Forget apologies and excuses-sometimes, a well-spoken insult is the proper response. And now, with a cigarette in one hand and a martini in the other, fictional socialite Lady Arabella Snark (aka linguist A. C. Kemp) shows you how to use malicious language and stinging zingers to your advantage.

With just the right amount of pomp and humor, Lady Snark offers essential advice for gaining the upper hand at school, work, parties, and family reunions, including how to:

• Defend yourself against know-it-alls
• Answer rude questions in an equally rude manner
• Deliver impeccable insults
• Master weird and obscure put-downs

From dealing with drunks to sabotaging your husband's mistress, The Perfect Insult for Every Occasion is a funny and offbeat tour of the dark side of manners. Aggravating coworkers, nasty neighbors, mean in-laws? They're all rendered powerless when you have the perfect comeback-for any situation.

A. C. Kemp, linguist and pop culture maven, is the director of the award-winning American slang website www.slangcity.com and her innovative classes on slang and American culture have been profiled in the Boston Globe and Christian Science Monitor. She is a lecturer in foreign languages and literatures at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She lives in Boston.