Life
is full of hidden perils. Some you can see coming; smog, rabid dogs, visits by
your in-laws. Some you can’t; El Nino, UV radiation, and the Hanta virus. Some
you don’t expect at all. Thank goodness for Andrew Shaffer and his handy guide
to threats you never even knew existed.
Why bother breaking a sweat over global warming or Thanksgiving with
Uncle Dwayne when a greater danger lies in wait from a sharknado? For those not
in the know a sharknado is a tornado that forms over the ocean. Its whirling
fury sucks up several hundred sharks and then flings them out in a random
pattern over the nearest city. Needless to say, this agitates the sharks and
causes them to chomp away on people with happy abandon. SyFy Channel movies
have been warning us to duck and cover for years, but no. You wouldn’t listen,
would you? Now sharks are falling from the skies and you have no idea what to
do.
Luckily
Andrew Shaffer does. He has put all this useful information together in one
place to give us poor terrified victims of unnatural catastrophes the best
chance of survival. The book is divided into two sections; unnatural disasters
and monsters. Each part covers a multitude of dangers humans may have to face.
The simple layout makes it easy to thumb through as you’re running for your
life. Running, by the way, rarely works when death is hot on your heels. What does
work is rapid threat assessment followed by an adequate supply of guns, rockets
loaded with dry ice, bombers dropping glaciers, dynamite, the occasional nuclear
warhead, and a jewel called The Eye of Medusa (The last is only effective against
a basilisk.)
Tips and Treats
Along
with survival tips Shaffer also adds additional snippets of information on surviving
the unnatural catastrophe. Making your last line of defense against a sharknado
is not the time to figure out how to wield a chainsaw. Study the instructions
first. Also useful to know are the melting points of various manmade objects.
The St. Louis Gateway Arch is stainless steel and at 2600 degrees Fahrenheit is
much more durable in the face of a firenado (tornado made of fire) than is the
Statue of Liberty at a paltry 1984 degrees. Avid cooks will appreciate the
recipe for fried gatoroid. After all, once you’ve disposed of something as big
as a Greyhound bus it would be a crying shame to let all that good meat go to
waste.
Stocking Stuffer
Do
you have a crazed survivalist hiding in the basement? Or, better yet, a Boy Scout
or Girl Scout in your family? Forget those silly Red Cross first aid manuals
for Christmas. All they really need is How to Survive a Sharknado stuffed into
their stocking in order to laugh in the face of death (or perhaps earn some
really keen merit badges).
I received this book for free from Blogging
for Books for this review.
L.A.K.
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