The glory of footnotes

The first book I ever read that had footnotes was The Amulet of Samarkand by Jonathan Stroud and I LOVED IT. In the chapters featuring perspective from this handsome fella to the right, there would be occasional little footnotes with explanation, insight, jokes, or other standard musings of a demon.

I liked the story itself, but man did I really love every time there was a footnote. And a footnote that was like a whole bonus paragraph on the page? Heaven.

Besides research items, I don’t see them used much. One of my other favorite uses of footnotes is by Jenny Lawson in her books. I originally picked up Let’s Pretend This Never Happened at a used book store, because I saw a tiny Hamlet mouse on the cover and obviously had to check it out. I read the first few pages and died laughing at the footnotes, and immediately bought it and fell in love. In fact I also just went out and bought a copy of her other book, Furiously Happy, because I was having a bad day and I knew that book would be the perfect one to help pull me out of it. Also, how did I not have a copy already? I must have borrowed it when I first read it.

I digress.

I’m probably in the minority with my love of footnotes, here. It seems like it might be something that just annoys some people completely, especially if you’re a digital reader because clicking back and forth to read footnotes IS super annoying. Have you read a book that used footnotes before? What’d you think of it?