Fabulous! Mary Roach, a perennial student favorite, has
done it again! Her latest work is titled
Grunt and deals with all things military. With chapters on clothing and climate, Roach
continues to surprise and fascinate readers with facts about the 22 pages of
button specifications for the military or the tests on a treadmill in 104
degree heat inside the “cook box.” Continuing to appeal to reluctant readers,
Roach also stays true to her modus operandi by covering the particularly
bizarre, even including one chapter she herself labeled “It Might Get Weird: a
salute to genital transplants.”
As her subtitle notes, she is exploring
“the curious science of humans at war” and takes readers behind the scenes to
the labs where tests and trials are run on “everything a soldier wears, eats,
sleeps on, or lives in.” I particularly liked the section where she writes of
the courage of the scientists themselves who during tests either flew
blindfolded and upside down, were injected with cobra venom, or volunteered to
test experimental equipment. As Roach
says, “Sometimes courage is nothing more than a willingness to think
differently than those around you. In a culture of conformity, that’s braver
than it sounds.”
Like those in her previous works (Stiff,
Gulp, or Spook), Grunt‘s stories, stats and humor will
be popular with our students. Mary Roach’s
Grunt was selected an Amazon Best book June 2016 and received starred reviews from Booklist and Library
Journal.
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