AN EPIC HISTORY OF FAILURE

A lighthearted assortment of flubs and flops, from New Coke to the Black Death and the sinking of the Titanic.

Setting a goofy tone from the start with the subtitle, the author offers young disaster junkies a sampler of forehead slappers from ancient times to (roughly) the present. “Fun” as it may be to encounter quick accounts of, say, Boston’s Great Molasses Flood, the solar-powered Japanese lunar explorer that landed both upside down and in permanent shade, or how the Australian army was once defeated by a flock of emus, it’s hard to laugh at tragic incidents like the losses of the Titanic and the Eastland or the botched D-Day rehearsal Exercise Tiger, in which probably hundreds of Allied soldiers were killed by friendly fire. Moreover, not only does the author sometimes leave out noteworthy details (no mention, for instance, of cannibalism in the “Donner Party” entry), she neglects to provide sources or, for most entries, contexts or even dates. Older readers may greet with skepticism her assertion that Hannibal lost “more than half his army” to an avalanche while crossing the Alps or the suggestion of a link between the bubonic plague in Europe and a Papal decree banning rat-eating cats. In Kasperowicz’s cartoon illustrations, a racially and culturally diverse cast echo the overall jocularity with sight gags and comical visual notes.

Browsable fare for doomscrollers, though report writers should look elsewhere.