—oh, and turn up the music!—sort of way.  » GO TO THE TOUR « Sissy Nation John Strausbaugh's Sissy Nation: How American Became a Culture of Wimps & Stoopits will be released by Virgin Books USA. It tells how the country has gone soft and offers a rapid fire rant on ways to snap out of it. As of September 19th, 2007, Amazon.com is already reporting pre-orders. » Pre-order Sissy Nation. links
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