2 out of 4 stars
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Chauvinist, when applied to a man, refers to a male who patronizes and belittles women and believes they don't deserve equal benefits. Picking The Chauvinist's Guide to Modern Romance as the title, Morris Rollins seems to be looking for trouble. The book is in three parts: The beginning, Intermission I, and Intermission II. He begins by introducing Woman and Man and their desires. Next, he informs the modern men what they need to do to have intimate relations with various partners. During the first Intermission, he explains "How Chauvinism Works" while during the second, he gives his male readers tips on "Winning the Battle of the Sexes". Men, in Rollins' book, are categorized into Nice Guys, Cavemen, Smooth Guys, etc. while women are categorized into Nice Girls, Bad Girls, Femme Nazis, Nymphs, etc. Who are these people? What is so special about them? Do you want to find out? Then pick up Morris Rollins' extremely short book and start reading.
I'm going to use a reference to Brosh's Hyperbole and a Half. I hope you get it. The vibe I got from this book was something along these lines:
-What are we? -Men!
-What do we want? -Lots of sex!
-How do we get it? -By reading The Chauvinist's Guide to Modern Romance.
Joking aside, I didn't find the book remotely funny. Of course, some of the pictures and caricatures used in the book were amusing but other than that I can't say the text succeeded to make me smile. On the contrary, The Chauvinist's Guide to Modern Romance was somehow off-putting. Since this book is dealing with the ancient and never-ending discussion of the female versus the male, Rollins should've paid more attention to the language. It may come across as offensive and improper for most of its female readers and some of the male readers. The language used by Rollins is raw and filled with insulting remarks stated in a very casual manner. And no matter how you look at it, objectively or subjectively, parts of it (the Catholic girl and the nymph sections especially) are extremely obnoxious.
What I did appreciate in the book, however, was the beginning, where he defined Woman and Man then studied them psychologically. He explains "romantic love" and how different a man's and a woman's perspectives are on the matter. This section was informative, interesting, and non-offensive. I even learned what a chauvinist is, so it wasn't totally a bad book.
I didn't find any grammatical mistakes in the book. As for punctuation mark errors, there was this one specific error that kept happening, again and again, throughout the book. The language of the text is not difficult to follow; however, there are a few wordy sentences that need to be re-read once or twice. Having said all that, I'm going to give The Chauvinist's Guide to Modern Romance 2 out of 4 stars.
Considering the context, I don't know if I should recommend this book at all, but I have an idea who wouldn't enjoy reading Rollins' book. Because of the few inappropriate pictures and the heavily sexual context, I do not recommend this book to young readers. I also urge the sensitive readers to stay away from it. This book addresses delicate issues that might be hurtful to some readers (mostly female), so I encourage them not to go for this book. I didn't get the humor personally, but if you are into Man vs. Woman comedic texts, you might enjoy this book. Also, if you are a man, if you are a nice guy or a chauvinist wannabe, then I am sure you will appreciate the present book.
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The Chauvinist's Guide to Modern Romance
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