REAL-LIFE MYSTERIES & DISASTERS

Case files invite young readers to practice their detective skills on sets of unexplained oddities and large-scale catastrophes.

Neatly divided into 11 each of the titular categories, the entries all include a brief account of events, followed by a spread of notes, maps, eyewitness testimonials, and theories about origins or causation, arranged as if pinned on a bulletin board. Selected mysteries include supposed evidence of alien visitations from crop circles to Nazca lines and UFOs, plus reports of time slips, ghosts, and spontaneous human combustion. Disasters range in scope from the explosion of the hydrogen-filled airship R101 in 1930 and the Piper Alpha oil rig in 1988 to the extinction of the dinosaurs and the Black Death. Barker’s small, stylized images are often skewed as if they’d been dropped into place, which gives some spreads a busy look. Some blocks of text are placed on dark, low-contrast backgrounds, which makes them hard to read in low light. Still, all the immense explosions and tantalizing occurrences make for rousing reading, and the author judiciously balances credulity and common sense in her presentations. Tricky terms are defined both in the main narrative and an appended glossary.

Fruitful browsing for young people curious about the strange and unusual.