I love listening to the podcast and looked forward to reading the book. All the included stories are mysterious, unexplainable, and just plain unique. The book flows nicely from one story to another, and I like the formatting of the stories. It worked well and made reading easy. I can't pick one story over another because they are all so well-written. I'm happy I got to read this book and enjoy these stories.

I’m a huge fan of the Aaron Mahnke podcast network. So when I saw the availability of this book, I jumped. I received an ARC of this book as well as an audiobook. I have to admit I enjoyed the audiobook more. I liked being familiar with the narrators from their podcasts. I’ve already told multiple antidotes to friends and family. These are really short chapters which makes for a very fast read. I totally recommend this book especially the audiobook!


Thank you #netgalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review .

I’m not a podcast listener, so I had never heard of this author – but I intend to start listening to his Cabinet of Curiosities podcast on a regular basis. Reading this book felt like reading a 336-page episode of the old Paul Harvey show. I could almost hear Paul Harvey’s tagline, “And now you know… the rest of the story,” at the end of each of the stories in this book :)

Some of the stories were things I’d heard before – the US state of Franklin, the connection between Dr. John Bell and Sherlock Holmes, and Agatha Christie’s mysterious 11-day disappearance, to name a few. Some added head-turning details to stories I already knew – one of the Curtiss JN-4 planes (the plane illustrated on the inverted Jenny postage stamp) crashed shortly after the stamp was released… and landed upside down *insert Twilight Zone music here*

Most of the stories, however, were entirely new to me. All were fascinating, some made me chuckle, some made me shudder and some made me shake my head, but they were all fascinating. I’ve already recommended it to my reading friends who enjoy offbeat bits of history!

The book Cabinet of Curiosities: A Historical Tour of the Unbelievable, the Unsettling, and the Bizarre caught my eye, I do not recall why. I never heard of the podcast or it’s author. As I read each chapter, I kept thinking this could be called Did You Know? Each very short chapter is a story, a tale a tidbit a piece of history that comes with a little learning. Yes, you can google it, but this is more fun. I love the idea that it can create table discussions and get people off their phones. You can open the book at any chapter read it and enjoy it.
This book is simply written it would make a great gift! Yes, after reading it I tuned into the podcast :)
Thank you #netgalley for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

💥 Pub Date: 11/12/2024

This is a compilation of interesting stories in history. They're presented in a digestible way, which makes for easy reading. "Peculiar Places" was my favorite section of the book... I love learning about the history of towns. I'm not familiar with the author's podcast, but I'm definitely going to check it out!

🗣 Thank you to netgalley and St. Martin's Press for the opportunity to read and review this book via gifted eARC! All opinions are honest and my own.

Interesting collection of miscellaneous information that will fascinate curious readers from upper elementary to adult readers. The element of surprise at the end of each 'chapter' keeps the reader turning pages.

I really enjoy Aaron Mahnke's voice and the way he sets up the stories. This is a fun collection of mini stories divided into sections. I started out reading through from cover and the started bouncing around as the name of a story caught my eye. The stories are short enough they make a great read during lunch break or when you are sitting waiting for someone

Cabinet of Curiosities is a wonderful concept, based in the eclectic collections of Europeans beginning in the (primarily) Victorian era. However, I found it very disjointed and full of "Dad Puns" that were appropriately funny, but it wasn't what I was looking for in an enjoyable evening read. The stories were short, clear, and to the point, many of them had the old Paul Harvey feel of "Now you know the rest of the story," which I did enjoy.

I did not complete this book; I received an ARC; this is my honest review.

I received this book as an ARC from NetGalley.

Based on the author’s popular podcast, this book is a collection of strange oddities. As each is only a couple of pages long, it is easy to pick up when the reader has a few spare minutes. The stories are arranged by topic. Some of the situations are very well known, such as the Inverted Jenny stamp, while others are more obscure. I really enjoyed reading these brief clips.

I was drawn to this because of the book description. This is a collection of interesting short (a few pages) stories. This was a good book to read a few or several stories at a time. There was a wide variety of stories grouped with other similar type stories. I enjoyed this book and recommend it.

Thank you to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the Advanced Reader Copy (ARC) copy of this book and I am voluntarily leaving an honest review.

Cabinet of Curiosities by Aaron Mahnke

I've had a lot of doctor appointments lately and this book is great for those times when I'm waiting but don't want to dive into a novel. Each chapter is short, to the point, and interesting to me. Some touch on history or historical figures and fill in gaps that I didn't know about events and people. Other stories introduce me to happenings that I knew nothing about. A lot of them had me searching the internet for more of the story because much of what I learned here had me wanting to know even more. It's a great book for trivia nerds like me, my poor husband will never hear the end of all the "fun facts" I have at my disposal now...ha ha

Thank you to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for this ARC

This collection is for you if you like did-you-know facts you can share with anyone. Mahnke curates snippets of stories you might find far too strange to be true. The tales have a campfire storytelling vibe that many readers will appreciate. This would make a great gift for any curious reader.

This was an easy to read book. I thought the first half of the book was more interesting. As the book goes on I found myself loosing some interest in it. Some of the chapters seemed to drag a little too. I couldn’t help but think this book might be a good study book for Jeopardy

This was a great history book! As someone who loves to learn new facts and interesting stories this hit the mark. Some of the stories I had heard of before because they had been fairly popular, but some I had never heard before. I will definitely be buying the hardcopy.

Any lover of history, short stories, and random collected bits of knowledge will adore this book! Although I very much enjoyed it in printed format, I can only imagine that the audiobook would take it to the next level!

For more reviews and bookish posts visit: https://www.ManOfLaBook.com

Cabinet of Curiosities: A Historical Tour of the Unbelievable, the Unsettling, and the Bizarre by Aaron Mahnke is a series of short articles taken from Mr. Mahnke popular podcast. Mr. Mahnke launched his podcasting career in 2015 with Lore podcast, and has been at it ever since.

I’ve read similar books before, collections of bite size true stories for those of us who love trivia, history, or just general knowledge. These type of literary buffets can be read in any order, even though Mr. Mahnke does put them in general categories such as True Crime, War, Literature, Inventions, and more.

Cabinet of Curiosities by Aaron Mahnke is just a bunch of very short, mostly interesting tidbits. You can read them in any order, skip pages or even sections without missing a beat even if it’s in the same section.

When I checked out the sources which were used to write this book, I found them to be lacking. Most of it relied on Wikipedia other easily searched on-line material. That’s fine for a free podcast, or even a bookish blog with a Fun Facts Friday feature, but if you’re asking someone to pay hard earned money for a product, I think a bit more effort is needed. Other “bizarre” stories are out of context, as they were not seen as bizarre during that time, and many times embellishing an already amazing story was going overboard.

As a dad, however, I appreciated the cheesy jokes at the end of each story.

On a positive note, this book does not pretend to be anything more than what it is. The stories are simply written, often relatable, short and get straight to the point. I do wish that that more context or history would have been provided.

This is a fun book to introduce people to different subjects. However, it plays too loosely with history, presenting it without context or disputed evidence.

The book is a collection of tales of curiosity. Mildly interesting, a reasonably interesting if read in bits and pieces, but not as a straight through in 2 or 3 sittings.
I received an ARC copy from NetGalley and the publisher. All opinions are my own.

This book would make a great bathroom reader. There is a plethora of curious stories grouped into different catagories, much like the room(s) of curiosities he mentions. The stories are short enough to read as you have time on a bus or commute, or of course the bathroom.

I have to confess that I love books like this, with short little tidbits about all sorts of things, that you can consume a little at a time or in big batches. Cabinet of Curiosities was just that, a book full of interesting short stories from all sorts of categories. I learned so much reading this and enjoyed myself the whole time.

I had a great time reading this book and highly recommend it.

5/5 stars.

*** I would like to thank NetGalley, St. Martin's Press, and Aaron Mahnke for the opportunity to read and review Cabinet of Curiosities.

This was a really fun book. I actually think this would be the perfect bathroom book to learn a little fun fact or two. I do think there were a few stories that took a bit of a jump just to fit the punny closing line, but interesting nonetheless. I loved the way Mahnke sectioned the book. It was fun to see stories about people, animals, events, etc across the world and time. I would recommend this book for any and all curious minds.