Discover the extreme world - if you dare

A little disclosure seems necessary here – my daughter hasn’t read Miles Kelly’s Discover the Extreme World even though it was sent to her for the purpose of this review.

She has flicked through the book but found a lot of the writing beyond her reading age of eight. It is a book about extremes and she found the pages that mentioned the Black Death, supreme sacrifices (which covers humans being sacrificed to the gods) and legal punishments (such as beheading and torture) a little too extreme and too disturbing. It put her off reading the rest of the book even though we are only talking about a handful of pages here.

That isn’t to say it is not a great book packed full of fascinating information about the extreme and the extraordinary. It is, and it will keep many a reader engrossed for hours, but perhaps they need to be a little older to appreciate it fully.

It will teach adults a thing or two as well. I’ve found the book incredibly interesting, particularly the section about our planet and the sections on extreme weather, volcanoes and plate tectonics, which have interested me since my A Level geography days.

I’ve been impressed by the wealth of information provided in the book and the number of topics covered. As the back cover says, these adrenaline-packed pages reveal everything from speed machines to storm chasers to ferocious predators and super volcanoes.

There are sections on:

Active earth
Awesome animals
Incredible science
Ultimate machines
Super humans
History revealed.

And did you know ...

If you fell into a black hole, you would be stretched out like spaghetti because the pull of gravity on your feet would be so much stronger than on your head. Astronomers believe you’d become so “spaghettified” that you would eventually be ripped apart.
Coltan is a mineral used in the manufacturer of cell phones, but extracting it is a life-threatening activity for the people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Miners use their bare hands to dig, and risk facing collapsing mine shafts, radioactive minerals, and other deadly toxins.
The country with the highest number of languages in the world is Papua New Guinea, with 820.
In medieval times, water and milk frequently carried diseases. To avoid illness, those who could addord to drank beer and wine at all times of the day and night.

For children (and adults) who are fascinated by the world we live in, this book will not disappoint.

We received Miles Kelly’s Discover the Extreme World, inspired by the Discovery Channel, free of charge to review. It retails at £17.99.