Most Popular Books by Ken Jennings

Draws on medical case histories, scientific findings, and personal research by the author to separate myth from fact and debunk a vast array of parental edicts.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A witty, charming, and engaging dive into trivia’s colorful history, from America’s highest-earning game show contestant of all time “Insightful, informative, and written with a strong dose of humor and humility. . . . I loved this book.”—Will Shortz, crossword editor, The New York Times Ken Jennings is trivia’s undisputed king—and as he traces his rise from anonymous computer programmer to nerd folk icon, he explores his newly conquered kingdom: the world of trivia itself. Trivia, he has found, is centuries older than his childhood obsession with it. Whisking us from the coffeehouses of seventeenth-century London to the Internet age, Jennings chronicles the ups and downs of the trivia fad: the quiz book explosion of the Jazz Age; the rise, fall, and rise again of TV quiz shows; the nostalgic campus trivia of the 1960s; and the 1980s, when Trivial Pursuit® again made it fashionable to be a know-it-all. Jennings also investigates the shadowy demimonde of today’s trivia subculture, guiding us on a tour of trivia across America. He goes head-to-head with the blowhards and diehards of the college quiz-bowl circuit, the slightly soused faithful of the Boston pub trivia scene, and the raucous participants in the annual Q&A marathon in Stevens Point, Wisconsin, “The World’s Largest Trivia Contest.” And, of course, he takes us behind the scenes of his improbable 75-game run on Jeopardy! But above all, Brainiac is a love letter to the useless fact. (Who knew that there’s a crater on Venus named after Laura Ingalls Wilder? Ken Jennings, that’s who.) Engaging and erudite, Brainiac is an irresistible celebration of nostalgia, curiosity, and geeky obsession—in a word, trivia.

Become a presidential pro with this interactive trivia book from Jeopardy! champ and New York Times bestselling author Ken Jennings. With this book about U.S. Presidents, you’ll become an expert and wow your friends and teachers with clever facts: Did you know that Abraham Lincoln made Thanksgiving a national holiday? Or that Jefferson introduced the first French fries at a fancy state dinner? With great illustrations, cool trivia, and fun quizzes to test your knowledge, this patriotic genius guide will have you on your way to whiz-kid status in no time!

Let your inner astronaut explore outer space with this interactive trivia book from Jeopardy! champ and New York Times bestselling author Ken Jennings. With this book about space you’ll become an expert and wow your friends and teachers with out-of-this-world facts: Did you know that Mars has a volcano bigger than the state of Arizona? Or that there’s a star with a diamond the size of our moon at its core? With great illustrations, cool trivia, and fun quizzes to test your knowledge, this guide will have you on your way to whiz-kid status in no time!

A Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the Year The witty and exuberant New York Times bestselling author and record-setting Jeopardy! champion Ken Jennings relays the history of humor in “lively, insightful, and crawling with goofy factlings,” (Maria Semple, author of Where’d You Go Bernadette)—from fart jokes on clay Sumerian tablets to the latest Twitter gags and Facebook memes. Where once society’s most coveted trait might have been strength or intelligence or honor, today, in a clear sign of evolution sliding off the trails, it is being funny. Yes, funniness. Consider: Super Bowl commercials don’t try to sell you anymore; they try to make you laugh. Airline safety tutorials—those terrifying laminated cards about the possibilities of fire, explosion, depressurization, and drowning—have been replaced by joke-filled videos with multimillion-dollar budgets and dance routines. Thanks to social media, we now have a whole Twitterverse of amateur comedians riffing around the world at all hours of the day—and many of them even get popular enough online to go pro and take over TV. In his “smartly structured, soundly argued, and yes—pretty darn funny” (Booklist, starred review) Planet Funny, Ken Jennings explores this brave new comedic world and what it means—or doesn’t—to be funny in it now. Tracing the evolution of humor from the caveman days to the bawdy middle-class antics of Chaucer to Monty Python’s game-changing silliness to the fast-paced meta-humor of The Simpsons, Jennings explains how we built our humor-saturated modern age, where lots of us get our news from comedy shows and a comic figure can even be elected President of the United States purely on showmanship. “Fascinating, entertaining and—I’m being dead serious here—important” (A.J. Jacobs, author of The Year of Living Biblically), Planet Funny is a full taxonomy of what spawned and defines the modern sense of humor.

Ken Jennings’s Trivia Almanac is the ingeniously organized book where, for a change, the all-time Jeopardy! champ gets to ask the questions–and where every day of the year will give you the chance to test your trivia mettle. For example–February 21: In 1912, on this day, Teddy Roosevelt coined the political phrase “hat in the ring,” so Ken Jennings fires off a series of “ring” questions. What two NFL quarterbacks have four Super Bowl rings each?* What rings are divided by the Cassini Division?** Also on this date, in 1981, the “goth” music scene was born in London, so here’s a quiz on black-clad icons like Darth Vader, Johnny Cash, and Zorro. Do you know the secret identities of Ivanhoe’s Black Knight*** or Men in Black’s Agent M****? In this ultimate book for trivia buffs and other assorted know-it-alls, the 365 entries feature “This Day in History” factoids, trivia quizzes, and questions categorized by Jennings as “Easy,” “Hard,” and “Yeah, Good Luck.” Topics cover every subject under the sun, from paleontology to mixology, sports feats to Bach suites, medieval popes to daytime soaps. This addictive gathering of facts, oddities, devilishly clever quizzes, and other flights of fancy will make each day a fun and intriguing new challenge.

Offers facts about the highest landmarks and mountains, the deepest depth of the seas, what countries are shaped like food, ocean inhabitants, and capital location changes.

Traces the history of mapmaking while offering insight into the role of cartography in human civilization and sharing anecdotes about the cultural arenas frequented by map enthusiasts.

Provides facts on the classic myths of the Greeks and Romans, from how Prometheus outsmarted the gods to how Achilles''s heel led to his death.

Become a junior genius with the first three fact-filled books in from the Jeopardy! champ and New York Times bestselling author, Ken Jennings. Become an expert on maps and geography, Greek mythology, and U.S. presidents with the first three books in Ken Jennings’ popular children’s series! Wow your friends and teachers with all sorts of clever facts: Did you know that the biggest desert in the world is actually covered in snow? Well, how about the story of Prometheus and how he outsmarted the gods? Or that Thomas Jefferson introduced the first French fries at a fancy state dinner? With great illustrations, cool trivia, and fun quizzes to test your knowledge, these guides will have you on your way to whiz-kid status in no time! This fact-tastic boxed set includes Maps and Geography, Greek Mythology, and U.S. Presidents.

At a time of increasing concern about ethics at the top, The Serving Leader calls for leadership that is both more moral and more effective than the ruthless, bottom-line approach that has brought disgrace to once-mighty organizations. The book takes a practical "action approach" to servant leadership-a concept espoused by Ken Blanchard, Stephen Covey and many others. In this second book in The Ken Blanchard series, the authors use a compelling story based on real people to make its five principles of servant leadership accessible to a wide audience. "An amazing new kind of book that will challenge and inspire." -Harvey Mackay, author of Swim with the Sharks without Being Eaten Alive

Travel back in time to the age of the pyramids with this interactive trivia book from Jeopardy! winner and New York Times bestselling author Ken Jennings. With this book about ancient Egypt, you’ll become an expert and wow your friends and teachers with awesome ancient facts: Did you know that some Egyptians used to shave their eyebrows whenever a cat died? Or that some people worshiped a god of lettuce? With great illustrations, cool trivia, and fun quizzes to test your knowledge, this guide will have you on your way to whiz-kid status in no time.

With this collection of trivia from everybody''s favorite game Jeopardy, young readers will learn interesting facts about world geography. Contents by Ken Jennings, illustrations by Mike Lowery. Vietnamese translation by Phuong Thuy.

A tale of leadership in a class of its own, House on Fire!, winner of the 2020 Next Generation Indie Book Award, moves past tips and techniques to uncover the heart of leadership transformation that occurs when people see differently and serve differently. House on Fire! follows Sophie, a young investigative journalist searching for answers whose sources for a story on leadership principles in a high-purpose organization get mixed up in a series of mysterious fires around Pittsburgh. Along the way Sophie meets Jeb, a handsome firefighter and leadership partner at The House who is working to determine who is behind the mysterious fires targeting local Christians. Despite herself, Sophie finds herself falling for Jeb and tension mounts as she comes face to face with her past. Will Sophie confront her fear of fire and help solve the arsons before Jeb gets hurt?or worse? Based on the conviction that leadership transformation in the real world is more caught in the context of community than taught by a single textbook, Ken Jennings and Mike McCormick brilliantly bring leadership development to life through an integrated team of characters, each contributing to the personal growth of the others. Fit for the new landscape of leadership, House on Fire! specifically helps those navigating the shift from leading a company to leading a cause, from command and control to team empowerment, or from leading an organization to transforming a community. Readers follow Sophie as she explores the intersection of faith and Servant Leadership in high purpose organizations and discover how to put Serving Leadership to work in their own high-purpose organization today.

Travel back in time to the dinosaur age with this interactive trivia book from Jeopardy! winner and New York Times bestselling author Ken Jennings. With this book about dinosaurs, you’ll become an expert and wow your friends and teachers with some awesome facts: Did you know that dinosaurs skin was more like bump bird skin than modern snake or crocodile scales? Or that the Tyrannosaurus Rex might have croaked like a frog instead of roaring? With great illustrations, cool trivia, and fun quizzes to test your knowledge, this guide will have you on your way to whiz-kid status in no time.

From New York Times bestselling author and legendary Jeopardy! host and champion Ken Jennings comes a hilarious travel guide to the afterlife, exploring to die for destinations from literature, mythology, and pop culture. Ever wonder which circles of Dante’s Inferno have the nicest accommodations? Where’s the best place to grab a bite to eat in the ancient Egyptian underworld? How does one dress like a local in the heavenly palace of Hinduism’s Lord Vishnu, or avoid the flesh-eating river serpents in the Klingon afterlife? What hidden treasures can be found off the beaten path in Hades, Valhalla, or TV’s The Good Place? Find answers to all those questions and more about the world(s) to come in this eternally entertaining book from Ken Jennings. Written in the style of iconic bestselling travel guides, Jennings wryly outlines journeys through the afterlife, as dreamed up over 5,000 years of human history by our greatest prophets, poets, mystics, artists, and TV showrunners. This comprehensive index of 100 different afterlife destinations was meticulously researched from sources ranging from the Epic of Gilgamesh to modern-day pop songs, video games, and Simpsons episodes. Get ready for whatever post-mortal destiny awaits you, whether it’s an astral plane, a Hieronymus Bosch hellscape, or the baseball diamond from Field of Dreams. Fascinating, funny, and irreverent, this “gung-ho travel guide to Heaven, Hell, and beyond” (The New Yorker) will help you create your very own bucket list—for after you’ve kicked the bucket.

The bestselling coauthor of The Serving Leader (over 90,000 copies sold) provides a roadmap that all leaders can use to create and align entire organizations around an inspiring purpose that drives superior performance.

"Unveil the impressive mysteries of your own body with this interactive trivia book from "Jeopardy! "champ and "New York Times "bestselling author Ken Jennings"--

Calling all future astronauts: get ready for your next space adventure with this free downloadable sampler of great books! Download this FREE sampler for excerpts from William Alexander, Stuart Gibbs, Ken Jennings, and Wesley King. Learn more about the books at SpaceAdventureBooks.com!

Extensive speaking schedule: The authors both average two speaking and/or training engagements per week at major corporate gatherings and at social sector conferences with audiences ranging from 50 to 1000.

A true pioneer in the field of recreational mathematics, Martin Gardner has been wrangling words for decades, and his latest opus is nothing short of extraordinary. From amazing anagrams and silly spoonerisms to alphamagic squares and cryptarithms, this mind-bending compendium is chock-full of whimsical forms of wordplay that are sure to have sesquipedalian scholars and limber-minded logophiles racking their brains in delight.

The Serving Leader Five Powerful Actions to Transform Your Team, Business, and Community, 10th Anniversary Edition, Revised and Expanded It''s people who make organizations great, so how can leaders best help their people achieve that greatness? As Ken Jennings and John Stahl-Wert show in this new edition of their bestseller, you can''t just demand greatness-you have to inspire it. The most effective leaders don''t just stand in front of their people, they stand behind them too. As one of the characters in the book notes, "You qualify to be first by putting other people first." This concept sounds paradoxical, but it leads to extraordinary outcomes-and The Serving Leader shows precisely how and why. While Jennings and Stahl-Wert use a compelling fictional story to outline the basics of Serving Leadership, all the characters in it are based on real people, the organizations depicted are based on real organizations-and the results they achieved are what really happened. This edition features a new foreword by Ken Blanchard, a new introduction, and a new chapter checking back in with Mike, the main character, to see what he has learned in the twelve years since he embraced Serving Leadership On one level this is the most practical guide available to implementing Serving Leadership; on a deeper level, it is a book about the personal journey of growth that real leadership requires. Great organizations are great because they''re filled with people who freely choose to do their very best. It''s a maddeningly simple concept yet stunningly hard to execute. Jennings and Stahl-Wert show leaders how to earn that kind of commitment.