Booklist calls SMASH, CRASH, TOPPLE, ROLL!: THE INVENTIVE RUBE GOLDBERG, illus. by Shanda McCloskey, “a gleefully nonlinear celebration of the iconic cartoonist’s life and work” in starred review

Smash, Crash, Topple, Roll!: The Inventive Rube Goldberg: A Life in Comics, Contraptions, and Six Simple Machines.

By Catherine Thimmesh. Illus. by Shanda McCloskey

May 2025. 60p. Chronicle, $19.99 (9781452144221). Gr. 3–6. 741.6973

Asking, “Why do something the simple way . . . if, instead, there is a catapult option?” Thimmesh delivers a gleefully nonlinear celebration of the iconic cartoonist’s life and work, combined with an invitation to experience the joy of exploring principles of physics by actually assembling the sorts of “crazy contraptions” Goldberg envisioned. Along the way she explains in detail how levers, inclined planes, and six other simple machines amplify and redirect force, offering inspiration by pointing to real working examples of Rube Goldberg–style constructions made for music videos, TV shows, contests, or just for fun. Only Goldberg’s highly improbable “Self Operating Napkin” is reproduced in full here, but echoing its visual style and goofy spirit, McCloskey spins off an intricately winding table of contents; precisely drawn views of those simple machines in various common forms, festooned with directional arrows; and figures of the cartoonist and a set of busy young makers in exuberant poses. Never have using trial and error, problem-solving, improvisation, and outside-the-box thinking to make wonderful gadgets—practical or otherwise—been more fun.

— John Peters

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