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Jump to navigationJump to searchDreadful Fates by Tracey Turner (view source)
Revision as of 13:55, 19 May 2010
, 13:55, 19 May 2010no edit summary
Here is a chocolate coffin, the travels of Einstein's brain, and more. So much more, in fact, there are trivia here I didn't know of – such as the kidnapping and ransom demand over Charlie Chaplin's remains, and the so-called Cucumber King of Burma.
There are quite a few foodstuffs in these pages, considering it's a book about corpses and what we do to them. Which brings me a little to the flaw I find here – in the end it is just “too” ''too'' random, too scattershot. There are at least three people dying from bananas – and not all in the way you might think. The layout of packing so many short paragraphs on the page as possible, in a nice, cosy style that is never much more complex than a tabloid headline, is excellent, but a greater coherence would be better, when there are so many instances of things that could be strung together.
Beyond that personal opinion, there is no reason for me to not recommend this book. Suitably ghoulish, in style, design and content, it should not scare off any adults wanting to browse, and it succeeds its remit of educating in an entertaining way. It certainly fills that unexpected gap I mentioned very nicely.
