Pick Me Up

The impressive 3D lenticular cover immediately grabs the attention of my 10-year-old co-reviewer, who at once obeys the cover’s exhortation to pick it up and explore its contents. Sad to report this initial enthusiasm quickly wanes and the book is deemed too hard to read, even ‘too weird’. Puzzled by this response I persevere, but reluctantly come to the same conclusion.

Pick Me Up belongs in the category of Miscellanies, a collection of information rather than a traditional reference book. The publisher has dubbed it a ‘shufflepedia’, clearly aiming it at a generation raised on internet surfing. Pages jump from one subject to another, with computer-generated artwork, photos, bizarre juxtapositions of typeface, styles and colour, at once busy, bright and baffling. Now I love Schott’s Miscellany and have a magpie-like fascination for accumulating quirky facts and statistics, but this volume leaves me cold. I am by turns irritated and put off by its too-clever-by-half approach. Perhaps it is a matter of taste. Perhaps it will grow on me. In the meantime I need new reading glasses after all that 8 point type and recommend an award for the writer of the least helpful backcover blurb: ‘Nature. History. Science. Whatever.’