Sep 24, 2022
Science Tales: Lies Hoaxes and Scams| Book Review
The review of a Science graphic novel that deals with controversial topics like the moon landing and climate change.
Science Tales: Lies, Hoaxes, and Scams is a graphic book that investigates scientific urban myths and frauds written by Darryl Cunningham. He is a professional cartoonist and journalist. His most well-known work is the graphic investigative book Supercrash: How to Highjack the Global Economy. This is his second book of visual journalism, which I am reviewing today.
The book attempts to define and defend scientific procedures disparate from the scientific establishment. Mr. Cunningham describes it as a “pro-science and pro-critical thinking book.” Unfortunately, science, like any other subject, has fallen victim to folly, corrupted politics, and greed numerous times.
Whether it’s claiming that the moon landing was a hoax or denying climate change, the problem of mistrust or blind confidence in the scientific establishment is genuine. You might be astonished to learn that, despite having a million images of the Earth from outer space as evidence, there are still those who believe the Earth is flat or doughnut-shaped.
Science Tales, a comic novel, confronts such nine controversial hoaxes in a simple, engaging, and discernible spirit with pure facts and statistics. The book’s interesting themes include -
Homeopathy,
Electroconvulsive therapy
The Moon Landing,
The MMR Vaccines
Chiropractic
Evolution
Fracking
Science Denialism
Graphic novels are very challenging to write. It is unusual for a book to describe complicated phenomena such as climate change and evolution using just illustrations and a few sentences. And it’s even rarer to come across detailed explanations that are also entertaining. This book is a testament that the proper amount of humour and sarcasm combined with hard-boiled facts can turn mountains.
It’s only an hour-long read. Everyone should read Science Tales: Lies, Hoaxes, and Scams. I’d give it a 5/5 for its laconic style and a 3/5 for the artwork. The colour scheme of the images is somber, in contrast to the writing style, though it resonates with the events of the story. However, vibrant or monochrome designs appeal more to me.
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