It will not be of interest to Dilbert fans who already have the books from which these cartoons are taken. However, seen as a "Best Of" book, it is worthwhile. The actual selection of material is very good and it certainly shows the humour of Dilbert at its best.

If you do already have all of the books in the Dilbert series, I'd suggest buying this one as a gift for a friend who is not familiar with Scott Adams work. It makes a great introduction, showing what Dilbert is all about.

If you are not familiar with Dilbert and want to find out what it is all about, then this book is a good place to start. Just accept that, if you get hooked and buy the other books, you will then have a copy of this book that you do not really need. If that happens, no problem, gift wrap it and send it as a present to a friend.

My only real gripe about the book is that its nature is not made clear on the cover. Not making clear that this is a "best of" collection seems to suggest that the author, or his publishers, view the readership as little smarter than some of the characters in the books.

20 of 24 found the following review helpful:

I have to agree with the last point...  Nov 17, 1999

Don't dog Scott Adams, this is obviously a re-release of previous work, but I hardly consider it to be him selling out. If you already have the other books that these cartoons are in, then don't buy this one. The idea behind this book is to help people find cartoons relating to the specific topics they are looking for so that they can use them to prove their point, rather than having to dig through books to find the right comic for the situation.

2 of 2 found the following review helpful:

Very funny stuff  May 02, 2005
By Pistol Pete "Pete"
Dilbert knows office humor and this book is a compilation, by topic, of some of Adams' best work over a 10 year period. I love Dilbert, so this book is a lot of fun.

However, I will warn you - having the strips arranged by topic takes some of the humor out of it - a whole section of strips dedicated to "Secretaries" for instance, is not nearly as funny as just seeing an occasional barb. Can you imagine Seinfeld doing his comedy routine by subject? "Ok, here are all my jokes about women", now onto "cookies" - no, it just doesn't work as well. I prefer the straight timeline accumulations. And you will find yourself rereading strips you have seen in other Dilbert books too.

But overall, a fine collection - I still think it's great - it just could be better.

1 of 1 found the following review helpful:

Excellent best-of compendium.  Feb 17, 2006
By James Yanni
This book is a collection of many of the best of the Dilbert Strips, organized according to subject matter. If you don't have all of the previous Dilbert collections, this is a very good way to get many of the best of the previous strips all in one book. But even if you DO have all the previous books, it's not without value to have so many of the best strips all in one book, so conveniently organized. Granted there's no new material here, which some might consider a flaw worth docking the book at least a star for, but as reprint collections go, it's a fabulous collection.

1 of 1 found the following review helpful:

Great for a quick reference  Jul 16, 2002
By gladbook
The nice thing about "Dilbert Gives You The Business" is that the comics are broken down into different topics: Bosses, ISO 9000, Secretaries, Human Resources, etc. I find it useful when I'm in a conversation with a friend and say, "You know, I once read a Dilbert cartoon that relates to this." I simply look up the appropriate category in DGYTB and look for it. I only wish the book were longer and more comprehensive. But as Dilbert compilations go, this one definitely gets five stars.

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