Publishers Weekly
04/01/2024
In this sly debut political parody, McIndoe and Gaydos offer up a fictional backstory to their satirical conspiracy theory, widely popular online, that the U.S. bird population has been replaced by birdlike CIA drones. The joke, which pokes fun at several things at once—unhinged conspiracy theorists, actual government malfeasance, and how genuinely weird birds are—begins here as a tongue-in-check history of the U.S. surveillance state. Presented in the form of an exposé (narrated by a QAnonesque “Patriot”), the story starts with CIA chief Allen Dulles deciding to kill every bird in America after one shits on his car, and folding the project into a plan to surveil leftists. From there, military aviation contractor Boeing is enlisted to poison the birds, and hippies are tricked into constructing the replacement robot birds by CIA infiltrators who claim the drones will deliver food aid to Vietnam (this is meant as a sendup of real-life MKULTRA experiments: “If they told anyone... it would sound like the deranged ramblings of a braindead psychonaut”). Other chapters elaborate additional elements of the joke (in their “bird drone field guide,” the authors get back to making fun of birds; for example, seagulls are said to habitually steal half-eaten food because they are actually collecting DNA from saliva). It’s a silly and winning spoof. (June)
From the Publisher
Provides a wry commentary on an era where conspiracy theories are no longer relegated to shadowy internet forums and the fringes of media. By detailing an utterly ridiculous alternate history wherein your pet parakeet is in fact an insidious agent of espionage, [McIndoe & Gaydos] offer a sharp lesson in media literacy.”
—New York Times
“Cosplaying the paranoid fringe, Birds Aren’t Real delivers a knowing satire of American conspiratorial thinking in the century of QAnon. Beneath the collegiate humor, however, lies a profound grasp of conspiracism’s psychic appeal, and a valuable provocation. How to best fight false claims and conspiracies online is currently the subject of fierce debate among social and computer scientists, policymakers, even the Supreme Court…Could it be, as a consequential election looms and violent online fantasies spray into real life, that we are going about it all entirely the wrong way?”
—The New Republic
“A silly and winning spoof.”
—Publishers Weekly
"Quirky and humorously provocative."
—Kirkus
“‘Bird Truthers’ Peter McIndoe and Connor Gaydos include evidence to support their very real and super normal beliefs in this new manifesto, which contains charts, illustrations, activities, and leaked government documents. Whether or not you’re one of the faithful, it promises to be a fun read at least.”
—A.V. Club, "10 Books You Should Read in June"
“More than a million people have become followers of a conspiracy theory that birds aren’t real…[the movement] mirrors some of the absurdity that has taken flight across the country.”
—60 Minutes
“[A] meta conspiracy movement, set to out-conspire all other conspiracies.”
—Vice
“The most perfect, playful distillation of where we are in relation to the media landscape we’ve built but can’t control…It’s a conspiracy-within-a-conspiracy.”
—The Guardian
Library Journal
05/01/2024
The popular parody web conspiracy theory comes to the page in this swift and mordant read. The authors are performance artist/filmmaker McIndoe and Gaydos, the Gen Z satirists and self-described "public information officers" who proliferated the tongue-in-cheek Birds Aren't Real movement. Their movement mocks other conspiracy theories such as QAnon and warns the masses that birds in the U.S. are actually government surveillance drones. Their book sticks to the gag with gusto; they even craft a detailed history of the movement dating back to the '70s. Fun illustrations give readers insight into the cartoony mechanisms that power these bird-drones, spotlighting the various types of drones, the purpose that each disguised bird species serves, and instructions on how to stand up to the program that enables bird-drones, including knocking out the drones' power and holding rallies. But some readers may find that the joke begins to drag in book form. VERDICT This satirical conspiracy-theory book makes a fun addition to collections. Give to fans of other quick, funny, satirical reads such as The Donald J. Trump Presidential Twitter Library by The Daily Show with Trevor Noah team.—Jack Phoenix
Kirkus Reviews
2024-03-15
Two young writers satirize the American obsession with conspiracy theories by offering “insights” into a fictional governmental plot.
During the Trump era, the far-right fringe groups, including QAnon—which posited that elite Satan-worshipping pedophile democrats controlled politics and the media—developed a robust following, to the chagrin of many, including then teenage McIndoe. He responded by disseminating a joke conspiracy theory claiming that, in the 1970s, the U.S. government “killed off the entire bird population and replaced them with robotic bird replicas that are used for mass surveillance.” In this book, McIndoe and Gaydos move to the next parodic extreme by offering an in-depth history of this fictional movement—which they claim has been “brutally suppressed” by the government—and other absurdist gems, including a field guide to major bird drones such as pigeons, seagulls, bluebirds, and vultures and a “real history of America” that claims the apex of the American Revolution was in 1812, when “Washington led his colonial army across the Delaware ocean.” For fellow “Bird Truthers” seeking to spread the word, the authors deliver sage advice on everything from how to hold rallies—complete with instructions on ways to make the best use of speeches, moments of silence, and bagpipes—to how to hypnotize every member of the armed forces for effective government overthrow and how to create shelters and societies by digging interconnected backyard holes. Illustrated throughout with black-and-white sketch-style drawings, the text presents its own alternative-fact universe that ridicules the bizarre distortions that have become an embedded part of American sociopolitical reality. “This book,” write the authors, “is intended for readers with an IQ over 250….If your IQ is under 250, please close this book immediately and read something more suited to your sensibilities, such as Goodnight Moon or Frog and Toad.”
Quirky and humorously provocative.
