An analysis of the present political moment, and the anger that defines it, from bestselling author and acclaimed satirist P.J. O'Rourke.
P. J. O’Rourke Books






A collection of O'Rourke's writings about cars for Car and Driver, Automobile, Esquire, Forbes, and other publications.
Parliament of Whores: A Lone Humorist Attempts to Explain the Entire U.S. Government
- 240 pages
- 9 hours of reading
Called "an everyman's guide to Washington" (The New York Times), P. J. O'Rourke's savagely funny and national best-seller Parliament of Whores has become a classic in understanding the workings of the American political system. Originally written at the end of the Reagan era, this new edition includes an extensive foreword by the renowned political writer Andrew Ferguson -- showing us that although the names and the players have changed, the game is still the same. Parliament of Whores is an exuberant, broken-field run through the ethical foibles, pork-barrel flimflam, and bureaucratic bullrorfle inside the Beltway that leaves no sacred cow unskewered and no politically correct sensitivities unscorched.
Holidays in hell
- 288 pages
- 11 hours of reading
A collection of stories about those travel destinations rarely featured in travel brochures, largely because they are in a perpetual state of war, revolution or shortage of everything from hot dogs to toilet paper.
Parliament of Whores
- 256 pages
- 9 hours of reading
In 1988, P.J. O'Rourke moved to Washington to examine the US government and to look at what politicians do and why it costs so much. The author argues that governments make everything complicated, obscure and tedious to confuse members of the general public in what he describes as a dictatorship of boredom. In this book he examines and explains many of the aspects of the workings of the American government. P.J. O'Rourke is the author of Modern Manners, The Bachelor Home Companion, Republican Party Reptile and Holidays in Hell.
Now available in paperback, Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations, the book that created the field of economics, is transformed into a page-turner of global significance by America's sharpest political commentator writing in English today.
From the author of Give War a Chance and Parliament of Whores, this book offers P.J. O'Rourke's view of all the trouble in the world - but with the goal of answering some tough questions.
Looks at freedom in Russia, Berlin, and Nicaragua, the Gulf War, Africa, drug testing, and pokes fun at people such as Dr. Ruth and Lee Iacocca
Modern Manners
- 280 pages
- 10 hours of reading
In Modern Manners cultural guru P. J. O'Rourke provides the essential accessory for the truly contemporary man or woman-a rulebook for living in a world without rules.Traditionally, good manners were a means of becoming as bland and invisible as everyone else, and thus of avoiding calling attention to one's own awkwardness and stupidity. Today, with everyone wanting to appear special, stupidity is at a premium and manners-as outrageous and bizarre as possible-are a wonderful way to distinguish ourselves, or have a fine time trying.Modern Manners is an irreverent and hilarious guide to anti-etiquette that offers pointed advice on a range of topics from sex and entertaining to reading habits and death. With the most up-to-date forms of vulgarity, churlishness, and presumption, the latest fashions in discourtesy and barbarous display, P. J. O'Rourke makes it easier for all of us to survive with style in a rude world.
The Baby Boom
- 272 pages
- 10 hours of reading
With his typical wit and keen analysis, O'Rourke looks at the way the post-war generation somehow came of age by never quite growing up and somehow created a better society by turning society upside down.



