Insane Inventors

Gr 4 Up—With color illustrations and a smattering of black-and-white photographs, this addition to the series offers a taste of the wacky drive that inventors often need in order to innovate. Each short chapter details an inventor's truly wild decision, such as the duel that resulted in the loss of astronomer's Tycho Brahe, or uninformed choice, such as various scientists' pursuit of radiation and radioactive elements, resulting, almost universally, in their deaths. While the book does touch on some familiar inventors, such as Marie Curie, Nikola Tesla, and Thomas Edison, other chapters explore lesser-known scientists such as Stubbins Ffirth, who consumed all manner of bodily fluids to prove that humans could not transmit yellow fever to one another. Given the brevity of the chapters and the cartoonish artwork, even reluctant readers will garner insights from this title. While this is not a solid research resource on its own, the detailed bibliography provides a wealth of further sources.