I think if I looked hard enough underneather the copies of “The Big Book of Death”, “Three-Fisted Tales of ‘Bob’”, “The Philosophy of Andy Warhol”, “Opium For the Masses”, my Jean Genet, Anatole France and J.G. Ballard, the ReSearch book about body modification and the booklet about how celebating the sabbath on Sunday is the work of Satan that was left in my mailbox, I might possibly discover I own a book written by Stephen King or Tom Clancy. And that would be strange :).
“The Jewish-Japanese Sex and Cookbook and How To Raise Wolves”.
All one title, by Jack Douglas. He was a writer of a certain comedic genre in the early to mid-1960’s.
The book is OK, but not as good as the title.
I also have, “The Theory and Practice of Hell”, which, IIRC, is about the design of the Nazi prison camps. Actually a fascinating read.
I also have a copy of “The Yippie Handbook”; Dave Forman’s “Eco-Defense” and some classic underground manual on bomb building.* I have to laugh when they arrest some guy and say, “He had guns and bomb manuals!” So do half my friends.
Whistlepig
- Not that I intend to build any bombs. But when the invasion/revolution/apocalypse comes, I’ll be ready to fight back.
The Complete Guide to Birdfeeding
Tijuana Bibles (a collection of those Depression-era, X-rated underground comic pamphlets)
Is That You Laughing Comrade? (A collection of underground Soviet jokes, as collected from Lithuanians. Many are recognizable “Polish” jokes that substitute CP apparatchiks for the dumb Pollack; others are specifically Communist/Soviet in their references. Oddly moving.)
The Japan That Can Say “No!” (another historical curio)
**On Being Swedish
Markings** (a personal collection of poems and philosophical musings and various epigrams). What makes this one a curio is that its author was Dag Hammarskjold (a U.N. Secretary General during the height of the Cold War) and its translators, Leif Sjoberg and W.H. Auden. FWIW, former Secretary of Defense William Cohen once authored a collection of poems, as did Leonard Nimoy (with his original photographs)… just in case one is interested in building a collection of oddball “poets”.
London Cemeteries: An Illustrated Guide and Gazetteer
I once (very briefly) owned a copy of The Principles and Practices of Embalming. If you ever wanted to know exactly what decomposing humans look like, get your hands on an embalming textbook. Ugh!
I’ve got the Malleus Maleficarum too, and one of the fake Necronomicons, which startles people from time to time. But they blend in with various books on magic and offbeat religion … Strangest thing I’ve bought recently was a copy of Beowulf. In the original Old English.
Mine is “Hear the Sound of My Feet Walking Drown the Sound of My Voice Talking” by Dan O’Neill, originally published in like 1971 or something. My copy has been colored in by several generations of kids and acidheads and it’s a bloody marvel…
And another here with Malleus Maleficarum. And a lot of books on torture and executions.
I really miss my Encyclopedia of Unusual Sex Practises though. I lost it in a move. It sure earned me some strange looks. I’ll need to grab that one again. 
Wow, you guys make me look positively sane. I think that the weirdest book I own is a high-school physics textbook. From 1903. Well, that and Winnie the Pooh translated into Latin, but I’m sure a lot of folks have that one.
But then again, I was cleaning the apartment a bit yesterday and discovered that I have a copy of Gulliver’s Travels which I didn’t know I had, so who knows what else might be lurking in the lower strata?
- In Memory of James L. Feurgeson * This is a book which was apparently published by the subject’s children after he died to memorialize their father. It tells the story of his rather ordinary life in excruiating detail, and includes several pictures of James.
I bought it in a box of books at a yardsale.
Being an avid non-fiction reader, I have a large amount of books that the average person would think odd, such as books on the history of salt production, the social history of flatulence, corsets, toilets, city planning and food production. (Minor historical details fascinate me.)
My book collection is very mixed-up; I’m not sure what is the strangest book.
I have “The Medicine Show” published in 1974 by Consumer’s Union. This book intends to “help consumers better understand the differences between genuine advances in health and medicine and the exaggerated claims of the sellers.” It’s quite informative, actually.
I also have a very cute Doonsbury collection, “That’s Doctor Sinatra, You Little Bimbo!”
whistlepig: you might like my copy of FM 5-34, Engineer Field Data, published by the US Army. Very cool survival stuff.
Have you met Lieu?
A copy of ‘The Stranger’ by Albert Camus in Czech, found it in a thrift store.
‘A Field Guide to Germs’ by Wayne Biddle. Not really strange but a cool title.
Mine can’t really compare to some of those already mentioned. 
I’ve got a fairly eclectic mix in my library - here are a couple of my more odd ones:
A kids book called Everyone Poops by Taro Gomi
How to Shit in the Woods by Kathleen Meyer - Hmm, it might look like I have a fixation here…
Flattened Fauna by Roger M. Knutson. It’s like the nature books that help you identify bird or animal species, except it’s how to recognize which animals you’ve found flattened along the highway.
Telephone Boxes by Gavin Stamp. A history (with photos, of course :)) of British phone booths. It’s part of a series: other books cover such subjects as manhole covers and park benches (I’m serious!).
Manifold Destiny by Chris Maynard and Bill Scheller. A cookbook on how to cook meals on the engine of your car.
I’ve also got a stack of Little Blue Book volumes from Haldeman-Julius Publications dating to the 30’s. I found them years ago in an old box of stuff my great-uncle had. Some of the titles:
[ul]
[li]Survival of the Fittest - H.M. Tichenor[/li][li]Ridiculous Women (Les Precieuses Ridicules) - Moliere[/li][li]How to Argue Logically - Arthur Schopenhauer[/li][li]Why I am an Infidel - Luther Burbank[/li][li]Character Reading from the Face - Leo Markun[/li][li]the Psychology of the Criminal - Leo Markun[/li][li]Trial by Jury: the Great Burlesque of Modern Criminal Justice - Harry Elmer Barnes[/li][li]How to test Your Urine at Home - B.C. Meyrowitz[/li][li]Who Started the World War - Harry Elmer Barnes (note this is WW I it’s talking about…)[/li][li]Herbert Hoover: the Fatuous Failure in the White House - E. Haldeman-Julius[/li][li]Questions and Answers About Birth Control - Margaret Sanger[/li][li]Einsteins’s New Space-Substance Theory - Isaac Landman[/li][li]Socialism and Communism - Norman Angell[/li][/ul]
Eric
Hey Lissa I also have the big Salt book, as well as Cod, written by the same author (if we’re talking about the same thing :D).
The wierdest books I currently have would be my extensive Bukowski collection. Not hard to find, but disturbing in their own special way.
What edition ?
PS No “e” in Smyth.
I have a first-edition of “Rose is a Rose” by Gertrude Stein. A children’s book, about a little girl named Rose, it has bright pink pages & bright blue type. Opening it, I am 8 years old again.
I got 800 bucks for identifying this on Jeopardy. Thanks for the memory.
And The Realist editor Paul Krassner put out Pot Stories for the Soul . It’s in one of the boxes here, someplace.
As for my favorite oddball, gotta be Presidential Trivia and Meat Facts . For the title alone.
-Myron
Ooh, I have one of those too, but in my line of work that counts as normal. I’ve also got Winnie Ille Pu, like Chronos.
Just remembered that I have a children’s book about the life of King Arthur, as told by his dog, but I haven’t read it yet.
Probably the most unusual book I own and have read is The Housewife’s Rich Cabinet, a compilation of home remedies and household hints from early modern conduct books, on such topics as:
– “How to Make a Young Face Exceedingly Beautiful or an Old Face Tolerable”
– “To Take out the Marks of Gunpowder Shot into the Skin of the Face” (one wonders if this was a common problem in early modern England – I hope not, as the remedy calls for fresh cow dung).
– “To Cure Armhole Stench”
– “To Make Common Drunkards Loathe and Abhor Wine” (This one involves a live eel, and is quite alarming.)
Great stuff. I love weird books.
a 1910 biology book… I love it… 90% of it is “we don’t know” and it has the BEST chapter on races…
it explains in detail about how blacks and whites are nearly identical in anatomy and how there is no reason to belive any superiority of whites and all sorts of stuff… its amazeingly forward thinking… in 1910 it must have been a real controversy to write that, its real good.
then you turn a few pages and get to the section about parasites and it says something along the lines of “all chinamen have worms because they live an awful filthy lifestyle”. it cracks me up every time… they do SUCH a good job going into detail about how blacks and whites are equal… and then right after it they come up with that.
How to Build a Corpse (in the comfort and privacy of your own home!) has a prominent place in my bookcase, and has drawn a few odd looks. Of course, leaving it out on the coffee table drew even odder ones.
I’m currently staying at a relative’s. I’ll be returning home in about a week and can tell you then.
Mapcase
Is absolutely correct. But just who is Mapcase? Just an SF fan? Or something more? Have I, through the anonymity of the web, been given a chance to atone for the key? Or am I just babbling like an idiot? I’m hoping it’s both.