While sifting through the rubble that comprises my room I was delighted to come across two books that had a big impact on me as a child- Arthur C Clarke's Mysterious World and the sequel volume ACC's World of Strange Powers.
Unlike many sources of information on supposedly supernatural or extraterrestrial events, these books treated the subject matter with great good sense, approaching each phenomenon with scientific rigour, reexamining the past evidence and poking holes in anecdote and hyperbole.
Each chapter ended with a few paragraphs from the man Clarke giving his level-headed opinions on the preceding chapter and helping to ground the reader still further in the sense that here was an unusual subject being given serious treatment by serious people. The detailed examination of the Tunguska incident and the subsequent expeditions to the site are of particular note.
It's worth mentioning for clarity that a lot of the things discussed in these books have been since consigned to the bin of quaint superstition or fact-litewishful thinking. In the three decades since these books first saw light many advances in thought and technique have demonstrated logical means by which things can go bump in night or appear to defy rational analysis. None of that makes these volumes, or indeed the TV show that spawned them, any less entertaining or important.
At the very least its a good nostalgia hit.
