Review of "Interesting Stories for Curious People: A Collection of Fascinating Stories About History, Science, Pop Culture and Just About Anything Else You Can Think Of," by Bill O’Neill

 Review of

Interesting Stories for Curious People: A Collection of Fascinating Stories About History, Science, Pop Culture and Just About Anything Else You Can Think Of, by Bill O’Neill, ISBN 9781648450440

Five out of five stars

The short stories are indeed interesting

 Covering topics from space aliens to actual cases of public human cannibalism, the stories in this book justify the word “interesting” in the title. Some are based on facts, such as the one about the Mariana Trench, the deepest spot in the ocean. One of the most unusual facts is that most of the actors that played the bumbling German soldiers in the television show “Hogan’s Heroes” were in fact Jewish. Werner Klemperer, who played the bumbling Colonel Klink and was Jewish said that having the soldiers portrayed as nincompoops was the only way he would act out the role.

 There are many candidates for the weirdest story. My best candidate is about Belgian serial killer Mark Dutroux. With the aid of his wife Michelle Martin, he would abduct, rape and torture to death pre-teen girls. What makes the story a candidate for the weirdest is that Dutroux appeared to have deep connections into the highest levels of Belgian society. There were twenty unexplained deaths of witnesses involved in the Dutroux cases and some women that managed to escape claimed that he was just a grunt that procured girls for very highly placed people in Belgian society.

 All the stories are very short, three pages at most. The point and the main justifications are all well-made there is never any doubt as to what the main point of the story was. This book is another proof of the adage that truth is stranger than fiction.

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