How to Take Over the World

Practical Schemes and Scientific Solutions for the Aspiring Supervillain

By: Ryan North

Narrated by: Ryan North

Length: 10 hrs and 3 mins

Publisher's Summary

“Comic book fans will fall hard for this delightfully daffy guidebook.... Exuberant, optimistic, and just plain fun, How to Take Over the World will both surprise and delight.” (Esquire)

A book this informative should be a crime!

Taking over the world is a lot of work. Any supervillain is bound to have questions: What’s the perfect location for a floating secret base? What zany heist will fund my wildly ambitious plans? How do I control the weather, destroy the internet, and never, ever die?

Best-selling author and award-winning comics writer Ryan North has the answers. In this introduction to the science of comic-book supervillainy, he details a number of outlandish villainous schemes that harness the potential of today’s most advanced technologies. Picking up where How to Invent Everything left off, his explanations are as fun and elucidating as they are completely absurd.

You don’t have to be a criminal mastermind to share a supervillain’s interest in cutting-edge science and technology. This book doesn’t just reveal how to take over the world—it also shows how you could save it. This sly guide to some of the greatest threats facing humanity accessibly explores emerging techniques to extend human life spans, combat cyberterrorism, communicate across millennia, and finally make Jurassic Park a reality.

©2022 Ryan North (P)2022 Penguin Audio

Critic Reviews

“An irreverent romp through geeky tropes that also sends up the undying self-help genre. Who among us hasn’t thought about the best way to construct a secret, technologically advanced lair from which we might conquer all humanity? North assumes we all have, and in doing so he zaps the fun back into one of pop culture’s most enduring archetypes.”—NPR 

“[How to Take Over the World] is full of extremely funny, extremely informative riffs that make for an engrossing frame for very deep dives into knowledge that is esoteric, interdisciplinary, and damned interesting.”—Cory Doctorow on Twitter

“Who among us has never dreamed of living on a secret base, riding around on a dinosaur and holding the Earth’s core hostage? . . . The joy of this book comes from the straight-faced seriousness with which North approaches each scheme. . . . fun and accessible.”—Nature

A hilarious exploration of selfish altruism

The target demographic for this book is rather niche, but for those who are ambitious in their goals with a tentative approach to modern moral restriction, this book is a fun read.

Granted: is there anything in this novel that is of significant use to an aspiring supervillain? Not really. If you’re actually looking for a guide to take over the world, this book is not for you. This 100% falls into the “read for fun” category. Any supervillain wishing to truly optimize their time should probably open a physics textbook instead.

Nonetheless, it’s not often I get to engage in dialogue (even from a 1 sided discussion with an audiobook) about my wild ideas and schemes to change the world for the better. This book has served as a lovely substitute for all the friends that I don’t have…

Because we all have super villain tendencies

I enjoyed this book. I love interesting facts and I loved how now I can rule out some schemes and now try others, because you never know when the faith of humanity will rest in our hands.

The limits of a

I am squarely in the target demographic for this book, not because I am an actual supervillain but because I appreciate nonfiction books that take the time to dive deep into unusual factual topics and bring to light whatever unexpected gems are encountered on the way. The kind of bad guy the author is thinking about is not the one primarily motivated by hatred or resentment, but the freethinking genius who chooses not to respect the boundaries society places on behavior. And yet the most noteworthy schemes described are the ones which are technically legal and conceivably possible, given enough perseverance. There is a steady escalation in scope from the early sections concerned with the money and land resources to carry out the real schemes that will cement the reputation of anyone with the intellect and daring to pull them off. By the end he's talking about cosmic-scale ideas far beyond the scope of what any mundane mind would dream up, and it's exhilirating. If you are looking for something easier for the average person to wrap their mind around, a cozy read, this might not be the book for you. There's a kind of giddy optimism when pushing a loopy notion all the way to its furthest limit when trying to bring it into being. But he is careful to keep things honest when he runs into one of the numerous blind alleys a mad genius might come up with.

There could be no better narrator than the author. It becomes clear how some of these notions took hold as he sat down to write this when you hear them spin out the tale, with frequent digressions.

A themed trip through a natural history museum.

Many interesting paths through subjects from biology to geology to astrophysics, all with the supervillain theme. If you have a strong background in one, just wait a bit and something novel will be presented. A book for the curious, read by the author. Worth my time.