Awaken the Used Car Salesman Within

Description

139 pages
$14.99
ISBN 1-895837-71-5
DDC C818'.602

Publisher

Year

2000

Contributor

Illustrations by Christopher Hutsul
Reviewed by Lynne Perras

Lynne Perras teaches communication arts at the University of Calgary.

Review

Awaken the Used Car Salesman Within is a clever parody of self-help
books that promote inner reflection and psychological improvement.
Touted as a guide to becoming a more effective salesperson, the book
begins with a short introduction that the two authors conclude by
signing, “Disingenuously yours.” The rest of the book, a tongue-
in-cheek guide to achieving success through deception and manipulation,
features such maxims and rules as: “Warning: The Surgeon General has
determined that honesty is dangerous to your financial health”; and
“When you tell the suc—customer that the car they are looking at is
a one-owner vehicle you’re not required by law to tell them that the
owner was Gilles Villeneuve”; and “This above all: To thine own self
be true. But feel free to lie like a rug to everyone else.” Almost
every page is accompanied by a humorous black-and-white illustration by
Christopher Hutsul.

Awaken the Used Car Salesman Within is definitely aimed at a male
audience; there are a couple of somewhat sexist comments among the
maxims, and the salesperson is always identified by means of the generic
“he.” Still, the book offers a refreshing commentary on modern
society’s paradoxical quest for both material and spiritual
fulfilment.

Citation

Bowden, Steven, and Ron Steeds., “Awaken the Used Car Salesman Within,” Canadian Book Review Annual Online, accessed December 2, 2024, https://cbra.library.utoronto.ca/items/show/8129.