Society has become rude, Lynne Truss warns us in her latest book, Talk to the Hand where she wittily rants about the deplorable state of manners today. Quoting everyone from Y.B. Yeats to The Simpsons, Truss narrows down modern communication as the root of rude behavior. Mobile phones and iPods have left us operating in small, private bubbles where it’s easy to let rudeness rule, and the art of holding doors and saying “Thank you,” has been forgotten. “It used to be just CIA agents with earpieces,” Truss writes, “who regarded all the little people as irrelevant scum. Now it’s nearly everybody.” Though her chatty tone will leave readers chuckling, her arguments are serious regarding society’s decline.