"What a thoroughly delightful book. One day it dawned on O’Keefe, a marketing executive with years of experience behind him, that although he had often referred to 'the average American,' he had no idea who that was, or what such a person would be like… He embarked on a nationwide quest to find him (or her). The book explores the whole notion of average. Is it just another word for mediocre? But how can that be true, if being average means being in the majority in all things? Some cities rebel so strongly against the average label that they seize on any distinction, no matter how trivial or ludicrous, to promote themselves as special. But does that approach devalue the idea of 'special' until it, too, is effectively meaningless? At the end of the book, O’Keefe reveals the identity of the Average American, but it is the search itself - and the author’s exploration of the whole concept of being average - that makes this curious book so illuminating and enjoyable."
- David Pitt, Booklist
“‘The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation’s Most Ordinary Citizen’ is about finding the single most average man, or woman… The journey toward run-of-the-mill has never been so remarkable.”
- Nicole Joseph, Newsweek
"Depending on how closely you cleave to the statistical norm, you prefer figure-skating to nascar, live in the state where you were born, spend more money in restaurants than grocery stores and are just as happy as you would be if you earned 20 times your salary. At some point today you will say a prayer, not floss, take a shower for 10 minutes but not sing in it, drive an eight-year-old car to work, spend 95% of the day indoors and 2 1/2 hours online, consume 20 teaspoons of added sugar and not save any money... Our times have changed since 1965, when the typical family had a breadwinning father and a stay-at-home mother; now about 20% of families do... When you peel back the numbers and look at the lives underneath, it turns out there's much to love about Average, and much to learn, as Kevin O'Keefe discovered when he set out to write The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen. We may be fascinated by the rich and famous, but polls show we don't want to be them: the average American lives 13 years longer than the average celebrity, who is four times as likely to commit suicide. What O'Keefe found in his travels was that being average usually means having a certain balance in your life... Think of it as the wisdom of crowds, and pretty soon the average just might become your ideal."
- Nancy Gibbs, Time magazine
"Kevin O'Keefe, a marketing consultant, set out [with] a burning desire to persue and comprehend the very thing he had spent most of his time avoiding: life as lived, defined and loved by the vast majority of his fellow citizens... The author starts with a pool of candidates that embraces all 281,421,906 official residents of the 50 United States and the District of Columbia counted in the 2000 census, and chapter by chapter, using the census and other statistical sources, introduces new categories of averageness that gradually whittle that number down to one... [The findings] overturn commonly held notions of what the average American does and thinks. It's also a golden opportunity for the author to hit the road, always traveling in a mid-size car, and spend time with Myklar the Ordinary, a magician who carefully explains to his audiences that there is no such thing as magic, and Rich Bean, the first politician to run under the banner of the Average American Party. Not to mention an 88-year-old Brooklynite named Harry Average... Gradually, the average American takes form. He (or she) spends 95 percent of the time indoors, thinks abortion is morally wrong but supports the right to have one, owns an electric coffeemaker... at least one pet and would rather spend a week in jail than become president... and believes that Jews make up 18 percent of the population (the actual figure is between 2 and 3 percent)... [O'Keefe's] project is intriguing, combining as it does the elements of a detective story and the trivia interest of Ripley's Believe It or Not."
- William Grimes, The New York Times
"According to Kevin O’Keefe, whose new book, 'The Average American,' chronicles his hunt for the most statistically typical person in the United States, the average American drives a car (eight years old, no vanity plates) and owns a home (permanent, freestanding, occupied by 2.62 people, with a washing machine, a dryer, an outdoor grill, and a private lawn requiring forty hours a year of mowing). He lives within fifty miles of the town where he grew up, has a listed phone number, and is regularly in bed before midnight... O'Keefe's formula for pinpointing averageness is as follows: find statistics that reflect majority preferences and apply them to a given population, winnowing the pool until one candidate remains - a perfect match... He used only 'affirmative' factors (for example, having a household pet, eating ice cream at least once a month) as criteria for advancement; no one could be advanced for something he or she didn’t have or hadn’t done... Another tenet of the O’Keefe method is subject participation, which makes for a demographic portrait that is distinctly bottom-up... Like many people given to tropes of questing and conversion, O’Keefe, a former marketing executive who lives in Murray Hill, was once unhappy with his life."
- Lauren Collins, The New Yorker
"There is one person who... is certifiably average."
"[The Average American] may be one of the most sought after [people] in the world... O'Keefe ended his search... and learned lessons about life that hit close to home."
- Bob Schieffer and Richard Schlesinger, "CBS Evening News"
"It is a terrific book. You've got to pick it up and read it. It's called 'The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen'... It's a great story."
- Steve Doocy, FOX News Channel's "FOX & Friends"
"Great dinner conversation... I think that everyone is going to run out and get this book and see how average you are, remembering that average is good.”
- Martha Stewart, nationally-syndicated “Martha”
The author's quest to find the 'most statistically average' American turns out to be a lively, fact-filled trip."
- Teresa K. Weaver, Atlanta Journal-Constitution
"The Average American is a great source for politicians and marketers trying to identify the 'typical' voter or consumer, but it's also a fun and informative way to find out just how average you are - or aren't."
- Stuart Englert, American Profile - "Our Picks"
"There are an awful lot of people in this country - politicians, TV programmers, marketers, moviegoers, those who sell everything from cereals to cell phones, cars to colas - who would dearly like to meet the average American. After all, it is the average American they are all hoping to appeal to. Well, come meet someone who has done more than just dream... Kevin O'Keefe has written a book about his... long search to find the average American. For Kevin, it was personal."
- Heidi Collins, CNN's "Anderson Cooper 360"
"Like many a great American quest, The Average American begins with a cameo by Marlon Brando and ends in the suburbs. The tale in between transforms an inventory of statistical figures into real, human figures whose stories may sound familiar, but surprise nonetheless."
- Kathryn Lebo, Rivet magazine
"Is it possible to find someone who ranks as the most average person in America? That is the task of the author as he takes the reader across the United States in search of this most average of all people... This is actually an interesting view into America and the American people and mindset. The Average American makes interesting reading and is a recommended read."
- Harold McFarland, Midwest Book Review
"O’Keefe’s search turned into a two-year journey that took him from Keene, N.H., to the Hawaiian island of Maui. Along the way, he met dozens of colorful characters and distilled a profusion of statistics - from the average home size to the average commute time - into 140 criteria that define the average American."
- Marti Attoun, American Profile
"Armed with a notebook and a keen sense of observation, Kevin O'Keefe traveled throughout the country in search of the average American."
- Larry Cox, Tucson Citizen
"For most of his life, [O'Keefe] consciously avoided anything that was the norm. 'Average' was definitely not a word he wanted anywhere near his name. But somebody has to be average or there would be no benchmark for all those statistics that are collected every year. With this in mind, O'Keefe started looking for the most average person in America. He began with the Census Bureau in Maryland... It's a trivia buff's dream with... interesting facts that are fun to read. O'Keefe uses real information to back up his research, so his reasoning is sound when he rejects cities or people based on an out-of-the-ordinary existence. I found that stuff pretty amazing... If you're delighted by current events and enjoy knowing the minutiae of everyday life, resolve to read this book."
- Terri Schlichenmeyer, Pahrump Valley Times (Nevada)
"No journey is without purpose and O'Keefe didn't take it on simply because he was a marketing consultant who wanted to look deeper into what made an average American, but also in that he felt he had lost touch with what once was common to him, because he had always strove to be different, never simply living life just to enjoy it... Reading further, his thoughts go from curiosity to determination as the mission envelops him... which floods the pages with statistics that could make one's head spin, but also gives readers a choice in what they want to absorb and keep. The statistics are different enough for that... With all the people O'Keefe talks to and all the statistics he shells out, 'The Average American' is a studious, well-researched look at the many types of lives which make up the United States and all that occupies our days every week. He's got a unique viewpoint and the end result is surprising."
- Rory L. Aronsky, Valley Scene magazine (San Fernando Valley, California)
"Reader perfect."
- Bookreporter.com editors
"America is the world's biggest melting pot - a nation of nearly 300 million different faces, personalities, and traditions. But if you crunched all the figures and tossed in every 'most often,' 'usually,' and 'only on Sunday,' you'd end up with a composite of the single most average person in the country. Author Kevin O'Keefe did just that in his new book 'The Average American' [with] his extraordinary discoveries about the ordinary."
- Joanne Chen, Life magazine
"We hear so much about the average American. Indeed, each of us has some ideas of the characteristics and opinions of the average American... A couple of years ago, Kevin O'Keefe got a wake-up call. He was living in Manhattan at a high-powered career with a big salary working as a marketing consultant... He was a long way from the sleepy Connecticut suburb where he grew up - far enough, that he had lost any appreciation for the average American he was paid to understand. At least that's what a prospective client said about him. That client was Marlon Brando, and when Marlon Brando accuses you of being out of touch, maybe there's something to it. O'Keefe decided to immerse himself into all things average and began a two-year quest to find the most average person in the country."
- Bob Edwards, XM's "The Bob Edwards Show"
"[The Average American] has turned ordinary into an art. What I thought was so interesting in there was that... most Americans are happy most or all of the time. That's nice to hear."
- Hannah Storm, CBS' "The Early Show"
"What are Americans really like? O'Keefe starts with all... of us as he explores both what it means to be average (a noble attribute) and narrows down the field to find the man or woman that best meets all the qualifications. This is a fun and fascinating story of all of us."
- Daniel Connors, editor-in-chief, Catholic Digest - "Dan's Top Pick of the Month"
"On the talking-head shows, cable news, certainly when you have people on the extremes or either side of the aisle, it makes what appears to be more contentious debate but in fact is nothing about problem solving or actually trying to find a way to bridge the great political divide... What I think is more important is to try to find a way to bridge those divides because the empowerment of what I call 'moderate middle America' might be epitomized by what [O'Keefe] describe[s] as 'the average American'… I think it's a fascinating book... I think there’s a lot to be said in what [is] in the book... It’s a great book. It’s a fascinating read… I read this commencement address that [O’Keefe] gave at
- Jerry Doyle, Talk Radio Network's "The Jerry Doyle Show" - "Recommended Books"
"If you consider yourself an average American, an above average American or a below average American, you want to pick up 'The Average American.'"
- Richard Stevens, ABC Radio Network's "Richard and Lori Show"
"What would lead someone to search for the most archetypical, quantifiably average person in the United States? In the case of author Kevin O’Keefe, it was the accusation by Marlon Brando (to whom he was pitching a marketing campaign for a charity) that O’Keefe was 'out of touch with the average American.' O’Keefe was, understandably, baffled. Apart from the fact that the accuser was hardly Everyman himself, O’Keefe was the son of a schoolteacher and a secretary, raised in a middle-class family in a quiet New England town. How much more average can you get? Plenty, as it turns out. O’Keefe takes the statement to heart, and what follows in this book is a kind of personal and professional quest to find the Average American... Perhaps, he considers, Brando was right. Perhaps in finding the true Average American, he will find something that’s been missing in his own life... The author states (somewhat tantalizingly) that 'if you ever lived in the 50 states or Washington, D.C., you were a candidate for the nation’s most ordinary person.' His journey begins at the U.S. Census Bureau to establish some criteria - a process that evolves throughout the book... Through carefully documented methodologies, O’Keefe decides on some 140 criteria that his Average American candidate must ultimately meet to be considered [and] discover[s] a fascinating assortment of characters who are both surprising and familiar. Traveling the country in (what else?) a mid-sized car, the author discovers, for example, a magician who calls himself Myklar the Ordinary, and a politician seeking office under the Average American Party... What is most interesting about this book is the way it addresses the lingering stigma of 'average.' Why do we so readily assume that average equals characterless? Why do most people think (or hope) they are above average in some respect? Why do people rebel so strongly against being considered average that they will clutch at any straw of differentiation (a fine question for whoever wound the world’s largest ball of twine)?... The story of the search, a kind of fanfare for the common man, is a surprisingly good read."
- Margaret Teichert and Oleg Kaganovich, Prosper magazine
"A really fun book. I enjoyed it immensely."
- Donna Davis, WMXJ-FM's "Rick and Donna in the Morning" (Miami)
"A wonderful story."
- Lynn Cullen, WPTT-AM's "Lynn Cullen Show" (Pittsburgh)
"Big favorite of ours, this book - JR and I love it - called 'The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen.' It's by Kevin O'Keefe... It's such a great read."
- Sharon Fogaren, WFHN-FM's "The Morning Show with JR and Sharon" (Massachusetts)
"[Five stars] Uplifting... If you are an Amazon buyer you are probably not average, and Amazon reviewers even less so. I was compelled to buy this book simply on the premise that it would be interesting to learn what 'average' was. I was NOT expecting an uplifting book that inspired reflection... and that is what this book is... I simply cannot get over the fact that this book made me feel good about America and good about the standard run of the mill American. The idiocy and mendacity of our leaders aside, this is a great Nation, and I have tears in my eyes as I conclude the book... The average American, informed on the 4th of July, properly concludes that it is a great honor. Honor indeed. This is a superb book."
- Robert D. Steele, Amazon.com Top 50 Reviewer
(former Marine Corps intelligence officer and CIA clandestine services case officer)
“We have a good many pictures – and caricatures – of typical Americans. But is that actually prevalent of the average American? Kevin O’Keefe has found the answer.”
- Ivar Iversen, Dagsavisen (
"Fascinating. It truly is."
- Jamie Phillips, KCVM-FM's "Mix Morning Show" (Iowa)
"Really interesting... A lot of surprises in 'The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen.' Kevin O'Keefe, thank you for doing an above average job on this book."
- Barry Nolan, Comcast Network's "Nitebeat"
“One of the ways Kevin has organized his book is that at the beginning of every chapter, he talks about how many people are left who could possibly be the most average, so you’ll see ‘Candidates remaining: fewer than 50 million’ or ‘Candidates remaining: fewer than 8 million’… It’s a really fun and funny book… It is an enlightening book about who we really turn out to be.”
“Kevin O’Keefe… went on the hunt for the Average American and has put it in an outstanding book called ‘The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation’s Most Ordinary Citizen’… [O’Keefe] started with over 280 million candidates for the title of Average American and as you hit the last chapter that [is] down to 2,000… This is a keeper… recommended by just tons of people… In fact, I’m going to bring it home to my wife because it’s also something she’d like to read… [O’Keefe] not only spent a lot of time looking at all the surveys and taking in the Census bureau, but what was most impressive was that [he] actually went on the road from one end of the country all the way to the other… [O’Keefe] met some amazing people on the journey and I just got the biggest kick out of seeing how these people approached life. And one of my favorites was a magician by the name of Myklar the Ordinary, [then] Mason Proctor... [The findings] really do overturn what most people think is average… I thoroughly enjoyed [the book].”
- Ron Thulin, KAHL-AM’s “The Ron Thulin Show” (
“Who, exactly, is the ‘average American’? The results are surprising.”
- Allen Pierleoni,
"Speaking of interesting subject matter, Kevin O’Keefe… has figured out what it means to be average in this country… I love [his] book, ‘The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation’s Most Ordinary Citizen’… We never stop and say, ‘What does it mean to be average?’ and that’s really where it began for [O'Keefe]… The author’s got a lot of personality."
- Michael Smerconish, WPHT-AM's "The Michael Smerconish Show" (
"It's a very interesting book. A great read."
- Ken Morgan, KFNN-AM's "Business for Breakfast" (Phoenix)
“In business as a marketing executive, [O’Keefe] has always heard statistics about the average American. Curious about this, he set out to find if there was such a person. He tells the story of his quest in a wonderful new book, ‘The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation’s Most Ordinary Citizen’… There’s great humor in this book but this was a serious search… It’s really a fascinating book.”
- Gary O’Brien, WDWS-AM’s “Gary O’Brien and Friends” (
"'The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen'... It's very readable. It's really such a heartbeat of America."
- John Pendleton, WJGR-AM's "The John Pendleton Show" (Florida)
"Man flab: not a beer belly, but that little extra something some guys carry around the middle... Suddenly, the big screen is burning up with girthy guys who may not have... six-pack [abs]... Not fat by most people’s standards, man flab is more like that extra 10 to 15 pounds that prevents some men from looking lean... Women are digging it. The book that inspired the man flab fad is called ‘The Average American,’ by Kevin O’Keefe. It’s a story about the extraordinary search for the nation’s most ordinary citizen."
- Steve Karlin, KCCI-TV's "News Channel 8's First News at Five" (
“The author of ‘The Average American’ [reports] love handles are taking hold in
- A.J. Hammer, CNN Headline News’ “Showbiz Tonight”
“Last night on Showbiz Tonight… got a lot of people talking, including our friends Robin Meade and Glenn Beck from Headline News… Big news, there’s no buts about it: men with more in the middle are making headway... Joining me here in
- A.J. Hammer, CNN Headline News' "Showbiz Tonight"
"'The Average American' is a fascinating insight into what it is to be average, what it is to think of yourself as average, how that is used for and against us by marketers and others."
- Elmer Smith, WHAT-AM's "The Exchange" (Philadelphia)
"Entertaining and enlightening... The trip to rural Maryland is to see Myklar the Ordinary - a magician with a sense of reality - entertain kids at a church. O'Keefe runs a marathon with a limping potential Mr. Average American and visits the first candidate of the Average American Party on Election Day... After all the traveling - and avoiding stereotypical average places like Peoria and Normal, Illinois - O'Keefe...discovers a very unlikely Average American... Maybe it's because as a journalist I'm a storyteller rather than a statistician, which made me appreciate his anecdotal approach to his quest... It would be a great holiday gift for the kind of people who buy the latest 'World Almanac & Book of Facts' every December."
- David M. Kinchen, Hinton News (West Virginia)
"[O'Keefe] spent a lot of time to track down, literally, the Average American and what it takes to be so average... In a society that always tells you to shoot for the stars, to be the very best, to be competitive in your field, I take comfort in the fact that average can be pretty special."
- Carol Lin, "CNN Live"
"The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen' - it will teach you a lot about people."
- Bob Rivers, KZOK-FM's "The Bob Rivers Show" (Seattle)
"A fascinating book... It's very interesting. It grabs you... It's got everything you could possibly want."
- Reid Howell, KYMO-AM/FM's "KYMO Morning Show" (Missouri)
"There's a lot of myths that are... busted in this [book]."
- Jerry Eliott, WLVQ-FM's "Wags & Elliott" (Columbus)
"A good enough story by itself, but [it also has] a twist of the sharpest citrus peel... O'Keefe was clearly not happy with the sort of person he had become... He realised then that being superlative might not be everything. With a new-found perspective - discovered, it appears, partly because of meeting the woman who is now his wife - O'Keefe set off to investigate just what it meant to be average, to be ordinary."
- Andrew Buncombe, The Independent (United Kingdom)
"[O'Keefe] learned a great deal about the image of Americans in the eyes of other Americans... I found it very satisfying to find out that [the book] dissipated and completely dissolved the American myths that [it] did... The next time I want to find out about what's average or how close I may be, with pride I'll call Kevin O'Keefe, or maybe I'll just pick up the book and remind myself of all the information on the average American."
- Pat McMahon, KTAR-AM's "Pat McMahon" (Phoenix)
"I love the book... What I found intriguing - what I enjoyed most in the book - were the interviews... Being the most ordinary American is actually a pretty good thing to be. It is a good way to live your life... A great book."
- Connie Asero, WTKF-FM's "Viewpoints" (North Carolina)
"Kevin O'Keefe... has written this really fun book called 'The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen'... Politics: One of the conclusions [O'Keefe] came to... is that the country is not quite as polarized in red and blue as we might think... What [O'Keefe] found is [not] even close to the media portrayal of the average American."
- Mark Johnson, WDEV-AM/FM's "The Mark Johnson Show" (Vermont)
"Kevin O’Keefe['s] 'The Average American' lists... characteristics that fall within the bounds of normalcy for all Americans... So what does all this have to do with direct marketing? Well, aside from being a fun way to see how criteria gone wild can result in the ultimate segment - the one truly 'normal' American - it’s a great reminder that marketing segmentation is the science of finding which of 281,421,905 abnormal Americans make up the best potential market... Before cracking O’Keefe’s book, my image of the average American was that of a NASCAR-loving Midwestern soccer mom in her mid-30s. I suspect this wasn’t far off from most folks’ commonly held view. So what happened? A lot of math... O’Keefe peppers the book with observations as to how average Americans in pop culture, ranging from 'Father Knows Best' and 'Leave it to Beaver' to the Joe Walsh song 'Ordinary Average Guy,' reflect his findings... Each chapter starts with a dwindling number of prospects for average Americanhood, based on how the preceding chapter’s findings narrowed his search... When O’Keefe settles in each location, he interviews people regarding characteristics the average American might embody... He spoke with a magician who bills himself as Myklar the Ordinary; an SUV-race coordinator who hands out prizes not only to the race’s winner but to the entrant whose average time is closest to that for all participants... Meat-and-potatoes interviews as well, such as one with a Census Bureau statistician, as well as a chat with pollster George Gallup Jr., whom O’Keefe describes as 'the son of the father of the average American.' As O’Keefe traveled, he added religion, sports played or watched, leisure activities enjoyed and political characteristics, among others, to his initial list. O’Keefe then used publicly available data to determine what the average, or in many cases average range, of these traits was among Americans. By the last chapter... O’Keefe’s list of prospects was whittled down to 2,000 individuals, while his original list of 16 attributes... had grown to the final list of 140."
- Richard H. Levey, Direct magazine
"I love the book. I love the way [O'Keefe] put it together: the statistics, the information, the... personal journey."
- Jim Buchanan, WICC-AM's "The Talk of the Town with Jim Buchanan" (Bridgeport)
"A book that was given to me for Christmas... I thoroughly enjoyed it - finished it within two days.... There are many things in the book that made me proud to be an average American."
- Eric Tomb, KVMR-FM's "Booktown" (California)
“We all have an idea about who the average American is… If one reads the book, you’ll get some nice surprises… It kind of goes against what you hear on the media or see on television… My perception was that [the average American] wants to be famous… but that’s really the opposite of what [O’Keefe] found… I want to make sure everybody gets [‘The Average American’].”
- Kathryn Zox, WSDE-AM’s “Kathryn Zox Show” (
"The author of this really interesting book, 'The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen'... completed a tour of America, went all over the place, to find what the average American is doing... I just think it was a great project, and it turned out to be an excellent book; incredible... [O'Keefe] traveled the country trying to find the Average American, and he did... I like [his] whole style of checking out what's real."
- Allan Handelman, nationally-syndicated "The Allan Handelman Show"
"We should be sending [the Average American] as an ambassador to other countries. In a nutshell, this is what America is, right here... Awesome."
- Matt McAllister, KTYD-FM's "The Morning Show" (Santa Barbara)
"Raised middle class by a public school teacher and a housewife/secretary, O'Keefe loved baseball... Post college he hopscotched American urban centers as an accomplished marketing master... He fell from the norm... His findings, chronicled in 'The Average American' (PublicAffairs), unveil several indisputable facts."
- David J. Foster, Northeast News Gleaner (northeast Philadelphia)
"The book is greatly fascinating. It’s just fun to read and it’s really got a lot of cool stuff in it."
- Rick Crandall, KEZW-AM’s “Rick Crandall’s Breakfast Club” (
“A bunch of interesting things are revealed in it… There’s a story that you can follow as well, with Kevin’s journey.”
- Steve Fast, WJBC-AM's "The Drive with Steve Fast and Beth Whisman" (Illinois)
"In his book The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen, Kevin O'Keefe traverses America and scours through statistics in search of the average citizen. He examined the data to determine where the average American lives, works, what he likes and dislikes, along with many other characteristics. The New Yorker magazine followed suit and wrote a piece on what makes the average New York citizen. Now, The Lafayette has gone in search of the 'average' Lafayette student."
- Mark Mummert, The Lafayette (Lafayette College)
"'The Average American'... I love these statistics... [O'Keefe's] got really interesting facts in this book."
- Chris Booker, WFNY-FM's "The Booker Show" (New York City)
"A very, very interesting book."
- Mike, KROX-FM's "The Morning X with Mike & Jason" (Austin)
"'The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen' [is a] terrific book."
- Dino Costa, Radio Colorado Network’s "The Dino Costa Show"
"With all the talk about the immigration debate that seems to be going on in Washington, D.C., it's time maybe to reflect on what it means to be an American. And all of a sudden [a] book crosses our desk... An amazing story that all adds up to 'The Average American'... In this period of debate over what constitutes being an American, [O'Keefe] has defined it."
- Mark Mason, KEX-AM's "The Mark and Dave Show" (Oregon)
“A great book… a fun read… This tag of average is not a bad thing.”
- Wayne Norman, WILI-AM's "The Wayne Norman Show" (Connecticut)
"[The Average American] is my hero."
- Bill Wilkerson, KTRS-AM's "The KTRS Morning Show" (St. Louis)
"Kevin O'Keefe didn't always realize how important the average American is. But for two years in search of the Average American, O'Keefe... concluded he likes the Average American a lot."
- Charles Osgood, CBS Radio Network's "The Osgood File"
"You have to give O'Keefe credit. He certainly did his research."
- Gary Ott, Midland Reporter-Telegram (Texas)
"An obsessive search to find the one person who could represent average... Starting at the Census Bureau with a pool of 281 million people, [O'Keefe] started an extensive process of elimination, excluding people who fell to the extremes."
- Alan Tu, WHYY-FM's "Radio Times" (Philadelphia)
"If you get the book 'The Average American,' you find out who that person is... Pick it up. Lots of extraordinarily interesting stuff about statistics, about polling, about why so many people think that folks out there, particularly politicians, aren't listening to the average American."
- Barry Lynn, nationally-syndicated "Culture Shocks with Barry Lynn"
"A fun book. And I'll tell you, one of the reasons I so like 'The Average American' - and we can only go so far because we are AM radio - [the book] even has sex statistics."
- Francene Cucinello, WHAS-AM's "The Francene Show" (Louisville)
"[O'Keefe] decided to define the overused phrase 'average American'... He spent much of his adult life avoiding being average... As he thought about what it meant to be ordinary, he began to wonder what he'd missed... He feels liberated by his new understanding of the nuances of being average."
- Susan Campbell, The Hartford Courant
"O'Keefe pored over statistics to identify characteristics and neighborhoods and struck up conversations with potential candidates. His two-year search for the average American also included a lot of thought about whether average is a good thing, something to look down on or something to aspire to."
- Neal Conan, NPR's "Talk of the Nation"
"Last October, I was driving from Orlando to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Fortunately for me, NPR was very clear when I was going through South Carolina and I heard [O'Keefe's] interview with Neal Conan. And it was a long one, and it was phenomenal. I had the best time for that portion of the drive. I was listening to [O'Keefe] talk about the criteria... A woman called in during the show and basically made a pitch for her husband. I almost crashed the car: She described me. And so I was sitting there going, 'That can't be!' And there was a part of me, obviously, going, 'Is that true?' And, obviously, it wasn't. [O'Keefe] moved on and there were several other criteria... Bottom line is, these people, when [O'Keefe] got down to the final 2,000 [candidates], as average as they were statistically - pretty extraordinary people."
- Josh Mothner, WGMX-FM's "Morning Mix" (Florida)
"The book, my wife could not put it down. She tried to match [Average American] criteria throughout the book. She took the test on the back of the book... We've got all of our listeners now on the edge of their seats wanting to know if they're average or not... The book is a great read, folks."
- Glenn Lance, WKSR-AM/FM's "The Morning Show" (Tennessee)
"O'Keefe's chronicle is certainly interesting, sprinkled as it is with statistical tidbits which readers will inevitably want to measure themselves against. (The average American falls asleep within seven minutes of going to bed and eats three pounds of peanut butter annually.) And there is a certain frisson in the idea that every American reading the book was, for a short time at least, at the beginning of the project, a candidate for [the Average American]."
- Debra Hamel, book-blog.com (author, "Trying Neaira")
"A turn of events that could have come out of the Wizard of Oz... Not only did the project give O'Keefe food for thought for his own life, it could be a boost for all the 'average' Americans across the United States."
- Brenda Sullivan, Broadcaster North (Connecticut)
"Delightful book. Good reading."
- Bill Darwin, WTRC-AM's "At Your Service with Bill Darwin" (Indiana)
- Ben Ball, WTKF-FM's "Coastal Daybreak" (North Carolina)
"[O'Keefe] came away from the process with an unexpected positive view of what it means to be average."
- Heather Lake, The Chronicle (Connecticut)
"This book is interesting... [O'Keefe's] tales about putting it together are equally interesting... An interesting and personal study of Americans and what makes us different and what makes us alike."
- Jayne Carroll, KUIK-AM's "Jayne Carroll Show" (Oregon)
"Kevin O'Keefe, author of the book 'The Average American'... went in search of the one person who epitomized the absolute, most averages of anyone in our entire country... An amazing story. The details of it are even more amazing. And some of the statistics, I thought, were the most intriguing parts of the book."
- Tim Axelrod, KLO-AM's "The Tim Axelrod Show" (Utah)
"Find out if you're average; pick up the book."
- Mancow Muller, nationally-syndicated "Mancow's Morning Madhouse"
"It's a great read."
- Bill Haft, WJGR-AM's "Around the House" (Florida)
"The average American is alive and well."
- Carole Goldberg, The Hartford Courant
"'The Average American' - it’s a great book.”
- Jon Carson, WFON-FM’s "Jon and Mary in the Morning" (
"It’s really interesting… I enjoyed reading it. Plus, I love anyone that quotes SpongeBob: 'Everybody’s good at something, but nobody’s good at everything.'”
- Mary McGuire, WFON-FM’s "Jon and Mary in the Morning" (
"Amazing, fun, quirky statistics [are] found in author Kevin O'Keefe's book The Average American"
- Risk Factor (risk-management trade newsletter)
"One of my favorite stories that [O'Keefe] has got in [the] book is about... the long-distance trucker who said he didn't want money to ruin his life."
- Friday Epley, nationally-syndicated "Heart to Heart"
"A book that explains the average American."
- Ezgi Basaran, Hurriyet (Turkey)
"A great book."
- Nate Shelman, WERC-AM's "Alabama Mornings" (Birmingham)
"O’Keefe used statistics... and personal interviews to focus on finalists. He used 140 criteria for the average American [including] a high school diploma... We think [the Average American represents] what’s great about
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"[O'Keefe] spent two years compiling statistics and developing 'average' criteria. The findings would fit a large portion of Marlow’s population, but alas, we were not the ultimate source of the typical average American... There is nothing wrong with being average, or from being from a town full of average folks. Yes, life is just fine in good old Marlow, Oklahoma."
- Harbour Whitaker, The Marlow Review
“What's the best thing in the world? Hands down, no holds barred, without a doubt, it's home and family life… A few months ago, at a neighborhood multiplex cinema, I heard a dad say to his son, ‘Hey, let's go get some popcorn and soda!’ the line delivered with the excitement a trainer whips up Blue Ribbon enthusiasm for his Whippet. Why couldn't I generate that spark of euphoria? For some reason I shirked moments of joy as if they might any second rip off their happy Luke Skywalker masks and reveal their true Darth Vader nature. Lately I've been helped by several books… This time through ‘The Odyssey,’ I realized it wasn't about wandering, but about homecoming, Odysseus longing for his wife and son even though wined, dined and sometimes bedded by gorgeous goddesses... In ‘The Average American,’ Kevin O'Keefe odysseys to discover the most average person [and] when O'Keefe shows up at [the Average American's] door…”
- Rick Holinger, The
"The characteristics [O'Keefe] got from every angle to describe the average American... Really cool stuff."
- Jim Conlee, KQXT-FM's "Jim Conlee" (San Antonio)
"What it means to be the average American... An interesting book."
- Chad Smith, KLGR-AM's "Morning Show" (Minnesota)
"It's a fun read."
- Mike McConnell, WLW-AM's "Midday with Mike McConnell" (Cincinnati)
"I have some good news to report: ordinary is just fine... I recently discovered a book titled 'The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation’s Most Ordinary Citizen,' written by Kevin O’Keefe and published by PublicAffairs, which, in a way, celebrates our ordinariness. A former marketing executive, the author said he’d often referred to 'the average American' but never really knew who that person was. With that, O’Keefe embarked on a nationwide search to find the most average American in the country and explore the whole notion of 'ordinary'… I’ve since taken out the 'just' as in 'just ordinary Americans.' As I said, ordinary is just fine."
- Tracy Behringer, Daily Local News (
"What is an average American?... [The criteria] is intriguing... The topic is a most interesting one... The book is 'The Average American'"
- Ray Pietz, KGAL-AM's "Valley Talk" (Oregon)
"[O'Keefe] has done a remarkable job at finding out who is average."
- Jane Foy, WINA-AM's "WINA Morning Show" (Virginia)
"Really interesting."
- Erica Hansen, KOSY-FM's "Scott & Erica in the Morning" (Utah)
"[O'Keefe] has traveled the highways and byways of America searching for the average [and] went the average route for the journey as well... 'The core of averageness,' now that's got to be a new catch phrase."
- Matt Richards, KSND-FM's "Matt Richards Morning Show" (Oregon)
"Very cool... very interesting book."
- Lisa Osborn, KKZZ-AM's "Lisa Osborn" (Santa Barbara)
"An amazing amount of research... Quite a bit of fun... It's called 'The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen.'"
- Mark Wayne, WICH-AM's "Mark Wayne Show" (Connecticut)
"If you are in need of a great book, check out The Average American by Kevin O'Keefe. It's a great read."
- Beth Ritter-Guth, proftitutes.blogspot.com
(English professor, Lehigh Carbon Community College)
"One man's search for John Q Public, John and Jane Doe, Joe Six-Pack - all of them euphemisms for the average American... There's a lot here for politicians."
- Peter Solomon, WIP-AM's "Conversations with Peter Solomon" (Philadelphia)
"Very interesting in that it's kind of fun to look at what makes us average, what makes us ordinary."
- Dianne Anderson, KAGM-FM's "Wake Up New Mexico" (Albuquerque)
"Fascinating"
- Larry Ahrens, KAGM-FM's "Wake Up New Mexico" (Albuquerque)
"When Kevin O'Keefe, author of 'The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen,' set off to find the most average American, little did anyone know what he would find... O'Keefe may have found the average American."
- Terri Fyffe, The Eastern Progress (Eastern Kentucky University)
“O’Keefe, a marketing consultant, spent more than a year searching for the definitive average American [with] statistical averages from credible surveys and polls to top off his census data.”
-
"Earnest"
- Maureen Callahan, New York Post
"Characteristics and 'must haves' for the average American living in today's society."
- Kara Hardy, The Hilltop (Howard University)
"A journey to locate the quintessential John (or Jane) Q. Public."
- Chuck Thompson, Southwest Airlines Spirit magazine
"Kevin O'Keefe, author of The Average American... has crossed the history and geography of the U.S.A."
- Foreign Policy (Spain)
“This book is one of a rare breed: the truly informative, flowing nonfiction narrative. It’s difficult to achieve such a thing in a non-biographical book, and one so laden with facts. Somehow, though, O’Keefe manages to retain the reader’s attention while using the statistics to draw us ever further into the story, the challenge that he has posed himself. The premise of the book, as explained by its subtitle, is simple. Studies and marketing campaigns refer constantly to ‘the average American.’ But who, really, is the average American? All of us are quirky and unique in some way - and many of us devote a great deal of time to ensuring that we aren’t pegged as typical. O’Keefe, a lifelong individualist feeling slightly burned-out on ambition, makes it his quest to locate the person who is ‘the average American.’ This first requires compilation of a list of criteria, and O’Keefe chooses what I found to be an intriguing method of accumulating those criterions: after beginning with a standard list from the Census Bureau... he set off on a cross-country trip to determine what Americans themselves consider important, and then collecting data on those things… I was impressed by the ease with which he was able to weave the statistics - because the text is thick with numbers - with the dialogue, narrative, and interpretation stemming from his travels. While describing his walk along the Kansas marathon course with his aging ‘running’ partner, Randy Barten, who has injured his knee, O’Keefe tells the reader not only that just 33 percent of people sing in the shower (though 86 percent occasionally pee), but also manages to relay the connection he felt with the town and the camaraderie he struck up with Randy. I’m used to seeing three types of nonfiction books that aren’t memoirs, biographies, or straight narratives: those in which statistics rule, and anecdotes present are only to illustrate or explain the numbers (Freakonomics), those that are so laden with illustrative anecdotes that I’m almost tempted to call them 'technical memoirs' of a sort (Mind Wide Open), and those in which the numbers and the experiences are at best uneasy bedfellows (Blink). I enjoyed all of those books, but seeing the numbers in the context of a compelling array of experiences, which fueled further numerical analysis, was refreshing… I enjoyed it: the numbers were enough to make me say ‘Wow!’ and the narrative was enough to keep me engaged, and for that it was more than worth my time.”
- Tori Borland, read-this-now.com
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