When I a teenager I’d buy a new page a day calendar each year. You know the squarish desk ones that have an inspirational quote each day? This book reminds me of those, except this is Fun Facts: Geek Edition. And it’s in book form so it doesn’t matter which day you start.

This is the book you’re looking for if the geek in your life is a sci fi and fantasy all rounder. It covers movies, TV shows, comics, games (computer and board) and books.

Because there are so many entries (365 because apparently nothing notable has ever happened in sci fi or fantasy on 29 February), I’m going to share one fun fact per month.

On 25 January 1947, a patent that described one of the earliest computer games was registered.

On 28 February 1985, Terminator’s John Connor was born.

The first Comic-Con happened on 21 March, 1970.

The Simpsons first aired on 19 April 1987.

The Buffy the Vampire Slayer finale aired on 20 May 2003.

Jaws was released in American cinemas on 20 June 1975.

Indiana Jones was born on 1 July 1899.

Ray Parker’s Ghostbusters theme song made it to #1 in America on 11 August 1984.

The Jetsons was first broadcast on 23 September 1962.

Fox Mulder joined the FBI on 24 October 1984.

Alice in Wonderland was first published on 26 November 1865.

Stan Lee was born on 28 December 1922.

While I would have preferred it if less births and deaths were mentioned, overall this was a fun read. I particularly liked the infographics. I don’t think I’m enough of an all rounder to want to consult this book each day but I did enjoy reading about the franchises I love.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Aurum Press, an imprint of Quarto Publishing Group, for the opportunity to read this book. I’m rounding up from 3.5 stars.

A neat book, would be great as a coffee table (or for the bathroom!)... could work great as a gift for your geeky friends (or the geek inside you)

This is a fantastic coffee table book for the geek in your life or even someone just mildly interested in the pop or geek culture! Every day has interesting tidbits about things that happened in history or why certain dates are important if geek culture is your thing. I wouldn't necessarily recommend sitting down and trying to just read it all right away, but give yourself time to absorb it day by day. It is colorful and the graphics are eye-catching. I would highly recommend this to anyone who is interested in finding out more about this ever-growing cultural phenomenon or for something to keep your friends entertained.

Perfect for anyone who loves flash fiction. Nice info graphs to support the writing. Brilliant read.

This is a kind of calendar with geeky info for each of the days. Some of the facts were more interesting, some less so, but I liked that the explanations came accompanied by infographics or diagrams. Overall, interesting and fun to read.

This is exactly the sort of fun, nerdy coffee table book I LOVE. All the infographics were super well made, and super interesting.

Some were a little hard to read since I was reading this on Adobe Digital Editions, so I really want to buy a hardback.

If you're into geeky, meta stuff about your fandoms, then this is for you!

This book was awesome! Not only was the information provided incredibly entertaining, but the graphics were so eye-catching and fun and they added a whole new element to the book. Obviously, I would highly recommend this book to any geek I know, but I think there’s something in here for everyone to enjoy, whether or not they consider themself a geek. There’s stuff for movie fans, music fans, literature fans, TV fans, and more. I’m so glad this book exists and I can’t wait to buy a physical copy to add to my library. My only wish is that it had been longer. I wanted more!

Are you a fan of lists and graphics? Do you like to be a know-it-all? I am and I do, so I enjoyed this very much.Nicely curated and beautifully designed - this would be a lovely gift for sci-fi/fantasy fans of all kinds.

A Jazzy, Upbeat, Graphically Enhanced Book of Lists

I like books of lists - lists of movies, books, characters, places, events - you name it. It's fun to see what you know and what you don't know, where you've been and where you should go, what you've read and what you've missed. Well, this book is like the ultimate Geek book of lists, and the author has cast his net wide enough to interest just about anybody, not just the hardcore.

Now, if this were just a fancy thought-for-the-day style calendar book it might not have enough substance to afford it more than some passing interest. The author, though, gives us much more. About every third day gets a full page info-graphical treatment. The graphics might be of a network connecting each Star Wars character to each movie in which he appeared. Or, it might look like the Pac-Man game board, but with Pac-Man factoids spread around the paths. Or it might be an X and Y graph of every Pixar release by year and gross earnings. Want to know the San Diego Comic-Con attendance from each year since it was founded? Here it is. You get the idea.

The book fills up about half the days with references to birthdays or publication dates or release dates for seminal books and movies and for influential or foundational geek celebrities and innovators. The rest of the pages are loaded with graphics about just about anything. We cover games, books, movies, TV, cultural events, inventions/patents/doodads, comics, graphic novels, artists, computing, and science and technology. As I said, a wide net.

Some of the references are obscure and some are marginal, but the author's heart is in the right place and the overall project is winning. It was also interesting that the organization is based on dates, not years, so the things that happened on, say, October 6, 7, and 8 can be centuries apart and yet still feel connected. That everything-thrown-together approach makes for some felicitous combinations. That said, there are lots of indexes if you just want to look up references that especially interest you.

The bottom line for me was that while this wasn't really encyclopedic and it certainly wasn't comprehensive, it had just the right sort of random listness that made for a fun browse. A happy find.

(Please note that I received a free advance will-self-destruct-in-x-days Adobe Digital copy of this book without a review requirement, or any influence regarding review content should I choose to post a review. Apart from that I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.)

This would be a good gift for the geek in your life, or something fun to ease y0u into a large number of fandoms. The graphics are well done and fun to read. For each day that is chosen, something historic or interesting is presented about an aspect of "geek" culture. Subjects range from the typical Doctor Who and Star Trek, to information on the creator of the Hubble telescope and Alf. Information is presented in a fun and easily sharable way, and if nothing else, may help you win big on trivia night.

Ideal for science fiction fans. This guide presents the interesting facts about the most popular of the sci-fi culture. From the classic of the start for the last century to today’s ouvres. Excellent book!

As a geek who loves facts and trivia I really enjoyed this book. The infographics and mini pictures were a nice addition and I can myself using some of the trivia for quiz nights. Not really something to sit down and read in one go. I'd probably call it a bathroom book.

If you need a primer on nerdiness, this book is the perfect choice.

Filled with cool facts from the start on a range of topics, this book taught me so much reading it and made me look up more books I want to read, more films I need to watch and a Netflix binge that is the length of which the world has never seen.

The infographics are fantastic throughout this book, the Buffy The Vampire Slayer one in particular made me really remember the percentage of the kills in the show which were Buffy’s and as you open it, the timeline of timelords is a really cool and well laid out graph that really summarises this book well.

I also really liked the representation in the book, throughout the book it was good to see a fair balance of female and male mentions that really allows for a rounded and honest representation of geek culture, mentioning writers such as Ursula LeGuin and Octavia Butler and actresses such as Zoe Saldana and director, Kathryn Bigelow.

An ideal book for a rookie geek, it’s an awesome Christmas gift for anyone of any age really. Well worth a read.

This is a really geeky-fun gift book. It is a bit like a calendar, in that it has geek facts for every day of the year. Each selection is explained, and often there are graphs, grids, charts and diagrams to helpfully illustrated the impact or importance of the events. The graphics are fun and well-done.

I didn't like some of the facts chosen - perhaps it was hard to find pure geekish facts for every day of the year, and I know everyone's connection with geek culture differs, but I was not interested in seeing so much about filmmakers and actors. I enjoyed reading about books, authors, gaming milestones, scientific achievements, and the like. On the other hand, looking up a special date to find that the day was when the fourth series of the television show Babylon V aired, or that this was the date that Fox Mulder joined the FBI, was a real sad trombone.

This would be a fun gift for the geek in your life, and a good coffee table book, able to be picked up and read in short bursts, or to use for conversation starters.

Book sounds great and I was very excited to read it, but sadly no kindle version is available. Wish publishers would specify this in the description.